ECAC Monthly Recap: November and December 2025

Hello, ECAC and NCAA hockey world! Has everyone recovered from ECAC Hockey's chaotic November (and start of December)? I hope so, because the second half of the season began Dec. 30th. With the midseason break now behind us, let’s take a look back at where the conference left off after the first weekend of December. 

In my October recap, I noted how a then-perfect Cornell and a one-loss Quinnipiac seemed to clearly be the top two teams in the conference. Dartmouth and Yale also seemed ready to spend the rest of the winter battling for a chance at a first round bye come February…

Clearly I got a little too excited about the wrong Ivy League teams. While Cornell, Yale and Dartmouth all struggled in November, Princeton put together a 7-1 month before sweeping the opening weekend of December (more on that later). 

Clarkson (mostly) put its early-season struggles behind it, and even Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Union picked up some solid wins. Instead of saving it for the end of the recap, let’s refresh our memories of where the conference stands heading into the second half of the season with a look at who the current top four teams might be…

Lake Placid Power Rankings

Last month: Cornell, Quinnipiac, Yale, Dartmouth

The theme of ECAC Hockey this season has been parity, and right now it seems like any team can beat any other team on any night (with a possible exception for Princeton). This parity has made the conference much more exciting compared to years past, when a top tier of teams separated itself from the pack. It also has made picking this season's top teams far more difficult, as you can see from last month’s top four (please keep this in mind when I don’t pick your favorite team to win in the playoffs). 

1. Princeton (11-4-0, 8-2-0 ECAC): The best top line in the conference, a new coach straight from the PWHL, and a scorching hot goaltender have pushed the Tigers to the top spot in the standings at the midway point of the season. What makes this recent assent so impressive is Princeton’s subpar start to the year. The Tigers were swept by Connecticut in the season's opening weekend and needed overtime to overcome RPI. When I last made these rankings at the end of October, Princeton was a .500 team.

In November, the Tigers showed why leaving them out of the best-team conversation was silly. After notching a 1-0 win over Clarkson, Princeton swept its home-and-home weekend with Quinnipiac in what could be the most pivotal games of the season. Two weeks later, Courtney Kessel’s squad conceded only three goals en route to notching its first Central New York weekend sweep (that’s Cornell and Colgate) since 2016! 

With that historic weekend in the rearview mirror, the Tigers are set to open 2026 with a weekend series against Stonehill and a trip to the Capitol Region, where the wins should keep on coming.

2. Clarkson (11-6-2, 6-2-1 ECAC): Sitting just 2.5 points behind Princeton (with one fewer game played), the Golden Knights are another team that weathered a disappointing start and now seem set to compete for an ECAC title in the second half of the season. 

Boasting the nation's third highest scoring freshman, Sara Manness (who is running away with the conference Rookie of the Year Award), Clarkson picked up key November wins over Brown, Yale, and St. Cloud State before finishing 2025 with a 4-3 overtime victory over St. Lawrence in the first in-conference North Country battle (the Golden Knights also have a win and a tie in a pair of non-conference games against the Saints).    

Up next for Clarkson is a pair of games against the NEWHA’s Saint Michael’s before a pivotal weekend against Cornell and Colgate.

3. Quinnipiac (14-5-1, 5-4-1 ECAC): While Princeton and Clarkson started the season slowly before picking up momentum, Quinnipiac and Cornell seem to be on an opposite trajectory. The Bobcats started the year with a nine-game winning streak and didn’t pick up a second loss until Nov. 20th.

However, Quinnipiac has just two wins in its last seven games and has gone from averaging over four goals per game to 1.7 over that stretch. In better news, Felicia Frank’s impressive start to the year has continued, most recently punctuated by a 34-save shutout of Cornell. The sophomore netminder sits third in the nation in goals-against average, save percentage and wins while playing an NCAA-leading 1189 minutes in net. 

Kahlen Lamarche’s high-scoring start to the season continued into November, with the Division I leading goal scorer notching a pair of multi-point weekends. With only two other Bobcat skaters having scored more than five goals so far, finding non-Lamarche scoring will be key in the second half of the season. Quinnipiac will start January in Belfast, Northern Ireland, facing Boston University, with a chance to play No. 5 Minnesota Duluth in the Friendship Series finale (unless Harvard pulls off a massive upset against the Bulldogs).

4. Cornell (10-5-1, 6-4-0 ECAC): After starting the season 7-0 and looking like a team primed to make a push for back-to-back ECAC championships, the Red came undone in November and early December. Cornell lost all four of its Friday games in November and December, including its first road loss to Union since 2004, and was swept at home to end the first half of the season — the Red’s first point-less weekend at Lynah Rink in over two years.

While a lack of even-strength scoring marked the beginning of Cornell’s struggles (which included losses to Union, Colgate, and a tie against Syracuse), newer issues such as inconsistent defending and a cooling power play (which still leads the nation) have caused the slump to continue despite better five-on-five play. The Red are still one of the best teams in the nation statistically, boasting the sixth-best offense and defense, but losses to Princeton and Quinnipiac to begin December make it clear that last season's ECAC dominance has not fully returned. 

Luckily for the Red, the start of the second half is full of opportunities for statement get-right wins. The team will face No. 4 Penn State on the road on Dec. 30th, then host Clarkson and St. Lawrence.

Players of the Month(s)

Like the rest of this article, this edition of the monthly awards includes both November and the first weekend of December.

Forward of the Month: Issy Wunder, Senior, Princeton

After being held pointless in her first weekend of November, Wunder exploded offensively for Princeton, driving her team to the top of the conference standings. The 5-foot-11 captain tallied a goal and two assists in Tigers' weekend sweep of Quinnipiac before notching two-point performances in wins over Yale and Colgate. Then, in arguably the conferences most important game of the season thus far, Wunder scored a pair of goals 22 seconds apart to give Princeton a 2-1 lead over Cornell. The Tigers held on to beat the Red and claim the top spot in the conference at the midway point in the season.  

Wunder’s strength and on-puck confidence has allowed her to unlock both her own scoring and that of her linemates — Emerson O’Leary and Mackenzie Alexander, who herself had a 14-point month — forming the best top line in ECAC Hockey. Wunder scored six goals and assisted on seven others in November and the first weekend of December. 

Honorable mentions: Maddie Leaney (Union), Mackenzie Alexander (Princeton)

Defender of the Month: Stephanie Bourque, Senior, Union

With three 30-plus game seasons under her belt, Bourque is still finding new ways to contribute for the Garnet Chargers. In November, she registered a +/- of plus-7 and recorded 10 points, including a five-point, four-assist night against Delaware which tied the Union single-game program points record. In addition to her offensive contributions, Bourque also has led a defensive unit that shutout opponents in three of Union’s final four games of 2025.

Honorable mentions: Isabella Gratzl (Brown), Kendal Davidson (RPI)

TIG Goaltending Goaltender of the Month: Uma Corniea, Junior, Princeton

I’ve renamed this award in honor of the very real ECAC MAC Goaltending Goaltender of the Month Award (or ECAC MAC Goaltending Goalie of the Month Award, depending on your source). While it might be a bit of a mouthful, it definitely makes more sense than last year’s Bitcoin sponsorship!

The breakout of Corniea is one of the best stories in the conference. The Minnesota native missed all of last season with an injury, but has picked up right where she left off two seasons ago when she was named to Hockey Commissioners' Association's National Rookie of the Year watch list.

Understandably, Corniea looked a little shaky in her first starts of the season, but she found her stride in November, posting a 1.32 GAA and .956 saves percentage in the month. Corniea's hot streak continued into the first weekend of December, allowing a combined three goals in Princeton’s wins over Cornell and Colgate. 

Honorable mentions: Felicia Frank (Quinnipiac), Anya Zupkofska (Brown)

Goal of the Month(s): Princeton's Mackenzie Alexander vs. Quinnipiac, Nov. 20th

This goal is a great encapsulation of the past two months for Princeton. Wunder makes an incredible pass while fully sliding on the ice to set up Alexander, who fires a nasty one-timer into the back of the net — one of the many great plays the duo has made. The overtime game-winner secured the third win in Princeton's ongoing seven game winning streak, and came against a top-10 team in the country. 

Key Moments from Around ECAC Hockey:

(All program records are courtesy of the ECAC Hockey weekly media notes unless otherwise noted)

• Brown’s Olivia Fantino’s goal 1:43 into the Bears' 3-2 loss to Providence on Dec. 29th was the program’s quickest goal to start a game since Oct. 2022.
• Uma Corniea made a career-high 40 saves in a 2-0 win over Quinnipiac on Nov. 22nd.
• Union’s 7-0 win over Delaware on Nov. 28 was the program's largest margin of victory in a shutout win, and largest margin overall, since 2012. The win also gave Emily Evans her first career victory and shutout, joining Monja Wagner and Emma Rhéaume as the only Garnet Chargers to record a shutout in their first start of the season.

• Quinnipiac’s Felicia Frank made a career-high 34 stops against Cornell in a 3-0 Bobcat victory on Dec. 5th. 
• Georgia Schiff scored a pair of goals in her home state, helping lead Cornell to a 5-1 win over Vermont on Nov. 29th. 
• Maddie Leaney scored nine goals in the month of November, the most in a single month in Union’s Division I history. Leaney also set the program record for career hat tricks (two) and game-winning goals (eight).

• Union’s 4-3 upset of No. 4 Cornell on Nov. 21st was the programs first victory over a top-five ranked opponent. 
• Also on Nov. 21st, Colgate’s Emma Pais scored her 50th career goal in a 5-2 win over RPI.
• Brown’s Anya Zupkofska joined Cornell’s Annelies Bergmann and Penn State’s Katie DeSa as the only goaltenders to record three straight shutouts this season. 
• Clarkson and St. Lawrence hosted over 2,800 students for the North Country School Day Game on Nov. 12th, and WOW, the post-goal screaming sounds incredible.

• Izzy Whynot became the first Harvard student-athlete to earn back-to-back ECAC Rookie of the Week Awards since Jillian Dempsey in the 2009-2010 season.    

January’s Game of the Month: Princeton at Clarkson on Jan. 31st

A battle of the current top two teams in the conference, the Tiger’s 10th-in-the-nation offense will be tested by a Clarkson defense that has allowed more than two goals just twice to ECAC opponents. The first matchup between these two teams was an instant classic, with Princeton snapping a 10-game winless streak against the Golden Knights in a 1-0 overtime victory that came on Riley Sorokan's wrap-around goal.

While Clarkson currently trails Princeton by 2.5 points in the conference standings, the Golden Knights have played one fewer game than the Tigers, so the regular-season title could come down to this matchup. 

Can’t wait that long? Cornell visits No. 4 Penn State on Dec. 30th in a battle of what was at one point the last two undefeated teams in the country. 

Check out the full ECAC schedule here.