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The University of Maine men’s ice hockey team is dangerously close to entering a room they have not visited for a long time – the Hockey East basement.
With one month left in the season, the Black Bears stand just ahead of Merrimack in Hockey East at 4-10-3 in the conference and 8-13-3 overall. Climb the standings list eight slots and find UMaine’s competition this weekend – first-place University of New Hampshire Wildcats.
This time around, the heated rivalry between UNH and UMaine feels much different than past years when the teams battled near the top of the rankings. The young Black Bear squad is struggling to fight its way into a position to gain a playoff berth, while UNH appears to be cruising with a record of 16-7-1 overall and 12-4-1 in Hockey East. With just a few weekends left in the season, UMaine needs to pick up huge wins against the perpetually talented Hockey East competitors UNH, Boston University, UMass, Vermont and UMass-Lowell.
“This is now-or-never time for us,” Head Coach Tim Whitehead said. “When you combine this with the fact that we’re playing our biggest rivals in UNH, it should be a very intense weekend and exciting pair of hockey games.”
UMaine is coming off a difficult weekend in Massachusetts, where they lost one game to each UMass team. Saturday’s game against UMass-Amherst was especially difficult to swallow. The Minutemen fired on UMaine goaltender Ben Bishop’s net all night. Despite the fact that Bishop turned away 49 UMass shots on goal – a new career high for Big Ben – five found the twine by the time the onslaught ended in a 5-3 UMaine loss.
Much like his British counterpart, Big Ben has become a landmark for UMaine Athletics. This season he has surrendered 60 goals, which may not sound impressive until you consider that he has stopped the puck 631 times, giving him a .913 save percentage. In comparison, UNH’s Kevin Reagan, often considered one of Hockey East’s finer goalies, has allowed 45 goals but has seen far fewer shots. His save percentage of .922 only slightly outshines Bishop’s.
“‘Bish’ [Bishop] has been such a steady performer for us and given us every opportunity to win hockey games. I’m very proud of how he’s fighting through a very challenging season with a young team. He seems to be getting sharper and sharper down the stretch,” Whitehead said.
Most of the team’s problems in UMass were brought on by penalties, according to Whitehead. The Black Bears were forced to play shorthanded in power play after power play, skaters got tired and UMass’ shot totals swelled as a result.
“We addressed it quite harshly over the weekend and again in practice on Monday,” Whitehead said. “So the players understand that we can’t expect to take high penalty minutes in a game and still expect to come out on top.”
As is always the case, UMaine had a formidable opponent in UNH. The Wildcats have one of the top defensive corps and goaltenders in the conference and plenty of offensive weapons.
“We’re going to have to bring our very best game. Our players are confident that on any given night we can beat anybody and we’re going to have to prove that this weekend,” Whitehead said.
The Black Bears have a few weapons of their own set to return to the ice soon. Forwards Keenan Hopson and Chris Hahn are slated to return from long absences – due to injury – for the UNH game. Billy Ryan is expected to be in playing form for the weekend against BU, and the following weekend against UMass. Hahn has been out for a long time after he broke a finger during a game and then broke his jaw in his first practice back with the team. Whitehead hopes the return of three of his offensive powerhouses will help boost his team.
The sense of urgency for this weekend has reached desperation for a UMaine team that isn’t used to seeing itself near the bottom of the ladder.
“We’ve got to scrap and claw for every point just to make the playoffs,” Whitehead said. “This is unfamiliar territory for us. We’ve got to play desperate, and with intensity, without taking penalties.”
In other UMaine Hockey news, UMaine senior defenseman Brett Tyler has been nominated as a semi-finalist for the Walter Brown Award, an honor given to the best American-born hockey player in New England.
Tyler leads the Black Bears with six goals and 10 assists for 16 points. He is tied for the team-lead in both goals and assists.
“This season, where we’ve lost so much firepower offensively, Brett’s been our leader on offense as a defenseman,” Whitehead said of the versatile Maynard, Mass. native. “Occasionally that gets him into trouble when the other team transitions back toward our end, but for the most part he’s made a tremendous impact on our team over the past four years. This is certainly well-deserved honor for him and in my opinion he’s one of the best defensemen you’ll see in Hockey East.”
