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The University of Maine’s hockey team had not beaten the University of Connecticut this season, losing twice and skating to a 2-2 overtime tie.
But the Black Bears won the most important one so far, a 5-2 victory over the Huskies at the TD Garden in Boston on Friday night for their first Hockey East tournament championship since 2004.
Graduate student center and co-captain Lynden Breen and sophomore right wing Josh Nadeau staked UMaine to a 2-0 lead in the first period and the Black Bears never looked back.
UMaine had to go double overtime late Thursday night to beat Northeastern 4-3 on Thursday night but showed no signs of fatigue.
Senior center Harrison Scott extended the lead to 3-0 late in the second period and senior left wing and UMass transfer Taylor Makar scored a pair of third-period goals.
UConn junior left wing Tabor Heaslip scored both UConn goals.
UMaine improved to 24-7-6 while UConn fell to 22-11-4 after having its nine-game unbeaten streak snapped (8-0-1).
UConn was without graduate student center and third-leading Hudson Schandor, who was injured.
UMaine and UConn will both move on to the NCAA tournament. The Black Bears will be a number one seed.
Breen opened the scoring at the 12:47 of the first period with his seventh goal of the season and Nadeau converted on the power play 3:42 later.
It was Nadeau’s 10th.
Nadeau set up Breen’s goal by flipping a soft pass to him from the defensive zone.
The puck landed behind a Huskies defenseman so Breen was able to skate on to it which created a two-on-one with Owen Fowler.
Breen raced down the right wing, sliced across to the inner half of the right faceoff circle and fired a wrist shot between UConn goaltender Tyler Muszelik’s legs.
Nadeau made it 2-0 with a scintillating rink-length rush.
He picked up the puck from UMaine goalie Albin Boija in the defensive zone, sprinted down the ice with a full head of steam and then split a pair of Husky defensemen before shooting back across the grain to beat Muszelik, who had moved from his right to his left to try to cut down the angle.
Boija earned an assist which was the second of his career.
The Huskies came out fast in the second period and generated the first 12 shot attempts and five shots on goal.
But Boija made some saves and the Black Bears eventually expanded the lead when Scott notched his team-leading 18th with 3:23 left in the middle period.
UMaine senior defenseman and co-captain David Breazeale skated onto a loose puck high in the slot and took a wrist shot that hit a Husky player’s stick and popped in the air.
UConn defenseman Trey Scott swatted at the puck and got a piece of it but it dropped down in front of Scott, who swiped it out of the air through Muszelik’s pads.
Heaslip made it 3-1 3:11 into the third period when he got open in the low slot and one-timed a nice pass from behind the net by Kaden Shahan past Boija.
