2025-26 Women’s Preview & Analysis: New England Small College Athletic Conference (NESCAC)

Our season previews continue as the 2025-2026 Men’s & Women’s Division III hockey regular season nears closer. Today, we look at the women’s side of the New England Small Colleges Conference (NESCAC).

*As mentioned in our men’s article as well*

Also, for those of you that may not be aware: Another restriction the league has is their total amount of games of 24 (one less than everyone else) also applies to exhibition contests, hence why we rarely ever see a NESCAC exhibition game. For example, the NCHA has their 25-game limit, but it’s only for the regular season D-III games. They can play exhibitions, travel internationally, play USA NTDP teams etc… but the NESCAC strictly limits the teams to 24 total games regardless of status. I imagine there’s an academic justification behind this, but as a cheap-tuition state school grad, I can’t relate…

The NESCAC features:

Amherst
Bowdoin
Colby
Connecticut College
Hamilton
Middlebury
Trinity
Wesleyan
Williams

2024-2025 Overview

Last season, we saw Head Coach Jeff Matthews’ Amherst Mammoths take the auto bid for the third time in five seasons (excl. covid), shutting out Middlebury 1-0. Amherst has had an impressive stretch of seasons, with the only thing lacking being a national championship…

In 2023, Amherst lost to Gustavus Adolphus 2-1 in triple overtime, in 2024, they were upset by Elmira 2-1 in overtime in the first round, then last season, they were overwhelmed by HC Joe Cranston’s dominate River Falls squad 3-1 in the national championship once again. What’s the constant here? Their star goaltender Natalie Stott, who in three seasons, holds these stats:

4974:09 minutes played
0.94 GAA
.956 save %
34 shutouts
66-14-3

I’ve said it on repeat whenever I talk about the NESCAC or goaltenders, she’s been arguably the best goaltender in three seasons of anyone we’ve seen during her time and you could make an argument she’s up there with the all-timers in Women’s Division III Hockey.

Another note that should be mentioned, we saw huge gains from the Polar Bears of Bowdoin as they were an undefeated 10-0 and got to 12-1, but as the schedule got tougher, playing the top teams in the conference, they dropped five of six games, finishing their final 10 games 4-6-0, leaving them with a respectable record nonetheless of 16-7-0, they would eventually fall to Hamilton 2-1 in the NESCAC quarterfinals.

Another team we’ll discuss later, Trinity College had a similar surprise to many like Bowdoin. The Bantams opened their first four games with a sweep of Connecticut College and (at the time) #11 Hamilton, while two weeks later defeating #13 Norwich 2-1 in overtime, earning themselves a ranked spot in the DIIIHockeyNews.com & USCHO.com polls. However, the Bantams season took a worse turn than Bowdoin, dropping five & six in a row, finishing the season 10-13-1 after starting a promising 6-1-0 with solid wins.

Returning Production

Looking at the league and the returning production via our guy Scott Huston, we find some interesting results:

Like the men’s side of the NESCAC, the defending champs return a lot, and a lot of major pieces… Amherst returns 86.75% of scoring, 76.52% of assists, for 80.81% of their total points, including their star goaltender as we reiterated.

Speaking of returning a lot, HC Kayte Holtz’ Hamilton Continentals return the most of anyone in the league at just over 85% of total points (Hamilton returns the most production of anyone in the NESCAC on both Men’s & Women’s sides of the puck), maybe we see another run at the NCAAs for the Continentals as they made back-to-back NCAA tournaments in 2023 & 2024.

Trinity returns by far the least, funny enough, Hamilton as mentioned, returns the most on both sides of the puck, while Trinity returns the least! The Bantams returning an alarmingly low 31.71% of total points, with a graduating class of eight (three fifth years) and considering how defensive/low scoring the league is as a whole, the percentages may be a little exaggerated as the sample size of goals and assists is notably smaller for teams than other leagues.

One last note, Middlebury returns a fairly low amount, only bringing back 50% of scoring & 56.73% of assists.

Dark Horses

My ‘dark horse’ of the NESCAC is easily Bowdoin. The Polar Bears return 72.3% of total points and last season showed everyone what they’re capable of doing. Granted, they fell to the top competition late in the season, but, if you can beat the mid-bottom teams in the league and win 40-50% of the top-tier games, you’re right in the mix for an at-large bid via the NPI (coming from this league) and right in the race as always for the conference title auto bid.

Head Coach Marissa O’Neil enters her 15th year at the helm of the Polar Bears, holding a career record of 158-156-37 with a NESCAC title / NCAA tournament appearance back in the 2012-2013 season where they were shutout 4-0 by Elmira in the quarterfinal round, finishing the season 21-5-2.

This season, Bowdoin doesn’t play the ‘big two’ in Amherst / Middlebury until back-to-back weeks in late January, followed by two games at Hamilton… That stretch of games may determine the Polar Bears’ season if they’re able to take care of business against the mid-bottom level teams in the league… should be an exciting finish!

Final Thoughts

As long as senior Natalie Stott is in net for Amherst, I’ll never bet against them when it comes to NESCAC play. They were my pick to win the conference last season and I’ll roll with the Mammoths again.

Seeing what Bowdoin and Trinity did last season make myself and others think there may be more to come from that. At one point, Bowdoin was in the at-large bid territory but failed to hold steady and missed out on the NCAAs.

Speaking of NCAA at-large bids, we will see how many bids this league earns as they’ve taken the majority as of late over any other league. Now, I’m not getting into why and/or the entire situation itself as this isn’t the time and/or place, I’m sure we’ll get into it in a few months, but we’ll see if Colby College receives the final at-large bid for the fourth time in five years while winning significantly fewer regular season & conference games than others in contention. The Mules have made it past the first round twice and two of their NCAA losses came at the hands of conference-foe Amherst. It’s never personal, simply reality.

I think Middlebury will be really, really good, time will tell when Assistant Coach Emily McNamara takes over the helm once the legendary Bill Mandigo calls it an end to his illustrious career. Coach Mandigo has been at Middlebury 37 years and has racked up:

681-180-56 (most wins of any women’s hockey coach across all divisions)
Four National Titles (’04, ’05, ’06, ’22)
Two AWHCA National Titles (’00, ’01)
8 NCAA runner-up’s

When Coach decides it’s time, he’ll leave a legacy no one will forget.