Holy Cross Men’s Ice Hockey’s all-time winningest coach, Paul Pearl, announced his resignation this week after being behind the Crusaders’ bench for the last 19 seasons. A 1989 graduate of Holy Cross, Pearl concluded his tenure with an overall record just north of .500 at 297-293-69. Furthermore, he led the Crusaders to two Atlantic Hockey Championships and he was also named the Atlantic Hockey Coach of the Year twice (2004,2011). In the early stages of his career, he was named ECAC East and New England Writers’ Association Coach of the Year in 1998, while adding a Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference Coach of the Year title in 2002.
I wanna thank coach pearl for a great 19 years of service at holycross and wish him all the luck at harvard. Lets play harvard in hockey.
— joshua zukowsky (@crusaaderfan) May 16, 2014
Most recently, Pearl led the Crusaders to a subpar season in 2013-14. Although Holy Cross edged perennial power and eventual Frozen Four participant Boston College 5-4 in late November, Pearl’s squad finished the year with an overall record of 14-22-3 and a conference record of 11-13-3. In the first round of the Atlantic Hockey Tournament, the Crusaders battled back from an overtime loss in game one to beat RIT 2-1 in a best-of-three series. Holy Cross was then swept by top-seeded Mercyhurst in two games in the quarterfinals.
Prior to last season, however, Pearl led the Crusaders to winning records in three straight seasons from 2010-2013. Whoever Holy Cross brings in as the new coach will acquire the program in relatively good shape, as the Crusaders will return six of their top eight scorers from a season ago—Castan Sommer (son of Worcester Sharks head coach Roy Sommer), Matt Vidal, Tommy Dwyer, Brett Lubanski, Tim Driscoll, and Mike Barrett. Even better news for next year’s head coach is that only one of those players (Dwyer) will be a senior.
It is believed and sources have reported that Pearl has resigned to take a job as an Assistant Coach with Harvard University. The Crimson didn’t encounter too much success either in 2013-14, finishing 10-17-4 overall and eleventh out of twelve teams in the ECAC with a record of 6-12-4.
Holy Cross has begun a national search for their next head coach.
