From the archives: Hockey heroes

The game was tied and University of Michigan-Dearborn’s shot at playing in the national championship was on thin ice.

“Come third overtime, we were pretty drained, but we just battled through it,” said Hervey, a sophomore forward at the time. “I remember the sweat just dripping off me and my teammates.”

He corralled the loose puck in front of the goalie, then reeled back his stick and sent a powerful shot toward the net.

Goal. UM-Dearborn wins.

The day was Feb. 25, 1983, and UM-Dearborn earned its spot in the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics’ hockey championship by outlasting Wisconsin-Superior 4-3 in what was then the league’s longest game. The game dates back nearly three decades, but it’s still fresh in the mind of Hervey and his teammates.

“That game definitely resonated with us,” he said. “It was a truly amazing experience.”

UM-Dearborn lost in the finals, but second place wasn’t bad for a bunch of skaters from southeast Michigan.

They created a legacy on the ice. UM-Dearborn’s hockey teams finished in the top four nationally from 1980-1984.

“We had tremendous young men playing hockey out there,” said Peggy Foss, former UM-Dearborn athletic director.

Underdogs

Their roster didn’t send chills down the spine of many competitors.

UM-Dearborn’s teams were chock full of local skaters who didn’t have extraordinary size and strength.

Scott Schlaff (’84 BA.) didn’t mind playing the underdog role. Teams often would underestimate UM-Dearborn, which worked in the University’s favor time and time again.

UM-Dearborn traveled across the country for tournaments, but a trip to New York stuck with Schlaff. Their bus wouldn’t accelerate past first gear, so the trip took 18 hours. By the time UM-Dearborn arrived at the ice arena, they were a half-hour late for their game, much to the dismay of the hometown crowd.

“Fans were throwing pennies at us,” Schlaff said. “It was really kind of a weird, bizarre thing.”

Schlaff and his teammates didn’t have time to warm up and were forced to hit the ice immediately. They went on to beat the hometown team in the first round and eventually won the tournament.

That tournament embodied the team’s underdog mentality.

“We prided ourselves in that we were all homegrown guys playing against these very powerful programs that recruit from all over the country,” said Jim Brailean (’85 B.S.E.E.E.).

Hervey also embraced the team’s local roots.

“The fact that our team was made up of players from within a 75-mile radius of campus, that made it special because a lot of the guys on the team played junior or high school hockey together,” he said. “Going in to the Division I schools, we were an underdog. But we held our own. We were a legitimate team.”

Campus Buzz

Tony Allegrina (’82 B.A.) remembers the deafening crowd noise that encompassed the Fieldhouse during UM-Dearborn hockey games.

University of Notre Dame traveled to UM-Dearborn in 1983, a game that generated plenty of buzz throughout southeast Michigan.

“Man, that place was rocking,” Allegrina said. “The Fieldhouse was just jammed. There was definitely an element of excitement.”

Allegrina experienced plenty of excitement that season, as he handled the team’s play-by-play commentary for a local cable TV station.

He had no background in sports broadcasting, but said he enjoyed the opportunity.

“I remember trying to memorize the roster before the first game,” he said. “I was trying as hard as I could to remember all the players’ names. I called the Wolves the Wings on a couple occasions. It was a very homespun-type production.”

David Cunningham (’82 B.B.A., ’92 M.P.A.) also helped generate plenty of hockey buzz as sports editor for The Michigan Journal.

Cunningham quickly grew enamored with UM-Dearborn’s sports programs, namely hockey, which reigned supreme during his stint with the student newspaper.

“We were a powerhouse,” he said. “It always seemed like our team was in every game. There were no games where we were overmatched. We always expected to win.”

That expectation to win nearly propelled the hockey team to a miraculous win over the Ann Arbor squad in an exhibition game.

UM-Dearborn lost by a goal, but Cunningham said they gave the Wolverines a run for their money.

“We almost beat them,” he said.

“You felt like the hockey team put UM-Dearborn on the map in those days for many people who might not otherwise know it existed,” he said. “It branded us as being a major university.”

Excerpt from the Spring 2012 issue of Legacy.

Related: Wolverines will take on Oakland University outdoors this Saturday.