Little Gavin McCarthy lay face-down in the snowbank that lined the ice, his miniature frame looking more like a crumpled checking dummy than a hockey player.
Gavin caught his breath, brushed the snow off his helmet cage and charged back onto the ice — if only to be crushed back into the snow seconds later by his older brother, Case. Fighting back was a tough proposition. After all, Case was five years older and double Gavin’s size.
Such was life at the McCarthys’ backyard ice rink in upstate New York, where Gavin, Case and their brother, Aiden, spent countless hours during the winter.
The physicality was all in good fun, but those brotherly scraps and hits have come to define Gavin and Case as they’ve grown into hard-checking defensemen for the Boston University men’s hockey team.
When Gavin, a freshman, and Case, a graduate student and BU’s captain, suit up together for the Terriers this fall, it will mark the first time that the brothers team up for an organized hockey squad.
“It’s amazing,” Gavin said. “I never thought I would really have this opportunity with him.”
Case agreed.
“It’s awesome,” he said. “It’s weird having him here, because the first four years I didn’t expect to play with him. But I’m super grateful to have the opportunity.”
Because of the five-year age gap between the two brothers, Gavin and Case had never overlapped in school or in the junior hockey ranks. But Case gained an extra year of NCAA eligibility after COVID-19 halted BU’s 2020-21 season. He elected to use it and return for a fifth season, especially after suffering a serious upper-body injury in the Hockey East semifinals that kept him sidelined for the Terriers’ run to the Frozen Four last year.
Meanwhile, Gavin developed into a highly-touted prospect after three years with the Buffalo Jr. Sabres and a stint with the USHL’s Muskegon Lumberjacks last season. The Western New York native was selected by his hometown team, the Buffalo Sabres, in the third round of the 2023 NHL Draft.
Through Case’s recruitment — which began when he was just 15 — Gavin got a behind-the-scenes look at BU’s program and facilities as a 10-year-old.
That early exposure to the program played a role in Gavin’s decision to commit years later. Case encouraged Gavin to explore his options and pick the school that was right for him, but Gavin called the decision to commit to BU a “no-brainer.”
“[Case] couldn’t be more happy that I ended up here, because he loves it here,” Gavin said.
Case has been a resource off the ice, too, texting Gavin paragraphs explaining the ins and outs of BU’s ever-confusing dining plan system. Case also convinced Gavin to take the exact same course schedule Case took his first semester — a gauntlet that includes microeconomics and calculus.
“It’s definitely a tough schedule,” Gavin said with a laugh. “I don’t know if I should keep taking his suggestions.”
Joseph McCarthy, Case and Gavin’s father, likes to call hockey the “cornerstone” of the McCarthy family.
“Sports in general are a good learning lesson for kids, and we use hockey in that same aspect,” Joseph said. “It wasn’t an NHL dream or a college team from a young age, but we used hockey as a teaching lesson for day-to-day life, whether that’s working within a team, working with people with different views, or learning to work through failure.”
Joseph, a former Navy SEAL, played hockey through high school before joining the military. The McCarthys started their family near Albany, N.Y., but uprooted and moved to the Buffalo area, which allowed the kids to play youth hockey in nearby Canada.
“At that point, we dedicated ourselves to the sport for them,” said Joseph. Case was 12 years old then. Gavin was seven.
Clearly, that sacrifice has paid off. Case has played in over 100 BU hockey games and was selected by the New Jersey Devils in the fourth round of the 2019 NHL Draft. Gavin has been projected as an everyday player at the NHL level.
For now, they’re focusing on the season ahead, and the unique opportunity to play with one another.
“You’re around each other at home, but BU is a home away from home, so now I can bring him into my community for the past couple years,” Case said. “It definitely played a role into my decision to come back. There’s not many opportunities you’ll get to play with your brother at this level. ”
Recent Comments