UMass hockey head coach Greg Carvel is already hard at work assembling the 2025-26 Minutemen roster.

Since Western Michigan clinched its first-ever Frozen Four bid by beating UMass in the Fargo Regional final of the NCAA Tournament, 2-1, on Saturday, Carvel traded in his whiteboard for his cell phone.

“I switched from head coach to general manager from the end of the game Saturday, to when we got up Sunday morning,” Carvel told the Daily Hampshire Gazette. “My job changed pretty quickly.”

Carvel –- like most college coaches during this time of year — is in the early stages of parsing through the transfer portal, which opened last weekend. As of Tuesday afternoon, nearly 200 players are confirmed to be looking for new teams.

Depending on how many of the current Minutemen players with NHL rights leave early (sophomore Dans Locmelis counted as the first after signing with the Boston Bruins on Tuesday) will decide how active UMass will be in the portal, according to Carvel.

“The good thing is that it helps you fill holes and we’re going to have a lot of holes with a lot of kids signing,” Carvel said.

Juniors Cole O’Hara and Kenny Connors and sophomores Aydar Suniev and Michael Hrabal are other key Minuteman players with the option to sign pro deals, and while Carvel didn’t comment on specific expected departures, he mentioned more are likely on the way.

“We’ve lost [Lucas] Mercuri, [Ryan] Lautenbach, Joey Musa [to graduation] and now Dans [to the NHL]… there’ll probably be more,” Carvel said.

UMass had nine drafted players on its roster this season and that in and of itself forced Carvel to start mapping out a plan for next season as early as this past semester break.

“I think this year because there was such a large group of kids possibly leaving, we had to have a sense of who was going to be leaving.” Carvel said. “In years past, we all know who the guys are that are most likely, but this year, you got to communicate. The kids were all great communicating with me. 

“I asked the group at Christmastime, just where their heads were at,” Carvel said. “Then I think I checked in with them probably three-quarters of the way through the year, then right before we went to Fargo. The kids were all great, all very honest, very up front and that’s all I can ask of them.”

The only UMass player to enter the portal as of Tuesday was freshman defenseman Finn Loftus. 

UMass’ level of activity in the portal also impacts the recruits that will come in next season. Carvel didn’t list any players by name, but said he anticipates bringing in “a lot” of freshmen next season.

“We were young in the backend this year, we’ll be young up front next year,” Carvel said. “We’ll be experienced in the backend and in net and young up front.”

Following Saturday’s loss to the Broncos, captain Linden Alger said he felt the turning point of the season was UMass’ 5-4 win over UConn in Storrs on Feb. 7. Carvel agreed.

“In retrospect it definitely [was],” Carvel said. “I think it was a collection of milestones. When we beat Providence on the road, I think that it was late November, we hadn’t beaten a good team to that point. Then winning at BU, we hadn’t done that in a long time, winning at BC, we hadn’t done that in a long time, but that game at UConn, they were as hot as any team. That’s a hard place to win and I believe we came from behind in that game too. To me, it’s the collection of all those wins on the road against top teams, all teams that made the NCAA Tournament.”

As far as players Carvel felt took the biggest strides in their development, freshman defenseman Larry Keenan was at the top of his list.

“Keenan is definitely the one to me that was I think the most visible to everybody,” Carvel said. “He’s a big physical presence. He’s got tremendous skating ability, he’s got a lot of confidence and poise and he’s a smart player. We just got to bulk him up this summer.”

Carvel added none of his players have any major injuries going into the offseason, so the Minutemen that do stay will have a full offseason to train.

When asked about upcoming non-conference opponents, Carvel confirmed that UMass will be playing Northeastern an additional time, replacing AIC on the schedule.

“A lot of teams had AIC on the schedule and needed to fill that game and it’s really tough this late to find games,” Carvel said. “We actually play [Northeastern] three times in Hockey East next year, so we’ll play them four times.”

Carvel also disclosed that the Minutemen “don’t have any [in-season] tournaments like we did last year, I don’t believe.”

In Carvel’s ninth-year behind the bench in Amherst, UMass finished 21-14-5.

BRUINS LOCK UP LOCMELIS

The Bruins inked Locmelis to a three-year entry-level contract on Tuesday morning, with an average-annual value of $860,000.

Locmelis will play with the Providence Bruins of the AHL the rest of season on an amateur try-out contract.

In 70 games with the Minutemen, Locmelis tallied 15 goals and 47 points.

Locmelis, a Jelgava, Latvia native, was drafted by the Bruins 119th overall during the 2022 NHL Draft.