First Brown University hockey team in 1897–98. From left: Robert Steere, Harris Bucklin, Jesse Pevear, Irving Hunt, Albert Barrows, Charles Cooke, Horace Day.
Plaque in Meehan Auditorium honors the first game
The men's ice hockey team at Brown is one of the country's oldest programs, having played their first game in 1898.[3] That season, the team helped to form the first informal conference, the Intercollegiate Hockey Association, and wound up winning the league championship. While there was no formal declaration at the time, Brown's title is sometimes referred to as the first ice hockey national championship. Brown nearly repeated the feat three years later but ultimately fell to Yale in the first two playoff games ever contested for college ice hockey.[4]
The program swiftly declined after that near miss and the Bears became one of the worst teams in the nation. By 1906 the team had lost 16 straight contests, failing to score a goal in 9 games during that stretch. The program suspended operations after 1906 and remained shuttered for 20 years. When they returned to the ice they debuted with their first official head coach. Though James Gardner only lasted one season behind the bench the team performed much better with a hand at the tiller and quickly built up to be a respected program. In 1939 the team again suspended operations, though this time it was due to the onset of World War II. Brown's team remained out of commission for the entire duration of the war and didn't return until several years after its conclusion, finally hitting the ice again in 1947.
In only 4 years the team climbed all the way to 17–5 record, receiving the top eastern seed for the 1951 NCAA tournament. Though they ultimately fell in the title game, Brown had become one of the better teams in college hockey and, excluding a brief period in the early '60s, would remain so for the next 30 years. When the 1980s rolled around the Bears results started turning sour and Brown found itself looking up at the rest of college hockey. Since 1981 Brown has produced only six winning seasons and more than half of their campaigns have ended with single-digit win totals. The Bears had a brief resurgence in the mid-1990s, managing to make the tournament in 1993 but bowed out after only 1 game.
The following is a list of Brown's men's ice hockey players who were elected into the Brown University Athletic Hall of Fame (graduating class in parentheses).[8]
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