Brian Mason (born September 5, 1950) is a

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retired

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who led R.I.T to their first national championship in

1983 The year 1983 saw both the official beginning of the Internet and the first mobile cellular telephone call. Events January * January 1 – The migration of the ARPANET to Internet protocol suite, TCP/IP is officially completed (this is consid ...

Career

Brian Mason debuted in college hockey in

1970 Events January * January 1 – Unix time epoch reached at 00:00:00 UTC. * January 5 – The 7.1 Tonghai earthquake shakes Tonghai County, Yunnan province, China, with a maximum Mercalli intensity scale, Mercalli intensity of X (''Extrem ...

with the powerhouse

Clarkson Golden Knights The Clarkson Golden Knights are composed of 20 teams representing Clarkson University in intercollegiate athletics, including men and women's alpine skiing, basketball, cross country, ice hockey, lacrosse, nordic skiing, soccer, and swimming. Men' ...

led by legendary coach

Len Ceglarski Leonard Stanley Ceglarski (June 27, 1926 – December 16, 2017) was an American ice hockey player and coach. He was an All-American left wing on Boston College's 1949 NCAA championship team, and was captain of the 1950–51 squad. He was also a ...

. Clarkson had finished up as the tournament runner-up the year before and despite a second-place finish in the 1971 tournament the Golden Knights were passed over in favor of regular season champion

Boston University Boston University (BU) is a private research university in Boston, Massachusetts. The university is nonsectarian, but has a historical affiliation with the United Methodist Church. It was founded in 1839 by Methodists with its original campu ...

. While Mason would lead the team in scoring for the next two seasons Clarkson was unable to get close to another tournament berth during his time there. Mason went on to a brief professional career with the IHL's

Dayton Gems The Dayton Gems were a minor league ice hockey team based in Dayton, Ohio, and members of the International Hockey League from 1964 to 1977, and 1979–1980. In the fall of 1964, the lobby of their new arena, Hara Arena, had a natural gas exp ...

before hanging up his skates in 1975–76 season. By

1978 Events January * January 1 – Air India Flight 855, a Boeing 747 passenger jet, crashes off the coast of Bombay, killing 213. * January 5 – Bülent Ecevit, of Republican People's Party, CHP, forms the new government of Turkey (42nd go ...

Mason was back in college, this time behind the bench at Rensselaer as an assistant. After only two years he was given the opportunity to be a head coach at Division II R.I.T. In his four years there Mason's squads never had a losing season and won more games every season, growing from 14 in his first year to 29 in his last. He also brought RIT their first national title in 1982-83 and their first

ECAC West ECAC West was a college athletic conference which operated in the northeastern United States until 2017. It participated in the NCAA's Division III as a hockey-only conference. The conference ceased to exist after the end of the 2016–17 season wh ...

tournament title the year after. On April 6, 1984 Dartmouth announced that Mason would be replacing

George Crowe George Daniel Crowe (March 22, 1921 – January 18, 2011) was an American professional baseball player who appeared in 702 games in the major leagues as a first baseman and pinch hitter between and . Before joining minor league baseball in 19 ...

as head coach. Mason was taking over a declining program in

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that had seen some success in previous years but the recent returns hadn't been good. His first two seasons with the Big Green saw modest improvements to 5- and 7-win seasons but a 2-22-1 mark in his third year was the worst the program had ever recorded. A significant jump to 10 wins the next year began to erode immediately thereafter and ended with only four victories in 1989-90, leading to Mason's dismissal from the team. In his six-year tenure the Big Green never had a winning season and missed the ECAC

tournament A tournament is a competition involving at least three competitors, all participating in a sport or game. More specifically, the term may be used in either of two overlapping senses: # One or more competitions held at a single venue and concentr ...

every time. The only saving grace for Mason is that the year after he left his replacement Ben Smith beat Mason's record for the worst season in Dartmouth history with a 1-24-3 finish.

Career statistics

Head coaching record

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Mason, Brian 1950 births Canadian ice hockey coaches Dartmouth Big Green men's ice hockey coaches RIT Tigers men's ice hockey coaches Living people Ice hockey people from Nova Scotia Sportspeople from Halifax, Nova Scotia Dayton Gems players