Despite the fact that they’ve only been on the job for a few months and have yet to register a win for UMass, Greg Carvel and his staff are doing a good job of convincing high profile recruits to commit to the Massachusetts hockey program.  This week they picked up a commitment from Jeremy Davidson, a right shot forward who is one of the top under 17 players in the country.  In fact he’ll be representing Team USA in the upcoming U17 Five Nations Tournament next week.

https://twitter.com/j_davidson94/status/760483241065259008

Davidson played this past season for Minnesota prep powerhouse Shattuck-St Mary’s on their Under 16 team.  He had 17 goals and 28 assists in 51 games there.  Prior to Shattuck he played in the highly-regarded Honeybaked junior program in his native Michigan.  Davidson measures 5’10”, 165lbs but at only age 16 those numbers will likely increase.  He’s projected to arrive at UMass in fall of 2020.  His USHL rights are held by the Bloomington Thunder who took him in the 5th round of last year’s draft.

Here’s some reaction to the commitment on Twitter:

Davidson is one of the top players in his age group currently and is an excellent pickup for Carvel and his staff.  He was said to have over a dozen schools pursuing him, with Big Ten schools likely making up some of them.  It probably didn’t hurt UMass’ chances that Davidson is from Kalamazoo, the city where assistant coach Ben Barr called home for the last couple years before joining the UMass staff.

It’ll be a while until Davidson pulls on the maroon and white, but it’ll be exciting to follow his journey while we’re waiting.

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UMass made Jack Suter’s addition to this year’s recruiting class official.

SNB College Hockey’s Jeff Cox ranked the incoming recruiting classes for the Hockey East programs.  Cox has UMass’ freshmen as the 10th best class in the league, highlighting the additions of goaltender Ryan Wischow and defenseman Shane Bear.  Considering the swiftness with which Carvel and the staff put the class together, I think this is pretty good.  As Carvel attempts to reverse the fortunes of the program it’s not so much the ranking of recruits that will matter in these initial years, but what he’s able to do with them once they arrive in Amherst.  UMass has had quite a number of high profile players join the program in recent years, but it hasn’t translated into wins due to how poorly the teams have played on the ice.  What’s important is the team playing effectively and cohesively.  With wins and showing progress towards his vision for the program, more top recruits like Davidson will make the choice to come to UMass.

The Newburyport Daily News has a good article on incoming transfer Josh Coutuier’s decision to head to the state’s flagship.