Kevin Oklobzija

@kevinoDandC

In most circles, the trip around town taken by the Rochester Institute of Technology men's hockey team back in late August would have been considered the ultimate learn-the-city sightseeing tour.

The players are, after all, representing Rochester; why not get to know the city's history.

So the Tigers visited High Falls, the Susan B. Anthony House and the Frederick Douglass gravesite in Mt. Hope Cemetery. They stopped even by the reservoir at Cobbs Hill Park for the view from Pinnacle Hill.

The George Eastman Museum was prominent on their jaunt. They also paid a visit to The Magpie Irish Pub, since PGA star Rory McIlroy was spotted there last summer with fiancée Erica Stoll of Irondequoit, as well as Magnolia's Deli & Cafe, where President Obama dined in 2013.

The final landmark on the tour: the back doors to Blue Cross Arena at the Community War Memorial. "Teams that use these doors," coach Wayne Wilson said in a tweet that day, "earn it."

In all, his players traveled about 9.8 miles.

On foot.

It was the Great RIT Hockey Scavenger Hunt, Episode I, devised by assistant coach Dave Insalaco and the team's director of hockey operations, Jeff Siegel.

"It's how I got to meet a lot of the guys and bond with them," said freshman center Gabe Valenzuela, one of the newcomers.

Contested on Aug. 29, just before classes began, the scavenger hunt turned out to be a metaphor for the Tigers season. The obstacles, the places they needed to get to, the not-so-direct routes taken, the encouragement among teammates to find more energy, and the satisfaction and sense of accomplishment once goals were achieved.

The downtown arena was the perfect finish line, since that's where the Tigers wanted to be on March 19: playing for the Atlantic Hockey championship and an NCAA Tournament berth.

Sure enough, RIT reached the title game and blitzed Robert Morris University 7-4, earning a bid to the NCAA East Regional. The Tigers play top-seeded Quinnipiac at 4 p.m. Saturday at the Times Union Center in downtown Albany.

"The scavenger hunt was like our year," coach Wayne Wilson said. "It was tough."

Perhaps tougher than the coaches expected. "Some of the guys weren't prepared for 9.8 miles," Wilson said.

The rationale behind having hockey players run nearly 10 miles?

"If you're going to be successful, you have to learn how to work together," senior defenseman Alexander Kuqali said.

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The team was divided into four groups for the 10 a.m. start. Kuqali, Josh Mitchell, Brady Norrish and Andrew Miller were the captains.

"We started by High Falls," Wilson said, "and there was some girl trippin' on one of the benches, so that was interesting."

Such midmorning bonus props added to the intrigue.

The rules were pretty simple: Run to the designated landmarks, take a team picture at the site and send it to Siegel. Upon receipt, he would text the team captain the next clue, and then the race was on again.

"You'd send the photo and then get the next clue and find out you had to go another three miles," sophomore defenseman Chase Norrish said, "and you'd just about fall over."

Not everyone came properly equipped. Senior defenseman Greg Amlong didn't wear socks and ended up carrying his shoes the last couple miles; the blisters on his feet caused him to discard his sneakers.

"I'm not the greatest runner," Amlong confessed. "But your teammates were pushing you through it, just like in the season when you have guys pushing you.

"It was a good team-building experience."

The grueling run, with the hills, the wrong turns, the traffic, the pain, the people in the way, it really was the season in a mid-day capsule.

Wilson noted the many obstacles during the schedule. Losing senior winger Dan Schuler to a season-ending concussion just 13 games into the season. Losing forward Danny Smith for two months because of a broken arm. Losing both goalies, Mike Rotolo and Christian Short, at essentially the same time.

But with club-goalie-turned-Division I starter Nick Amato backstopping the Tigers, they secured a first-round bye in the conference tournament and, though they had to play their quarterfinal playoff series on the road at Mercyhurst, the Tigers still posted a two-game sweep as Rotolo returned to the goal crease.

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"There was no woe-is-me from the guys," Wilson said. "Yeah, we lost our two goalies. But if you don't expect your third goalie to step up and make a save, then he doesn't make a save.

"We tightened things up as a team, no question, but we also learned we can play better defensively than we had been playing."

Said Norrish: "There were big comparisons for sure. The scavenger hunt was a grind all the way through, but then we were happy to do the exact same thing during the season. It helped in our mindsets."

They definitely earned the NCAA berth.

KEVINO@gannett.com

NCAA East Regional

Who: No. 16 RIT vs. No. 1 Quinnipac

Records: Tigers (18-14-6); Bobcats (29-3-7)

When/where: 4 p.m. Saturday, Times Union Center, Albany