2021–22 Air Force Falcons men's ice hockey season

The 2021–22 Air Force Falcons men's ice hockey season is the 54th season of play for the program and the 16th season in the Atlantic Hockey conference. The Falcons represented the United States Air Force Academy and were coached by Frank Serratore, in his 25th season.
==Season==
After the worst season for the program in 25 years and likely its most trying, Air Force returned to the ice ready to put COVID-19 in the past. At the start, senior netminder and team co-captain, Alex Schilling, got the starting role but didn't perform particularly well. The Falcons got off to a 2–5–1 start with Schilling allowing nearly 5 goals a game on average. Despite the horrid start, Frank Serratore stuck with Schilling and the goals against slowly declined as the team got into its conference schedule.
A bad stretch at home in November sent the Falcons to the bottom of the Atlantic Hockey standings. While they recovered a bit by taking a series against Canisius, Air Force opened the second half of its season getting swept by American International. Fortunately, the rest of January was kind to the Falcons and they won five of their next six games to pull back into the middle of the pack. The team was up and down in the final month of the regular season and Air Force ended up 6th, guaranteeing them a bye into the conference quarterfinals, but making them do so on the road.
Air Force began its postseason against their fellow service academy, Army. The first game was a see-saw battle that saw both teams take two 1-goal leads. The Falcon offense opened up on Army's goal, firing 51 shots in nearly 4 periods of work and managed to earn the overtime victory. The second match was just as close with the teams again trading leads but, again, Air Force netted a goal in overtime to sweep the series and make the semifinals. Their match against RIT turned out to be a series of short-lived leads for Air Force as the Tigers tied the game quickly on three separate occasions. Near the mid-point of the third, however, the Falcons finally were able to hold onto their lead and fended RIT off for the final 10 minutes to send the team to the championship game. Air Force's season ended with a thud when the team was completely dominated by AIC, 0–7. The Falcons kept the game close initially, but the team got into penalty trouble, taking 40 minutes worth of infractions, and allowed four power play goals.
==Departures==
Erik Anderson 	Goaltender		Graduation (retired)
Marshall Bowery 	Forward 		Graduation (retired)
Thomas Daskas 	Forward 		Transferred to Miami
Max Harper 	Forward 		Graduation (retired)
Noah Kim 	Defenseman		Transferred to Wisconsin–River Falls
Shawn Knowlton 	Forward 		Graduation (retired)
Zach LaRocque 	Goaltender		Graduation (retired)
Jacob Levin 	Defenseman		Graduation (retired)
Keenan Lund 	Forward 		Transferred to Augsburg
Alex Mehnert 	Defenseman		Graduation (retired)
Zachary Mirageas	Defenseman		Graduation (retired)
==Recruiting==
Guy Blessing 	Goaltender		20	Chandler, AZ
Lucas Coon 	Forward 		19	Steamboat Springs, CO
Jack Conroy 	Forward 		21	Chicago, IL
Clay Cosentino 	Forward 		21	Framingham, MA
Andrew DeCarlo 	Forward 		21	Huntington Beach, CA
Mitchell Digby 	Forward 		21	Ottawa Lake, MI
Jason Kleinhans	Forward 		20	Herndon, VA
Jasper Lester 	Defenseman		21	Colorado Springs, CO
Frederick Paine	Defenseman		20	Duluth, MN
Jackson Sabo 	Forward 		20	Rosemount, MN
Austin Schwartz	Forward 		20	Parker, CO
Drake Usher 	Defenseman		21	Upland, CA
==Roster==
As of August 23, 2021.
==Standings==
==Schedule and results==
|-
!colspan=12 style=";" | Exhibition
|-
!colspan=12 style=";" | Regular Season
|-
!colspan=12 style=";" | 
|- align="center" bgcolor="#e0e0e0"
|colspan=12|Air Force Won Series 2–0
==Scoring statistics==
 	F 	35	16	13 	29 	73
 	F 	32	11	14 	25 	16
 	D 	36	3 	22 	25 	22
 	F 	36	7 	17 	24 	18
 	F 	33	11	11 	22 	19
 	D 	34	6 	13 	19 	38
 	F 	34	5 	14 	19 	21
 	D 	36	6 	12 	18 	33
 	D 	35	6 	10 	16 	54
 	F 	36	4 	11 	15 	20
 	F 	36	5 	5 	10 	10
 	F 	36	3 	5 	8 	10
 	F 	33	2 	5 	7 	58
 	F 	36	5 	2 	7 	10
 	F 	36	1 	6 	7 	4
 	RW	31	3 	3 	6 	11
 	D 	36	1 	3 	4 	37
 	D 	21	1 	2 	3 	6
 	F 	7 	2 	0 	2 	6
 	D 	23	1 	0 	1 	0
 	F 	2 	0 	0 	0 	0
 	G 	2 	0 	0 	0 	0
 	F 	2 	0 	0 	0 	0
 	G 	5 	0 	0 	0 	0
 	D 	5 	0 	0 	0 	2
 	G 	8 	0 	0 	0 	0
 	D 	27	0 	0 	0 	12
 	G 	34	0 	0 	0 	0
Total	 	 	99	168	267	480
==Goaltending statistics==
 	11	80 	0 	0 	0	3 	31 	0	.912	2.23
 	17	198 	2 	1 	0	10 	80 	1	.889	3.02
 	34	1897	14	16	3	111	802	2	.878	3.51
 	5 	13 	0 	0 	0	2 	4 	0	.667	9.27
Empty Net	- 	23 	- 	- 	-	1 	- 	-	- 	-
Total 	36	2212	16	17	3	127	917	3	.878	3.44
==Rankings==
Poll 	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week	Week
Poll 	Pre 	1 	2 	3 	4 	5 	6 	7 	8 	9 	10 	11 	12 	13 	14 	15 	16 	17 	18 	19 	20 	21 	22 	23 	24 	25 (Final)
USCHO.com	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	- 	NR
USA Today	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR 	NR
Note: USCHO did not release a poll in week 24.
==References==
Category:Air Force Falcons men's ice hockey seasons
Air Force Falcons
Air Force Falcons