Hundreds of hockey gamers rotated via Cornell’s New York-based campus over Mike Schafer’s three a long time of head teaching.
From an on/ice perspective, their legacy is lengthy entrenched as a bit of the Massive Purple’s historical past of constructing profitable champions. Even on this final yr, elevating the Whitelaw Cup for a second straight season handed this system its second consecutive postseason ECAC Hockey championship.
But the true lasting reminiscence of Cornell hockey isn’t one thing ingrained in an on-ice shot or examine for a participant like Hank Kempf. It’s not a dash in follow or a postgame movie session. It may not even land within the Ivy League training and life-changing diploma from one of many world’s finest universities.
The lasting picture, the lasting considered a Cornell hockey participant, is a second straight yr as a finalist for the Hockey Humanitarian Award.
“Coach Schafer at all times talks about how vital service is,” stated Kempf after being nominated for the primary time in 2024. “Taking part in for Cornell and being below him has actually been an important studying lesson into the worth of service. It’s been an enormous factor for me, and it’s influenced me to department out. Being within the Cornell hockey program is such an unbelievable place in so many areas, nevertheless it’s developed me as an individual since you get to take action a lot away from the rink.”
Kempf was the second member of the Cornell hockey program to be named a finalist for the award given to varsity hockey’s most interesting citizen. He’s trying to hitch Sam Paolini as the one Massive Purple gamers to ever win the award after Alyssa Gagliardi and Morgan Richardson grew to become finalists throughout their time on Cornell’s ladies’s program, and his nomination is the tenth time that somebody from the Ivy League and ECAC-based college appeared on the checklist of nominees.
Changing into the primary Cornell participant nominated a number of instances to the award, although, is simply a part of the story for Kempf, who has constructed a sustainable mannequin of charitable contributions to the higher Cornell and Ithaca communities. His efforts to prepare “Massive Purple Blocks for Therapeutic” stemmed from a tragedy in his personal private life after his mom handed away from a bout with breast most cancers, and it’s gotten teammates concerned by elevating cash primarily based on the workforce’s want to dam photographs throughout video games.
The cash raised went on to Kesem, a corporation that helps youngsters affected by a most cancers prognosis to a dad or mum by offering packages and providers for free of charge. Within the first yr, Cornell’s efforts exceeded the workforce’s preliminary expectations, and Kempf recruited Ryan Walsh and Jack O’Brien from the Cornell workforce to prepare a second yr alongside the whole teaching workers.
“A bunch of returners stayed [on campus] over the summer time,” he stated. “Earlier than the [2023-2024 season], we bought collectively and met with some workers. All of us form of determined that it could be an important factor, this yr, to do a service undertaking with the workforce and have or not it’s one thing that speaks to the workforce. I used to be a bit of hesitant to do one thing out of the gate in honor of my mother, however after I talked to my household, all of us [decided] it was one thing she would need me to do. From there, it was a no brainer to do one thing to honor her and to do one thing for breast most cancers.
“We actually checked out one thing that spoke to us as a shutdown, defensive workforce, and we love blocking photographs. Blocking photographs is a factor that’s actually huge in our program, so it was one thing that we stated could be cool to make [the program] performance-based particularly for utilizing shot blocks to lift cash for breast most cancers.”
Kempf has additionally been concerned with the Portal de Belen Basis service journey that took Cornell to poor and needy areas throughout the Dominican Republic, and he led a service journey to Monte Plata, the place the Massive Purple constructed a group service heart for the world. They later supplied items, providers and sports activities gear to the kids of the world whereas persevering with to elevate the spirits of a growing nation with a poverty charge exceeding 27 p.c.
He’s moreover labored with the Racker Heart, a assist heart for individuals with disabilities within the higher Ithaca, N.Y., space, and the Newfield Faculties Mentor Program, which hosted youngsters teams on campus at Cornell.
