Playing this year as a senior from Pennsylvania, forward Eric Tufman came in as a freshman looking for a challenge and an opportunity to play for a coach who had a big picture kind of vision while also trying to win each year. Last week, Tufman recorded his 100th career point on his third assist of the game in a victory over UMass Dartmouth. Tufman became the 12th player in UMass Boston Men’s hockey history to reach the century point plateau. The Mass Media had a chance to catch up Tufman on why he came to UMB as well as being fluent in polish.
MM: What do you do to get ready for a game?
ET: Game day for me starts a few hours before the game actually starts. First, I do a quick bike ride and stretch. Sitting around during the day makes me feel tired and lackadaisical, so that wakes me up. Then, before our pre-game meeting, I usually stickhandle with teammate Andrew Burke. Following the meeting, I tape all my sticks and then head to the gym where about ten of us kick the soccer ball around. Next, about 40 minutes before on ice warm-ups, everyone meets up and we do a dynamic warm-up and stretch.
MM: What made you decide to play at UMB?
ET: The one thing that intrigued me about UMB was that they were rebuilding. I wanted to go somewhere where there was a challenge. After talking with Coach Pete Belisle numerous amounts of times during my last year of junior hockey I really liked his vision. The program to that point was struggling on and off the ice, so he wanted to have a fresh start. All the freshmen that he brought in knew that we needed to put in so much work in order to be successful, and we did. Every year we have won a tournament and we were also one shot away from the NCAA tournament as we lost in overtime in the ECAC championship game in 2009. This year we are off to a great start and we will see what we are able to do with it. Also, this year more than any other year we are a confident group and expect to win every game. Lastly, we have great character guys in the locker room and we all pull for one another which is a huge plus.
MM: Tell us one fact about you that might surprise some people
ET: One weird fact about me is that I am fluent in Polish. Everyone in my family except me was born in Poland. It’s funny because people do not believe me at first and then they hear me speak the language.