Thirty years later with a name change to both the school and the team, the University of Massachusetts Lowell claimed their first Hockey East regular season title and HEA Tournament championship in 2013.

The roots of the current hockey program can be traced back to when the university was called the Lowell Technological Institute (LTI).

Bobby Orr and the Big Bad Bruins of the late 1960s and early 1970s helped grow the game during the Baby Boomer era in Massachusetts.

Games were played mostly at Skate 3 Ice Arena in Tyngsboro, and it was still technically UMass Lowell's home rink during their first Division 2 Championship run in 1979.

The coaching staff became the foreman and applied for federal job training grants in order to bring in tradespeople to help with the work.

[5] During the team's formative years in the early 1970s, the Chiefs had no conference affiliation besides a loose one with surrounding schools in the ECAC.

By the mid-1970s, Riley had started to assemble the core of players who would lead to UMass Lowell to their first national championship: Tom Jacobs from Hudson, Dean Jenkins from Billerica, and future NHL regular Craig McTavish.

Merrimack's hockey program was what Lowell had aspired to be: a national contender with a modern home rink on campus.

With the help of his student section, dubbed the "Wild Men," Riley wanted to crack the Merrimack goalie, Gilles Moffet, as their defensive depth had taken an early season hit.

The leader of the Wild Men went as far as to send super-imposed pictures of a turkey attached to the Merrimack Goalie to his dorm room.

Even Coach Riley had a troll up his sleeve and sent the Wild Men's leader up to New Hampshire to purchase a turkey and tie it up in front of the Merrimack goal.

[6] Still playing at Skate 3 Tyngsboro, Coach Riley sought to distill an attitude of us against the world, according to members of the 1979 Chiefs team.

After that point, UMass Lowell went 24–2 and with the addition of future All-American Paul Lohnes, of the Blue Line, and Mark Jenkins, who had transferred from Union forgoing a pro contract to use his last year of eligibility to play with his brother Dean.

129 a permanent home for the Chiefs, the program was rewarded with two more national championships, in 1981 & 1982, with same core group of guys from the 1979 run.

The strategy worked until Poulin, who had been sent off the ice early, ran into some "trouble" in the locker room underneath the stands.

The rink manager came over to me while the second period was still going and said, 'Listen, Billy, that big forward Poulin from Plattsburgh pulled the pipes right out of the wall.

During this time the rivalry with Merrimack was a more even match, the hate, or one might say envy, for the school in North Andover burned the same in Coach Riley.

The Chiefs had beaten them as a D2 school and one could speculate did not want to view Lowell on the same level as fellow institutions joining Hockey East.

[7] Lowell's transition to Division 1 was led by Chelmsford Native and future NHL stalwart Jon Morris.

Northeastern Coach and Gold Medal Winner Ben Smith gave Morris the nickname of Ghost, "He'd be in front of their defensemen, then vanish and reappear behind them. "

Jon Morris is still the All-Time Leading Scorer in Hockey East History recording 177 points over his 4 years with the Chiefs.

At the time there was an NCAA investigation into the program due to a pep talk between the 2nd and 3rd period of a game against Boston University.

Norm Bazin now coach of the River Hawks was recruited by Riley and donned the "Ranger" style era Lowell across his chest at the Tully.

The Chiefs were showing signs of things to come with Dwayne Roloson in net and the suburb first line pairing of Mike Murray and Shane Henry.

Freshman phenom and Hockey East leading scorer Greg Bullock made his debut with the Chiefs in 1993–1994.

Crowder was able to scale the mountain that was Boston University in February 1994 and played a memorably infamous home series against Maine the following weekend.

Due to an academic scandal with the Maine Hockey program, Lowell has been retroactively rewarded wins for this series.

Given at At-Large bid in the 1994 NCAA Tournament Lowell was sent West and was forced to play a de facto home game against Michigan State at Munn Ice Arena in East Lansing in the 1st round.

During the first overtime, Minnesota Jeff Nielsen potted the game-winning goal off of a Lowell turnover ending the hopes of a Frozen Four appearance.

The following is a list of people associated with the Massachusetts–Lowell men's ice hockey program who were elected into the University of Massachusetts Lowell Athletic Hall of Fame (induction date in parentheses).