Last year, Ray Sawada ’08 was a co-captain of head coach Mike Schafer’s Cornell hockey team that lost to Harvard in the ECAC Hockey tournament semifinals. This year, Sawada, the 52nd overall draft pick in the 2004 NHL entry draft, found himself playing for the Dallas Stars, alongside professional hockey all-stars like Mike Modano, Marty Turco and Brenden Morrow.
For most of the 2008-09 hockey season, Sawada was skating for the Manitoba Moose of the American Hockey League. Sawada has so far netted five goals and 10 assists in 49 games for the Moose, a team that is currently in first place in the AHL.