{"id":136934,"date":"2022-11-10T14:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-11-10T20:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/?p=136934"},"modified":"2022-11-09T11:33:08","modified_gmt":"2022-11-09T17:33:08","slug":"this-week-in-nchc-hockey-western-michigan-captain-polin-the-epitome-of-leadership-and-professionalism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/2022\/11\/10\/this-week-in-nchc-hockey-western-michigan-captain-polin-the-epitome-of-leadership-and-professionalism\/","title":{"rendered":"This Week in NCHC Hockey: Western Michigan captain Polin ‘the epitome of leadership and professionalism’"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Jason Polin is serving as Western Michigan’s captain for the 2022-23 season (photo: Ashley Huss).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Three years and a bit into his collegiate career, there\u2019s little about the way Western Michigan forward Jason Polin operates that surprises the Broncos\u2019 coach.<\/p>\n

Pat Ferschweiler has been in Kalamazoo that whole time, starting in 2019 when he became Western\u2019s associate head coach. Polin was fresh off a 35-goal campaign in his last of three seasons with the USHL\u2019s Cedar Rapids RoughRiders, and Ferschweiler, who was elevated as WMU\u2019s head coach last August, quickly saw future captain material in him.<\/p>\n

Polin wears the ‘C’ now in his senior season, and his leadership continued to shine through last weekend as he bagged consecutive hat tricks in a home sweep of Miami.<\/p>\n

His second career hat trick came Friday in 17th-ranked WMU\u2019s 7-1 win, on a night where underclassman teammates Ryan McAllister and Max Sasson each had three assists. Polin then had a career-high five points in the Broncos\u2019 5-2 victory Saturday, and McAllister again helped create three goals to finish the weekend with six assists.<\/p>\n

Sasson had a four-point game of his own on Saturday, with three helpers. How his goal that night came about won\u2019t show up on any box score, though. More\u2019s the pity, from Ferschweiler\u2019s telling of it.<\/p>\n

\u201cJason was on a 2-on-0 breakaway with an empty net, and he passed the puck to Max Sasson so that he could get the empty-net goal instead of (Polin) scoring his fourth,\u201d Ferschweiler said. \u201cHe made the whole play. He skated all the way around the D, the whole deal, was going in and passed to Max. I said, \u2018Poley, what\u2019s going on?\u2019 He goes, \u2018I had enough today, Coach,\u2019 so he gave one to Sasson.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s the epitome of leadership and professionalism, and is just a great kid, as well. I have zero, ever, problems with him. He\u2019s a world-class kid, a very, very good hockey player and he does it right every day. It\u2019s the perfect situation for a coach to have that kind of leader on your team.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ferschweiler feels Polin is the best defensive forward in the NCHC, but after a six-goal weekend, what he does around the other team\u2019s net is getting more attention.<\/p>\n

Polin collected a career-high 16 goals and 26 points in 39 games last season, but his nine goals and 16 points through 11 games this time around have him on pace to do even better.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe came in as a good player, and now he\u2019s such a mature, very good hockey player,\u201d Ferschweiler said. \u201cHe has just super-sized his game, and he kind of did the same thing in junior, then came in as a freshman as a good, complete player that plays on the puck, a 200-foot player. He was doing all those things from the start.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe always talk about how good and how professional he is and how he does everything right, and then sometimes his offense gets overlooked a little bit. He is a very good offensive player, as well, and certainly this year he\u2019s off to a tremendous start.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ferschweiler hopes that continues during WMU\u2019s challenging upcoming slate. The Broncos\u2019 next five games, including this week\u2019s trip to No. 4 St. Cloud State, are all against ranked teams, and as of now, seven of the Broncos\u2019 next 11 would be. Michigan Tech and Michigan State, both of whom WMU could meet in the Great Lakes Invitational, are currently receiving votes.<\/p>\n

But, future opponents are for a future version of the Broncos to concern themselves with.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe take it one weekend at a time, one game at a time,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re programmed to play just the game that\u2019s ahead of us, and we\u2019re not a team that looks right or left, or forward or back.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to have a real challenge on our hands with St. Cloud on their Olympic sheet against a veteran-laden team, and our singular focus right now is to find points up there if we can, and then move onto the next weekend.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Three years and a bit into his collegiate career, there\u2019s little about the way Western Michigan forward Jason Polin operates that surprises the Broncos\u2019 coach. Pat Ferschweiler has been in Kalamazoo that whole time, starting in 2019 when he became Western\u2019s associate head coach. Polin was fresh off a 35-goal campaign in his last of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":89,"featured_media":136935,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[812],"coauthors":[810],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nThis Week in NCHC Hockey: Western Michigan captain Polin 'the epitome of leadership and professionalism' - College Hockey | USCHO.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Three years and a bit into his collegiate career, there\u2019s little about the way Western Michigan forward Jason Polin operates that surprises the Broncos\u2019\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136934\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"This Week in NCHC Hockey: Western Michigan captain Polin 'the epitome of leadership and professionalism' - 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