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Five months of work, injuries, wins, losses and road trips will cumulate in just two games when the University of Maine women’s hockey team enters their biggest series of the season against Boston College this weekend.
The Black Bears, who are currently holding the fourth and final playoff spot in Hockey East, head down to Beantown with the Eagles just one point behind in the standings. In order for UMaine to make the playoffs, they have to sweep BC. Earlier this season, the Black Bears played host to the Eagles who won the first game of the series. UMaine was able to come back and tie the second game.
“We came out pretty strong and we wanted to set the tone for the weekend by knowing what to do in certain situations,” said UMaine head coach Guy Perron. “The team who won last weekend was the team who executed the most and that’s what we did. We are back were we want to be and this is a playoff weekend.”
“Our players are confident and we have to get a little more healthy than usual and after these next few practices, its playoff time,” said Perron.
UMaine is coming off of a successful weekend that saw them demolish Northeastern with a combined score of 8-2. The majority of those goals were scored on Saturday when the Black Bears’ five-goal barrage was jump-started by a defense that either scored or assisted on four of the goals. Besides putting points on the board, the defense was also able to shut out the Huskies on Saturday. Also, even though Friday’s game may have seen the defense give up two goals, they were still able to hold the Huskies to three shots in the first period.
“We have some pretty offensive defensemen and Julie and Kelly got some great shots and we were able to create off of the rebounds,” said defenseman and assistant captain Laura Maddin.
“All the girls know it’s a big weekend and you can’t worry about it and not stress, so the atmosphere is pretty calm. The nice part about this weekend is knowing that our fate is our hands. ”
The Eagles saw mixed results over the weekend. They defeated former top-10 team and Hockey East rival Providence College on Friday. Although the Friars lost 4-1 in their first game, they were able to beat BC by a goal the next day.
In order to prepare for what they may see this weekend, Perron had the team focus on BC’s style of play. UMaine focused on clearing the puck and being able to make a solid cross-ice pass during practice. Outside of concentrating on what to expect on defense, the Black Bears finished the day’s practice by doing some work on winning face-offs. According to Perron, one thing the team will work on over the remaining practice will be special teams.
“Obviously our expectations are to take both games away from BC,” said forward Danielle Tangredi. “We have to go in thinking positive and the playoff chase is really exciting – it does not get better than this as a freshman because you never know what to expect.”
“Practice gets more and more fun everyday and it doesn’t get stressful because we just work on the things we need to do,” said Trangredi.
Bangor Daily News