There are college hockey stars, and then there is UMass sophomore defenseman Cale Makar. Rink verbiage doesn’t quite do the man justice. “Stud,” “special player,” “sick”—none of these terms captures his essence. Sometimes you have to get to the rink and apply the eye test. Joe Bertagna is not only the commissioner of Hockey East, but a writer, historian and sage of college hockey. His take on Makar might be the most telling.
If you start with the premise that Makar is in a class by himself, then his accomplishments all fall in line: he’s a defenseman with 30 points in 25 games; he has powered UMass to its startling transformation from Hockey East doormat to dominant front-runner; during his extended Christmas break as a freshman, he returned to Amherst with a World Junior gold medal and All-World status. Now in his second, and by all projections, final season of college hockey, he has figured things out, to the woe of his opponents.
That’s a massive understatement, if you ask any of the 3,000 fans who attended the BU-UMass game at Agganis Arena last Friday. Makar was a blur all game long, hounding the puck, setting up goals and stapling unsuspecting Terriers to the boards.
So, it’s up to the pundits to project Makar’s future, that he will join his mates at Boston Garden for the Hockey East Championships next month, and we’ll get to watch him dominate the college game in an NHL palace. We will see him in an NCAA regional, probably New Hampshire or Providence, trying to reach hockey’s Holy Grail via the Frozen Four. He will then shift jerseys to a slightly darker shade of maroon, and jump into an NHL pennant race with the Avalanche.
And then this comet will be gone. The kid from western Canada will have left a star trail reminiscent of another Hockey East immortal, Paul Kariya: World Juniors, NCAAs, Hobey Baker. The college he feels so indebted to for assisting in his development—UMass—has become a national power in his wake.
UMass hockey SID Jillian Jakuba sees Makar nearly every day. She helped produce a video this fall promoting the Minutemen, and got to see Cale in a brand-new role. He did not disappoint.