Well, there are several factors that I believe give coach Haviland a long leash:
1) He’s still in the early stages of a long term contract and from what I’ve heard, he’s one of the highest if not THE highest paid coach in the conference. Unfortunately, given that CC is a private school, they are not required to release the details of his contract and so they chose not to. He was good buddies with the now former AD, Ken Ralph, the very guy who fired Scott Owens over the telephone and then hand picked Haviland as Owens’ replacement. Ralph “rewarded” Haviland two years ago with a long term deal following a 15-17 2017-2018 season.
CC’s season ended that year with a valiant effort in a 3-game series at DU. We as fans were proud of how they damn near beat the Pios, taking game 1, barely losing game 2, before having nothing in the tank and ultimately getting blown out in game 3 but putting up a great effort, thanks in very large part to goalie Alex Leclerc.
That said, I think many in the CC community had high hopes for 2018-2019 and rightfully so with the group of returning players. Last year was the best squad Haviland has had and they had many accomplishments-winning the Gold Pan back from DU after a 6 year drought, winning the Pikes Peak trophy from Air Force for the first time, and advancing past the first round of the NCHC playoffs and getting to the Frozen Faceoff for the very first time. I think last season started to establish some credibility in Haviland and his staff and that probably earned Haviland more time and trust with the brand new athletic director, Lesley Irvine. Because she has no previous ties to Haviland, hopefully she will take a much more impartial, unprejudiced approach and evaluation of him than her predecessor.
2) Expectations among Tigers fans isn’t anywhere near as close as what you see with UND and their fanbase, and that’s a big part of the problem. Can UND fans sometimes have unreasonable expectations? -Perhaps but they set the bar very high and that contributes to the winning culture at North Dakota. My impression of most CC fans is, they’re just happy being able to steal a game or two from DU. Winning the Gold Pan was awesome and a big accomplishment but the way the team and fans celebrated, you would’ve thought they won the national championship. My point is, the bar is typically set too low (see my first point with Haviland getting rewarded with a big new contract after a sub-500 season). Until fans, alumni, and the school start expecting-and demanding-more, Haviland will get by with mediocrity, we’ll settle for the occasional upset or two, but we will never host a first round playoff series and we’ll likely never make the national tournament. Expectations of every team and fanbase should be to win the national championship, otherwise, why even bother playing???
3) Because of the term of Haviland’s contract, I doubt the school wants to fire him and then have to pay two coaches’ salaries. This, despite the fact that CC has one of the biggest endowments in the conference. Given the premier conference that CC’s in and this new arena, I think the program has a lot to offer and would attract a LOT of talented coaches, certainly much better quality than what we currently have.
4) Robson Arena. Haviland has his fingerprints all over the design and construction of the new on-campus arena. It will be a big part of Haviland’s legacy so I highly doubt he’s going to voluntarily leave the program anytime soon. At least not until after the team’s inaugural season.
Sorry for the long reply but it was born out of the frustration of a guy who’s been a CC fan dating back to 1991. As much as I personally don’t care for Don Lucia, I give him all the credit in the world for saving a dying hockey program and bringing them to national prominence that lasted well over 15 years. I want to see us become a league and national contender again.
