After a hot stretch through the 2022-23 spring semester, the Holy Cross Crusaders have skated right into the 2023-24 season with a 3-0 record.

The Crusaders went 8-5-2 in the second half of the season before adding a pair of series wins over No. 2 seed AIC and then No. 1 seed RIT en route to an Atlantic Hockey Championship game berth.

While Canisius would take the title game by a score of 3-0, Holy Cross built the experience winning teams often require and have used that experience to fuel their hot start to open the current campaign.

Entering his third season with Holy Cross, head coach Bill Riga has helped the Crusaders go from a last-place team in 2021-22 to the runners-up in 2022-23 and find some consistency in their momentum.

A 5-2 nonconference win over Long Island on Oct. 8 opened the season in exciting fashion on home ice. Coincidentally, both goals against were scored by LIU transfer Grayson Constable, who spent the previous four seasons at Holy Cross, but was unavailable to play his fifth year at Holy Cross due to the college not offering graduate programs.

A home-and-home with a strong No. 20-ranked UConn with consecutive 20-win seasons added fuel to the fire with a defensive sweep through 2-1 and 2-0 wins.

Hear from head coach Bill Riga and senior goaltender Jason Grande following tonight's shutout of #20 UConn!#GoCrossGo pic.twitter.com/63uYr7SMLO

— Holy Cross M. Hockey (@HCrossMHockey) October 15, 2023

Riga has set goals for establishing the identity of his team. Among them: driving play, a team effort, and overall cohesion have been more visible to start this season as the belief begins to take shape in showing their late stretch last year wasn’t the proverbial flash-in-the-pan.

The Crusaders’ cohesion has seen 12 different skaters register at least a point through the first three games, with seven different goal scorers in that span. Senior Jack Ricketts now dons the ‘C’ for the program and fittingly leads the team with two goals and two assists for four points through the first three games.

Ricketts is building off a career junior year, where he scored 16 goals and 16 assists for 32 points in 41 games. The Oakville, Ontario native posted a single point in the Crusaders’ playoff run last season, but has clearly shaken off that uncharacteristic stretch with how he has started his senior season.

RICKETTS BEATS THE ICING TO SCORE THE EMPTY NET GOAL!#GoCrossGo pic.twitter.com/92ma9ZMRz5

— Holy Cross M. Hockey (@HCrossMHockey) October 15, 2023

This weekend Holy Cross opens Atlantic Hockey conference play against the reborn Robert Morris University Colonials. RMU’s revamped program remains a wild card that is still seeking its own identity. The Colonials opened the season with a 1-1-1 record, which includes a shutout, being shutout, and a tie. Coach Derek Schooley brings a wealth of experience and led his program to a third-place finish in 2020-21, the last season in which the team played before a surprise hiatus that saw friends of the men’s and women hockey programs rally to save them.

Riga won’t be looking past the Colonials, but following Robert Morris, the Crusaders will have RIT, Canisius, and AIC in consecutive weeks taking them into mid-November with a stretched-out test for the Crusaders’ durability.

Don’t miss a second of the action, livestream every Atlantic Hockey game—and much more—right here on FloHockey all season long.

Have a question or a comment for Jacob Messing? You can find him on Twitter @Jacob_Messing.