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Union College men's hockey head coachreleased the team's 2017-2018 schedule today at the annual Garnet Blades Golf Tournament at Stadium Golf Club.The schedule includes 36 contests against 14 non-league opponents and the 11 members of ECAC Hockey. The Dutchmen will also face five teams that made the 2017 NCAA Tournament.The Dutchmen, who won their fourth Cleary Cup in seven seasons as the ECAC Hockey regular season champions and earned a berth to the NCAA Tournament in 2016-17, open the campaign on September 30 on the road against 2017 NCAA West Regional Semifinalist Boston University.The following weekend, Union will compete in the 2017 Ice Breaker College Hockey Tournament, hosted by national 2017 NCAA national runner-up Minnesota Duluth. The Dutchmen will take on Michigan Tech in their opening game on Oct. 6 and will face either UMD or Minnesota on Oct. 7.Union hosts UMass in its home opener on Oct. 13 in the first of two games between the two teams, as the Minutemen also travel to Schenectady on Dec. 10. The Dutchmen's first contest against UMass marks the first of four straight games against Hockey East opponents. Union welcomes Vermont on Oct. 15 before traveling to RIT (Oct. 20) and Niagara (Oct. 21).The Garnet and White begins its 22-game ECAC Hockey schedule with a home-and-home series against Rensselaer, starting Oct. 27 in Schenectady, and will close out the regular season at Messa Rink against Cornell on February 24.The Dutchmen will meet Rensselaer in the 6th Annual Capital District Mayor's Cup on Jan. 27 at the Times Union Center.Road non-conference contests also include two games against 2016 National Champion North Dakota (Nov. 24-25) and two games at Nebraska-Omaha (Dec. 29-30).This season, Union will face opponents from four leagues outside of ECAC Hockey, including three opponents from both Hockey East and Atlantic Hockey, and two from the NCHC."Our program is looking forward to the challenging schedule that awaits in the 2017-18 season," Bennett said. "It is a schedule that will benefit our players as we prepare ECAC Hockey play, which is a battle every night."