Sullivan Mack ’25 had heard it all before.

The third-leading scorer on this year’s Cornell men’s hockey team, Mack has absorbed four years of inspirational, passionate, occasionally profane and always brutally honest locker-room talks from Mike Schafer ’86, the soon-to-be-retired Jay R. Bloom ’77 Head Coach of Men’s Hockey.

So when fellow members of a senior honor society asked Mack if he thought Schafer would be up for delivering the latest installment in Cornell’s “Last Lecture” series, he gave it a shot.

Credit: Ryan Young/Cornell University

“I mean, he’s given us some of the best pre-game speeches that I’ve been a part of, so I thought for him to be able to talk to the general student body would be an awesome opportunity,” said Mack, a forward from Anchorage, Alaska, who is bound for the American Hockey League.

Schafer agreed, and in the process undoubtedly made some “Last Lecture” history: This “last” lecture was also the lecturer’s first.

“Intimidating” is how Schafer – who last month coached his final game in a remarkable 30-year career at his alma mater – characterized the prospect of giving a lecture in an academic setting, which he did April 23 in Baker Lab.

The Last Lecture series, which began three decades ago and resumed this past fall following a five-year hiatus due to COVID, invites a respected professor or staff member to give a lecture as if it were their final one.

“When I talk to our players, or our alumni, when I talk for fundraising, that’s a little bit of a different venue,” he said. “I’m an expert in hockey and Cornell hockey, so it makes it a lot easier.

“But to really think about what you’d say in your ‘last lecture,’” he said, “and try to piece that all together with all the different things that you try to teach your players throughout the course of a four-year career is kind of intimidating.”

Schafer needn’t have worried. He had a rapt audience of students, student-athletes (including several of his own players), a professor or two and some alumni, many dressed in “Lynah Faithful” regalia.

“It was a huge honor to host Coach Schafer,” said Avery Look ’25, a biological sciences major from Queens and a member of the society that invited Schafer. “During our speaker selection process, we thought it was important to find someone who can bring people together and leave an audience inspired. With hockey being a huge part of Cornell culture and this being his final semester with the team, choosing Coach Schafer was a no-brainer.”

Among the approximately 600 in attendance – including around 100 in an overflow room, watching on Zoom – were his coaching compatriots: Casey Jones ’90, who will take over for Schafer behind the Big Red men’s bench next season; and Doug Derraugh ’91, the Everett Family Head Coach of Women’s Ice Hockey.

With no notes and no script, Schafer spoke “from the heart,” he said, touching on the lessons he learned both as the youngest of nine children growing up in Durham, Ontario; as a small-town kid arriving in 1982 at a major university, the first from his family to go to college; and as a defenseman for the Big Red.

“I still remember being at North Campus,” he said, “listening to all these kids talk about their achievements, and how smart they were, and I was like, ‘Oh, my God, I don’t belong here.’”

He soon proved that he did – earning athletic and academic awards from Cornell and ECAC Hockey, serving as team captain for two years and graduating from the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences with a degree in business management and marketing.

With a diploma in his hand but hockey in his blood, he stayed on East Hill for four years as an assistant coach under Brian McCutcheon ’71 before realizing “I needed to leave … I needed a challenge.” He headed to Kalamazoo, Michigan, to become an assistant coach at Western Michigan University.

After five years in the Midwest, Schafer returned to Cornell in 1995 and embarked on a coaching journey that included 561 victories (second all-time among Cornell coaches in any sport), 15 NCAA Tournament appearances, seven ECAC Hockey Tournament championships and six regular-season conference titles.

Schafer spoke passionately for nearly an hour, touching on themes of hard work; having a “growth mindset” – focusing on the process of getting better instead of the result you’re seeking; and what it means to be a contributor to your group, team, family and society.

“Go for the money, have success – but what are you going to do with it?” he asked. “Are you going to help others? Are you going to be in service to others? Are you going to use it wisely and be a strong person in your community? Those are things we talk about with our guys.”

He spoke of the legacy a person will leave, regardless of the records set, the championships won, the acclaim received.

“I just moved all my stuff out of my office – championship rings, coach of the year awards,” he said. “You know where they are? Where my wife (Diane ’86) put all my awards from college: in a bin in the basement, on a shelf. So the awards really mean nothing, in the sense of, ‘But how did I do it?’”

One of his closing themes was leadership – the fact that making the right decision for the organization is more important than trying to keep everyone happy. A tough decision will always make someone unhappy, Schafer said.

“I always thought, make the right decision, what your gut says, and live with it,” he said, “because then you can put your head down to sleep at night.”