In a normal year we’d be in the second month of the college hockey season… clearly 2020 has been anything but normal.
Earlier this week RIT canceled the season for all of its winter sports teams. This move was consistent with the Liberty League, which is a Division 3 conference where most of the teams at RIT play.
However, RIT’s hockey teams are Division 1 and do not compete in the Liberty League, and that’s why a couple of senior hockey players started a petition to convince the university to let them play this year.
“We love that Tiger logo and representing our school,” RIT senior hockey player Jake Hamacher said, “if we can do it safely we should be able to represent it on the ice.”
And that’s their goal this season, on Monday, Hamacher started a petition to convince RIT’s administration to let the Tigers play. More than 3,500 people have signed it.
“The hockey community is so powerful, as soon as we put it out there it started spreading like crazy, friends family and hockey fans across the nation want us to play,” RIT senior captain Alden Dupuis said. “It feels good knowing that we have that type of support behind us.”
On Wednesday night the players had a meeting with RIT’s President and Athletic Director.
“We’re hoping for the best in that they reverse the decision,” Hamacher said, “but we’re just glad that the RIT leadership is listening to their students, we felt we had a voice.”
Kyle leads sports coverage and hosts the Concrete Jungle podcast. Have a lead or question? Send it to [email protected].