Selection in the NHL Entry Draft is no precursor to success.

Being overlooked in the NHL Entry Draft is no barrier to eventually making it to the highest echelon of hockey.

With his junior career having finished on the west coast of Canada, Liam Steele is all set to take the next step in his development and career.

Namely the NCAA.

The undrafted defenceman committed to the prestigious Cornell University two years ago and is about to realize a historic move.

Any disappointment in being overlooked will doubtless be nulled by what lies ahead.

So what of Cornell?

The Cornell ‘Big Red’ men’s ice hockey team is a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I college ice hockey program that represents Cornell University.

Cornell competes in the ECAC Hockey conference, one of the six NCAA Division 1 conferences including Atlantic Hockey, Big Ten, CCHA, Hockey East and NCHC.

The ECAC is comprised of twelve schools including Brown, Clarkson, Colgate, Cornell, Dartmouth, Harvard, Princeton, Quinnipiac, Rensselaer, St. Lawrence, Union and Yale.

Six of the eight Ivy League schools sponsor men’s hockey and all six teams play in the 12-team ECAC.
Those schools are Harvard, Dartmouth, Cornell, Yale, Princeton, and Brown University.
The Ivy League crowns a champion based on the results of the games played between its members during the ECAC season.

Cornell has won the ECAC Championship a record 12 times.
Since the formal creation of the Ivy League athletic conference in 1956, Cornell has won the Ivy League title a record 25 times (21 outright, four tied), one more than Harvard’s 24 (20 outright, four tied).

The 1970 Cornell Hockey team, coached by Ned Harkness was the first (and currently only team) in NCAA hockey history to win a national title with a perfect 29–0–0 record.

The Big Red’s archrival is the Harvard Crimson. The teams will meet twice in 2023-24, on November 11 and January 26. Cornell will be looking to put the record straight after suffering three losses to their rivals last season (two in overtime).

But why is Cornell’s nickname, Big Red?

As per the University’s official website.

“The nickname “Big Red” for Cornell teams originated in 1905. The late Romeyn Berry ’04, then a recent Cornell graduate, was writing the lyrics for a new football song.
Since Cornell had no nickname at the time, Berry simply referred to Cornell as the “big red team” and it caught on.
Berry was graduate manager of athletics from 1919 through 1935 and was recognized as an outstanding authority on Cornell, its traditions and personalities.
He was a distinguished writer and newspaper columnist locally. For his musical composition, Berry won $25.
The song earned a spot in the Cornell Verses, joining rowing songs and other lyrics descriptive of Cornell life.”

Home for the Big Red is the Lynah Rink in Ithaca, New York.

The 4,267-seat hockey arena at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, opened in 1957.
A game between the New York Rangers (NHL) and the Rochester Americans (AHL) in front of 4200 spectators was the first to be hosted at the arena.

Cornell’s hockey teams began the practice of retiring numbers on February 25, 2010. The only two players to have that honour bestowed upon them are Ken Dryden, who played 1965–69, and Joe Nieuwendyk, who played 1984–87.

The current Head Coach, Mike Schafer, is something of an NCAA legend.

Schafer is the longest-tenured head coach in Cornell men’s hockey history, as he enters his 29th season at the helm of the Cornell men’s hockey program.

Schafer owns a career coaching record of 520-282-105 entering the 2023-24 campaign.
His 520 victories are the third-most by any Cornell coach with one team.

Along with being one of Cornell’s legendary head coaches, Schafer’s 520 wins career victories rank sixth among active head coaches at both the Division I and Division III levels, and his .632 win percentage is good for fourth among active Division I coaches with at least 275 victories.

In 2020, Schafer was named a co-winner of the Spencer Penrose Award, given to the nation’s top head coach. He shared the honour with North Dakota’s Brad Berry.
It was the first time he had won the award after being named ECAC Hockey’s Coach of the Year five times (2002, 2003, 2005, 2018, 2020).

Cornell has claimed five Whitelaw Cup (ECAC Hockey tournament titles), surpassing the late legendary Ned Harkness for the most in Big Red history. Schafer also has guided Cornell to three Cleary Cups (ECAC’s regular-season championships) over the past six years.

Liam Steele will form part of a ten-strong blue line core for the Big Red in 2023-24.

The group lacks NCAA experience in-depth, with five freshman defencemen set to make their collegiate debut.

Of the returning players, the bulk of experience and leadership will be in the form of Tim Rego, Hank Kempf and Michael Suda, with a combined 167 games between them. Sophomore Jack O’Brien is the only other blue-liner to have suited up in the NCAA, featuring in a solitary game last year.

Three NHL prospects on the backend are Hank Kempf (New York Rangers, 208th overall 2021), Hoyt Stanley (Ottawa, 108th 2023) and George Fegaras (Dallas, 83rd overall 2022).

The other NHL prospects on Cornell’s roster are forwards Luke Devlin (Pittsburgh, 182nd overall 2022), Ryan Walsh (Boston, 188th overall 2023) and Jonathan Castagna (Arizona, 70th overall 2023).

Cornell Defence Roster

2 Liam Steele (Freshman)
3 Jack O’Brien (Sophomore)
4 Hank Kempf (Junior)
5 Hoyt Stanley (Freshman)
6 George Fegaras (Freshman)
7 Jimmy Rayhill (Junior)
12 Tim Rego (Senior)
13 Marian Mosko (Freshman)
21 Ben Robertson (Freshman)
27 Michael Suda (Junior)

Steele has made history by becoming the first English player in Cornell’s program history.
Having previously been an honour roll student at Stanstead College, he has enrolled in the College of Engineering at the historic Ivy University.

Cornell will play exhibition games against Toronto Metropolitan University and the U.S. NTDP Under-18 Team before beginning their seasonal campaign by hosting the University of Minnesota Duluthon on October 27.

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