WATERVILLE — Former UMass-Lowell coach Blaise MacDonald became the 18th men’s hockey coach in Colby College history, the school announced Friday.

MacDonald replaces Stan Moore, who went 7-15-1 in one season as interim coach. Moore was hired after the resignation of Jim Tortorella, who was 230-138-33 in 16 seasons at Colby.

In 10 seasons as head coach at UMass-Lowell, MacDonald compiled a 150-178-44 record. The River Hawks never made it to the NCAA tournament under MacDonald, but did reach the Hockey East championship game in 2009. MacDonald and the school parted ways after UMass-Lowell finished 5-25-4 in 2010-11.

Lowell’s coach before MacDonald was current University of Maine coach Tim Whitehead, who went 76-93-11 in five years at the school.

MacDonald was also the first-ever men’s hockey coach at Niagara, and had a 91-58-17 record there in five seasons. He served as assistant coach and later recruiting coordinator and associate head coach at Boston University from 1990 to 1996. The Terriers won the Division I national championship in 1995. In those six years at BU, McDonald coached 23 future NHL players.

“As long as you have standards of excellence, it doesn’t really matter what level of play you are at,” MacDonald said in a press release. “You can be a player who exceeds expectations or be a high performer for the team as long as you have standards of excellence.”

MacDonald also served as an assistant coach at Darmouth, Princeton, and UMass-Lowell.
He graduated from the Rochester Institute of Technology in 1985 and helped RIT to Division II national titles in 1983 and 1985.

He had 13 goals and 106 assists in his collegiate playing career and was inducted into the RIT Hall of Fame in 1991.