Notebook: Ryan Tattle named finalist for Hockey Humanitarian Award

On Tuesday, UConn forward Ryan Tattle was named one of five finalists for the Hockey Humanitarian Award, which “celebrates a student-athlete who makes significant contributions not only to his or her team but also to the community-at-large through leadership in volunteerism.”

Tattle founded the Score for Cancer initiative and has raised more than $178,000 for the Canadian Cancer Society. The senior began the foundation in 2021 after both his mother and BCHL teammate, Greg Lapointe, were diagnosed with the disease. Tattle ultimately lost his mother to cancer on Nov. 25, 2023.

“A lot of people might look at it like, ‘Oh, well, he started this cancer foundation when his mom died,’ and that's not true. He did it before his mom died,” UConn coach Mike Cavanaugh said about Tattle on Wednesday. “He had a teammate come down with cancer. So this was all started before his mom had passed away. So it just shows you that it wasn't a reaction to something that happened to him in his life. It was more doing it out of the goodness of his heart.”

Tattle isn’t just the face of the organization, either. He is the organization.

“He's single-handedly doing it,” Cavanaugh said. “He writes personal notes to people. He's just doing things really the right way and he's doing it for the right reasons.”

The award winner will be announced on Friday, April 10 during the Men’s Frozen Four in Las Vegas. Boston College’s Kara Goulding, Minnesota Duluth’s Grace Sadura, Middlebury’s Meg Simon and Princeton’s Jayden Sison are the other finalists.

UConn celebrates seniors

With UConn’s final weekend home game coming up, the senior night is set for Friday night against UMass. The Huskies will honor seven players: Forwards Tristan Fraser, Tabor Heaslip, Huston Karpman, Jake Percival and Ryan Tattle; defenseman Tom Messineo; goaltender Tyler Muszelik.

The group (aside from Muszelik, who transferred in as a junior) represents the third full recruiting cycle to come through the program since it joined Hockey East. The Huskies brought in 10 players in 2014-15, replaced them with 12 freshmen in 2018-19, then added the current seniors in a 12-player class in 2022-23.

Only six players remain. Matthew Wood, Samu Salminen, Arsenii Sergeev, Jake Black and Mark D’Agostino all transferred out following a turbulent 2023-24 campaign in which UConn underperformed. Jack Pascucci followed after the 2024-25season . Those who stayed helped steady the ship then took the program to new heights.

They’ve captured two CT Ice championships, led UConn to its first NCAA Tournament appearance and need four more victories to become the winningest class in program history over a four-year span. They currently have 75 wins, putting them behind Hudson Schandor and John Spetz, who totaled 78 wins from 2021-25.

“That (win record) says something about what they've done and the imprint that they've left on this program,” Cavanaugh said about the seniors. “They bleed blue and they are true to the program. They've given everything that I could ask for in four years. So I'm very proud of the group, and I'm excited to see where they're going to go, because it's not over for them yet.”

Tage wins gold

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