Irish's Harris eager to play in front of hometown crowd
By MATT ORENCHUK
Sports Writer
Everyone can remember a day in their youth when they discovered something they love.
For Notre Dame's Paul Harris his day was when his discovered hockey for the first time. He was 9-years old when he went to a Yale-Harvard hockey game in New Haven, Conn.
"I discovered hockey at Yale," Harris said. "I had never been on skates before. My parents took me to the Yale game. The next day my parents went out and bought the skates, and I got my start."
The Ridgefield, Conn. sophomore is thrilled to be traveling to his home state for this weekend's two-game set with the Yale Bulldogs.
"I am really excited," said Harris. "All my friends from high school are going to be there."
Harris and his teammates will have an uphill battle ahead of them. Not only is Notre Dame playing a tough non-conference foe in Yale, the Irish are also coming off their worst performance of the season against Michigan this past Tuesday.
The Irish were drubbed 9-0 against the Wolverines. Notre Dame played an excellent game last Saturday against Ohio State, fighting for a 2-2 tie. But any momentum the Irish might have gotten from that game was squashed at the hands of Michigan.
The Wolverines got every bounce to go their way and jumped out to a 2-0 lead just three minutes into the game. Michigan then added one more goal at the end of the first to take a 3-0 lead into the first intermission.
The second period provided more of the same. Michigan scored 5:27 into the period to up their lead to 4-0. That was when Irish coach Dave Poulin pulled Irish goalie Kyle Kolquist in favor of junior Jeremiah Kimento.
Kimento wasn't any better, giving up three more goals in the second and two in the third for the final of 9-0. The loss was the worst for Notre Dame since a January 1996 loss to Michigan.
"We competed well against Michigan," said Poulin. "We had a lot of bad bounces, though. One of the goals was a turnover in our own zone, and another bounced off of Kolquist's skate."
Although a 9-0 loss to Michigan doesn't exactly give Notre Dame a lot of confidence, it doesn't hurt them too much. Notre Dame faces Yale this weekend in a non-conference game, and then doesn't play a CCHA game until it takes on Ohio State next weekend in Columbus.
That is plenty of time for the Irish to regroup. That is why Poulin likes the schedule. His team doesn't have to worry about making the playoffs, or where they sit in the CCHA. They can go out and play hockey and have fun.
"Michigan was a tough game," said Harris. "We are going to go into [this weekend] with our heads up. We are not worried about rankings; we are just going to play our best hockey."
Notre Dame expects Yale to play a very fast paced game. While Notre Dame plays a big physical game, the Bulldogs have small speedy forwards to play fast paced aggressive hockey.
"They have talented forwards," said Harris. "They are small and we hope to come out and use our size and strength to beat them."
All Sports Stories for Friday, January 26, 2001
