TIM Taylor – 2015 LEGEND OF COLLEGE HOCKEY

BY WALLY SHAVER

The Hobey Baker Memorial Award Foundation ­announced its 2015 Legend of College Hockey recipient as Tim Taylor. As head coach for Yale University for 28 years, Taylor made a name for himself by coaching more games than anyone in ECAC history. Whether he was leading an Olympic team into battle, coaching a Yale squad into the NCAA playoffs, moderating a panel at the World Hockey Summit, instructing a youth clinic or teaching his Bulldog players a new break-out system, Taylor was born to be a coach.

He coached the Bulldog men’s team from 1976 to 2006, compiled a school hockey record of 337 wins, and then went to work for USA Hockey as the director of player personnel for the U.S. national junior team that won a gold medal at the 2012 world championships.

The Taylor regime produced one ECAC title, six Ivy League championships, 19 ECAC playoff teams, a pair of 20-win seasons and many professional skaters. Taylor, the 1997-98 Spencer Penrose Award winner as the American Hockey Coaches Association Coach of the Year, was a three-time (1986-87, 1991-92, 1997-98) ECAC Coach of the Year and a two-time (1991-92, 1997-98) New England Coach of the Year. He coached all six of Yale’s Hobey ­Baker Award finalists.

Taylor had a number of important international assignments, the most notable as head coach of the 1994 U.S. Olympic team at Lillehammer. Additional roles included assistant general manager and assistant coach for the 1984 U.S. Olympic team; head coach of the U.S. National Team at the International Ice Hockey Federation World Championships four straight years in the 90’s, and a two-time ­assistant for the U.S. National Team (1981 and 1983). He also led Team USA to its best finish in the 1991 Canada Cup, taking over Team USA after head coach Bob Johnson became ill and led the Americans to second place.

Taylor (337-433-55 career record at Yale), the recipient of USA Hockey’s 2006 Distinguished Achievement Award, was a 1963 Harvard graduate. He spent seven years as an assistant at his alma mater before becoming Yale’s 10th head coach. He captained the 1963 Crimson team that won the Ivy League and the ECAC championships, and tallied 46 goals and 33 assists for 79 career points in 68 games. Tim Taylor passed away April of 2013 at the age of 71 ­after a long battle with cancer. In his honor, the Tim Taylor Cup was established and presented for the first time in 2014 to the Most Outstanding Player when Harvard hosts the ­annual Harvard-Yale game in Cambridge, Mass.

Coach Taylor was honored along with 2015 Hobey Baker Award winner Jack Eichel at the annual Hobey Baker Award Banquet on Thursday, May 28, 2015 in St. Paul, Minnesota.