If you are a University of Maine hockey fan, don’t panic.
It would be easy to do so after the Black Bears were outshot 38-18 in a 2-2 exhibition game tie with New Hampshire at Bowdoin College’s Sidney J. Watson Arena in Brunswick last Friday night.
The simple truth is that the nationally ranked defending Hockey East Tournament champion Black Bears (6th in one poll, 8th in the other) are going to be a work in progress for at least the first half of the season. When you have 13 newcomers and lose players who scored 64 of your 124 goals in 2024-25, you have to be patient.
UNH deserved to win the game. The Wildcats jumped out to a 2-0 lead and carried the play most of the game.
But when you have been to two consecutive NCAA Tournaments, you have developed a positive culture and a mindset that no matter how much you are getting outplayed, you still believe you are going to find a way to earn a win or a tie.
That’s what the Black Bears did, and that’s a good sign.
Another good sign is that not only do you have a returning second team All-American and All-Hockey East goalie in Albin Boija, you now have a second goalie in Mathis Rousseau who was the starting goalie for Team Canada in the World Junior Championships in 2023-24 and posted a 3-2 record, a 2.00 goals-against average and a .912 save percentage.
On Friday night, Boija stopped 17 of 18 shots and Rousseau rejected 19 of 20 shots, including a game-changing shorthanded breakaway by veteran Cy LeClerc in the third period with UNH holding a 2-1 lead.
The goalies will be pivotal and will have to do some heavy lifting while 12 of the 13 newcomers adapt to college hockey.
The other newcomer, Max Scott, brother of 2024-25 UMaine scoring leader Harrison Scott, played two years at Brown University before transferring to UMaine this year so he does have U.S. college hockey experience.
UMaine fifth-year head coach Ben Barr had 12 newcomers in the lineup including seven of the 13 forwards and four of the eight defensemen along with goalie Rousseau. The team is still trying to find its identity after having more experience the past two seasons, he said.
“The guys played hard but they just weren’t very connected. Nothing was clean: the breakouts, the forechecks. We weren’t very good systematically. It was kind of herky-jerky, to be honest,” Barr said.
Part of the problem was that UNH had a big edge in experience up front with eight forwards having at least 61 college games under their belts compared to UMaine’s four. UNH head coach Mike Souza and his staff recruit speed because UNH’s rink in the Whittemore Center is five feet wider than the standard 200-by-85 feet college rink.
Three of the Black Bears’ major personnel losses were centers Lynden Breen, Harrison Scott and Nolan Renwick, who left after having played 144, 140 and 132 career games, respectively. They took the vast majority of faceoffs last season with Scott winning 56.7 percent of his, Renwick winning 56.3 percent and Breen winning 52.2 percent.
You can’t underestimate the value of faceoffs.
“They determine whether you start with the puck or without it,” said Barr. “You don’t think a lot about it until you start losing a lot of faceoffs. We got better as the game went along but we really struggled in the first half of the game.”
Nine of the 13 newcomers are from the Canadian Hockey League’s three Major Junior Leagues. Two of those leagues play 68 regular season games (Ontario Hockey League, Western Hockey League) and the other plays 64 (Quebec Maritimes Junior Hockey League). U.S. college teams are allowed to play just 34 regular season games.
This is the first year Major Junior players are eligible to play college hockey because the NCAA used to consider them professionals since they received financial stipends.
We have now moved into the Wild West era of college sports where athletes are earning money through endorsement deals and other NCAA-legalized payoffs. So virtually anything goes. Major Junior players are adjusting to having much more practice time and half as many games.
They don’t have the time and space with the puck they used to have because the speed of the game is faster. They have to make quicker decisions and they have to figure out how to play well without the puck.
That will come with experience. That’s why they are here: to develop their games against older, more experienced players to help them prepare for future pro careers while also getting an education. Having 12 of their 17 home games before Christmas will certainly help because they will benefit from the home ice advantage.
Plenty of mistakes are going to be made but it is of the utmost importance that they learn from their mistakes and don’t repeat them.
The goal is to keep getting better and peak at the end of the season.
Barr said playing UNH in front of a sold-out crowd at Bowdoin was “great” for the team.
“Ben and his group were great to us,” said Barr referring to Bowdoin College men’s hockey coach and former UMaine player, assistant and interim head coach Ben Guite.
UMaine opens the season by hosting defending Atlantic Hockey America regular season champion Holy Cross (Mass.) on Friday and Saturday nights at 7 p.m. at the newly renovated Alfond Arena.
