Twitter
Facebook
Reddit
Digg
Tell us what you think!Send a letter to the editor about this or any other article in The Maine Campus.
For the Maine men’s hockey team, six months has come down to 48 hours. The adversity, pain and frustration endured in the struggle to return to the NCAA tournament will gain a measure of qualification after the Black Bears close out the regular season with a pair of games against Providence.
This is a weekend ripe with possibilities for Maine. If the roof should fall in, this being a Friar sweep accompanied by Boston University winning twice, the Black Bears could drop to fifth place in Hockey East and hit the road for the first round of the playoffs. Should Maine win both games, the team faces the possibility of finishing second in the conference. Should this happen, it would represent an amazing recovery for a team that has inhabited the middle ground of the conference standings for the last two months.
The reality of what may transpire this weekend lies somewhere in between these other two possibilities. Weekend sweeps in Hockey East are as rare as a clear explanation from Bill Clinton. Yet, this weekend looms large for another reason.
Maine is currently battling for the final spot in the PairWise rankings with Wisconsin and Nebraska-Omaha. These rankings are used by the NCAA to determine at-large bids to the tournament. What this means is that if the Black Bears take three points out of the weekend they’ll probably gain this final spot. If they stumble badly, they face the task of winning the Hockey East tournament in order to make it back to the NCAA’s.
The good news is that Maine is playing its best hockey of the season. The Black Bears, ranked 11th nationally, sport a 15-10-7 overall mark and stand at 10-7-5 in Hockey East. They are 5-1-1 in their last seven games and seem to have shaken off the effects of an offensive slump that plagued them for most of the season.
The bad news is that Providence is playing just as well. The eighth-ranked Friars (19-8-5, 13-6-3) will head north as winner in six of their last eight games (6-1-1). Providence is currently second in Hockey East with an outside shot at winning the regular season conference title should Boston College collapse.
The Friars are led by one of Hockey East’s most potent lines in Devin Rask, Peter Fregoe and Jon DiSalvatore. Rask leads the team in every offensive category. The sophomore forward has 18 goals and 26 assists. He’s notched seven power play tallies for a Providence club that converts on 20 percent of its man-advantage opportunities.
Fregoe comes in with 14-17-31 while DiSalvatore is at 7-15-22 on the season. This line represents over one-third of the total Friar goal production for the season.
Senior J.J. Picinic and junior Drew Omicioli have tallied 10 and 11 goals respectively giving the Friars a variety of scoring options throughout the lineup.
The Providence blueline is patrolled by a pair of dangerous two-way players in Matt Libby and Jay Leach. Libby with 10-18-28 is the quarterback of the Friar power play and a physical presence. Leach who has 18 assists to go with three goals, is a pinpoint passer and is rarely caught out of position.
Backing up the Friar attack is a pair of outstanding goaltenders. Nolan Schaefer is having a breakthrough season. The sophomore is currently 12-5-2 overall with a 2.22 goals against average and a remarkable .925 save percentage. Boyd Ballard, a senior, provides quality depth with a 7-3-3 mark and 2.68/.912.
With opponents only scoring 12 percent of the time on the power play, Providence is a team that has few chinks in the armor. The Black Bears will have to be at the top of their game to conjure up the kind of magic they hope for. Of late Maine has been able to win when they’ve needed to, a trait emblematic of a team playing with confidence.
The action begins at Alfond Arena on Friday with the regular season finale to follow on Saturday. Both games start at 7 p.m.
Bangor Daily News