BOSTON – He steps away from the microphone and off the stage quietly.

“Tim, mind if I talk to you for a second?”

As always, Tim Turner is more than glad to grant yet another interview, masking the pain he is doubtlessly feeling with a smile.

When the final horn sounded at the Fleet Center March 14 – ending UMass’ season by way of a 5-4 UNH victory in the Hockey East Semifinals – Turner went limp. The weight of four years for the Minutemen, and the weight of his finest season ever, was too heavy for the senior to bear standing up. His slouched glide across the ice sent him into a group of celebrating Wildcats, which he simply bounced off of and continued his trip back to the locker room.

Turner completed his UMass career with 107 points, fourth-most in the school’s history. And yet, he is one of the forgotten five, UMass’ oft-overlooked upperclassmen from this season – lost every time someone mentions the Maroon and White as a team featuring 24 freshmen and sophomores. Still, always the leader, Turner is quick to point at his youthful teammates as a source of the success of the Minutemen this year.

“I can’t say enough about our newcomers, it was a privilege for me to be on the same ice as those guys,” he said. “To come back from two down twice against UNH is amazing to me, and it’s happened all year, and we pay a lot of that to the young guys, and it was so fun to be out there with those guys. I’m just glad that my last year was with a group of guys such as that.”

But Turner is just as responsible for the jump that UMass made this year as any other talent on the ice donning the maroon and white. Along with co-captain Kelly Sickavish, Turner took on the task of speeding along the maturation of such a youthful squad. Being the ever-motivating leader. Giving his all at every turn.

“One of the things we’ve been trying to do over the three years as a coaching staff is figure out who would buy into the whole process of what we’re trying to do…we felt we really had to get these guys to understand what the commitment needs to be at this level in order to compete successfully,” UMass coach Don Cahoon said. “Kelly and Tim were as good as we had in that regard, they led by example, they led by being positive influences for their teammates, they led by their competitive spirits.”

And in the second period, Turner put home goal number 45 of his career, one he called “probably the best goal I’ve ever scored,” finishing off a two-on-one with Mike Warner.

“To watch it go in the net and see the crowd rise to their feet was one of the most amazing things I’ve ever been in.”

He may have escaped the glance of many people watching the growth of the UMass program, but he is certainly a person through whom that growth has flourished. Hats off to a classy character and a great hockey player.

Matt Brady is a Collegian Columnist.