Canucks give Aggies icy edge
In 2007, two senior captains of the USU Hockey club, David Wyman and Kent Arsenault, were not teammates. They were rivals.
Wyman played for the Wolverines of Utah Valley University a now defunct program. Arsenault was in his second year as an Aggie. According to these two athletes, the meetings between the two schools in that era were not always friendly affairs.
“We were both very fierce competitors on the ice,” Arsenault said. “It was always about David Wyman vs. Kent Arsenault. People would compare every stat that we had. It was kind of neat.”
Then, in what could be considered a massive coup in American Collegiate Hockey Association Division 2 Western hockey, Wyman and three other Wolverines decided to make the jump from UVU to USU in 2008, and the Aggies became unquestionably the superior hockey team in the state of Utah.
“At the time, there were a lot of people making talk about it,” Arsenault said. “I think people were surprised that we were all combining.”
Wyman said, “I don’t think too many people liked it too much, and we kind of got a target on our back from it.”
But for two Canadian players who had to travel more than 1,500 miles across two time zones to get to Cache Valley, that target is one these two are willing to wear.
Canadian players are not a rarity on the Utah State hockey team. Thirteen of the 25 players on the Aggie roster hail from our frigid neighbor to the north.
The story behind their journey to Cache Valley is not the type of story you would expect from the typical college athlete. There were no recruiting trips, no campus tours, no hotels, no meals and no free visits to the Spectrum. This, of course, is because hockey is not an NCAA-sponsored program at USU.
Arsenault found the Aggies through a friend and former Aggie, Greg Finatti, while he was living at home and attending college on Prince Edward Island.
“Finatti spent his rookie season at Utah State,” Arsenault said, “After his rookie season, he got a hold of me. He asked if I was interested in transferring schools to play some hockey in the states.”
Arsenault said he initially had mixed feelings about his decision to play in Cache Valley, but that those mixed feelings faded very quickly.
“After my first home game, I realized how dedicated our fans are here at Utah State and how lucky we as division two hockey players are to go to Utah State and be surrounded by such a great fan base,” he said. “I realized that a good group of guys held us together. We were all brothers, we were all best friends off the ice.”
Aside from hockey, Arsenault said he can find many similarities between his home on Prince Edward Island and northern Utah. Those similarities aided the transition to life as an Aggie.
“Beautiful,” Arsenault said of his first impression of the valley. “I grew up in a small town of about 16 or 17,000 people. Cache Valley was very similar in very many ways. You know the restaurant scene and you know every street in the town. The landscape, and definitely the mountains suck you in when you’re an outdoorsman like I am.”
Wyman, by comparison, started his journey in the tiny town of The Pas, Manitoba, Canada. Wyman said The Pas is a city of just over 5,000 residents, about 450 miles to the north of the Manitoban capital, Winnipeg.
“Lot’s of snow, very cold,” Wyman said.
But perhaps even that assessment is an understatement. Compared to The Pas, Logan is an urban, semi-tropical paradise. In The Pas, the average high temperature during January is a whopping 3.5 degrees fahrenheit, and the average high in July is 74.
Wyman’s route to Cache Valley, unlike most Division 2 hockey players, actually did involve some recruiting. Wyman said the UVU head coach made a visit or two to the frozen north to convince Wyman to be a Wolverine.
“Their budget was really big, and their coach came to Canada and recruited like an NCAA program,” Wyman said. “He did a lot of talking. I’d never heard of this league before, to be honest. It seemed a little sketchy with what it was all about.”
But Wyman quickly adjusted and rose to prominence at UVU. When the Wolverine program faltered, he, Seth Armitage, Jeremy Martin, and former Aggie Mike Douglass made the jump. The rest is history.
Since these two became accustomed to life in Logan, they have been nearly unstoppable on the ice.
Arsenault has been in Logan for five very successful years. Last season, he was invited to travel as part of the ACHA Division 2 All-Stars to play against semi-professional hockey clubs in Switzerland, Germany, Italy and France. He has amassed 412 career points (goals and assists combined) for the Aggies, and eclipsed the 100-point mark twice in his career. His best year as an individual player was in the 2008 season when he scored 52 goals and 58 assists.
Wyman has also led statistically successful campaigns through the two-and-a-half seasons he’s been at USU. He has amassed 192 career points in his time as an Aggie, averaging more than 80 points per season. His most successful season as an Aggie was his first; he totaled 24 goals and 59 assists on the year.
In just two years, these two leaders took the USU hockey program from being regionally respected to regionally feared. Last year the Aggies attained the no. 3 regional ranking, at that point, the highest ever achieved by an Aggie hockey program. This year the Aggies are undefeated on the road, are ranked second behind CSU regionally, and hold an astonishing record of 21-3 heading into this weekend’s action in Colorado. As far as the captains are concerned, the sky is the limit for this team.
“I can tell that this year our intensity and our focus is a lot better than it has been in the past,” Wyman said. “Kent and myself know that this is our final shot, and I don’t think anyone wants to go out of a sport losing every year in regional.”
“Our record has been absolutely phenomenal in the win-loss columns,” Arsenault said, “but those walls we haven’t been able to climb over, like winning regionals and getting to nationals – our main goal – and winning a national championship. This year has a whole different feel.”
Wyman said USU’s success this year has come from sustained growth and unity as a team, on and off the ice.
“We’ve grown and really realized the chance we have to go and do something great,” he said. “Our time is now. There is no tomorrow.”
“We know we have the skill,” Arsenault said. “Everybody in the nation knows that we have the skill. It’s a matter of coming together as a brotherhood once again and keep our head and everything. But right now, we’re on the right road to success.”
As for Wyman and Arsenault’s futures in the game, potential for a career is in no short supply for these Canadians.
“Pro hockey’s always a dream for myself,” Arsenault said, “and I’ll always go for that dream and see what’s out there next year. We’ll see what doors open here within the next couple months. Hopefully David and I can go overseas.”
“I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to play hockey next year,” Wyman said. “Hopefully I get to play, not have to go to the real world yet.”
– landon.hemsley@aggiemail.usu.edu