By John Powers, Globe Staff, 3/16/2004

Tyler Kolarik isn't sure about this "Mr. March" thing. "Obviously, it's been pointed out to me," says the perennial postseason poster guy for Harvard's hockey team. "But everyone steps up their game at playoff time."

It's just that Kolarik takes it up a couple of levels. In 14 ECAC playoff games over four years, the man from Abington, Pa., has piled up 8 goals and 21 points, 5 of them during the recent sweeps of Vermont and Brown.

Once again the Crimson, who were four games under .500 a month ago, have come out of dormancy to make it to the ECAC semifinals, earning a Friday date with Dartmouth in Albany, N.Y. Once again, their irrepressible left wing has been their alarm clock. It's Tyler Time.

"A switch goes off in him when March hits," says left wing Rob Fried, who has been Kolarik's teammate since their Deerfield days.

Between Thanksgiving weekend and Valentine's Day, Kolarik managed just three goals. During the last four games, he has scored that many, all on the power play.

"When the game is on the line, Tyler wants the puck," says coach Mark Mazzoleni. "And he delivers."

If Kolarik's production soars during tournament time, his teammates say, it may be because he sees no difference between a Tuesday game in November and the ECAC finals. He's always all-ahead full.

"We'll be at Princeton playing in front of 200 people," says Crimson captain Kenny Smith, "and Tyler will be playing like it's the final game in Albany."

And when it's the final game in Albany, as it was the last two years, Kolarik does whatever it takes to get on the ice, whether or not all of his parts are in working order.

"He's a warrior," said Fried.

Two years ago, with his broken right thumb in a cast, Kolarik scored the winning goal against Cornell in overtime to bring Harvard its first conference title since 1994. Last year, a separated left shoulder seemed all but certain to keep Kolarik out of the final.

"I had to talk Coach Mazz into letting me play," he says. "The doctor didn't think I was ready. So I had kind of a tryout during the pregame skate."

And ended up scoring what might have been another tournament-winner, had Cornell not tied the game with its net empty and gone on to prevail in overtime.

"Tyler has so much heart," says Smith. "He kind of wills things out there."

Like the no-angle goal Kolarik scored from behind the line last weekend on Brown goalie Yann Danis, who'd stoned Harvard twice in the regular season.

"I fired it because he didn't look ready," shrugged Kolarik. "I just figured, why not?"

That's the Kolarik credo: "You can't be afraid to put the pill on." That's why he took the shot that ended the 96-minute marathon against Cornell in 2002. "There wasn't a lot behind that shot," he concedes. "But you never know."

So when in doubt, Kolarik puts the pill on -- 120 shots this year, most on the team. And as often as not, he's shooting from the middle of Bloody Nose Alley, right in front of the crease, flailing away with his stick as if it's a shillelagh.

"He always has stitches in his face," testifies Smith.

Nobody on the team performs with less concern for cosmetic features than Kolarik, the player most likely to be sliding in front of your slapshot with chin exposed.

"Physical disregard," nods Kolarik, who says it comes from his days as a tailback at Deerfield, where he was named to the Massachusetts chapter of the High School Football Hall of Fame.

"Whenever Tyler got the ball, he'd have three guys hanging on him," Fried recalls. "He refused to go down."

It was Kolarik's intensity and passion and toughness, plus an undeniable scoring touch, that made him one of Harvard's prize recruits four years ago.

"He was one of the five elite players coming out of prep school hockey," says Mazzoleni. "That was a real coup for us. It put us on the map that we could woo a kid like that to come here."

Kolarik, who that year was the first US-born player ever drafted by the Columbus Blue Jackets (in the fifth round), stepped in and stepped up, scoring 13 goals and making the ECAC all-tournament team in 2001 (as the top point scorer), even though Harvard was bounced in the semis.

That was where the Mr. March reputation began. Kolarik was the tournament's Most Outstanding Player two years ago and now that he's not cast in plaster or swaddled in tape ("It's a nice feeling going to Albany in one piece"), nobody is betting against him this week.

"He gets the whole team going," says Smith.

It's all about the intensity, the passion, and the energy, which is why Mazzoleni decided to put Kolarik with frisky freshmen Kevin Du and Steve Mandes for the stretch run. Who else is hyper enough to keep up with him?

"I'm glad I don't have to defend them," says Smith. "They're all going a hundred miles an hour. But I love it when I'm out there with them, because I know I'll be spending the shift on the point. And I know if I'm open, they'll be getting me the puck."

None of his teammates will have to wonder where Kolarik will be this weekend. He'll be skating his shift, working the power play, killing penalties. And he'll be in the middle of the scrum, where the goals come from. If the vernal equinox is approaching and Harvard's hockey team is making another run, it must be Tyler Time.

This story ran on page F1 of the Boston Globe on 3/16/2004.
© Copyright 2003 Globe Newspaper Company.

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