00:29: Intro / Reacting to the Six Freshmen

13:00: Depth at Center

19:30: First Line Predictions

30:00: Boija the X-Factor

46:54: Frozen Apple Incoming! / Outro

00:29: Intro / Growing up in Bangor

13:00: Recruiting to UMaine

38:30: Pro Ranks Between America and Europe

43:00: Transitioning to Coaching

48:56: Early Impressions of this Year’s Freshmen / Outro

Intro / Nadeau & Djurasevic Depart: 00:28

Portalmania: 08:39

Turnover the New Norm?: 15:21

New Transfer Reactions: 35:32

Intro / Season in Review: 00:28
Player Awards: 32:40

NIL Landscape: 1:07:04

Regional Predictions / Outro: 1:23:00

00:28: Intro / Quick BC Takes

18:18: Where is the Barr Now?

30:25: Quick HE / Bracket Takes & Outro

Out with a whimper.

This confounding Maine Black Bears’ season ended in bitterly disappointing fashion on Friday night at the Conte Forum in Chestnut Hill as the Boston College Eagles soared past the Black Bears with a dominant 5-0 showing in the Hockey East Quarterfinals.

The Eagles move on to play down the road at TD Garden next weekend, while the Black Bears make the long trek back to Orono empty-handed and hearts broken, forced to relinquish their clutch on last season’s conference crown.

In the biggest game of the season, having to win to fight another day, Maine was second-best to Boston College in every area of the ice.

“We got what we deserved,” Head Coach Ben Barr said bluntly after the game. “I don’t think much went right [for us].”

Falling by five goals, it was the Black Bears’ joint-largest defeat of the season alongside a 6-1 loss at Providence on January 9th.

In the blink of an eye

The pre-game chatter amongst the thousands of blue and white-clad supporters that descended onto the Conte Forum was “which version of the Black Bears is going to show up tonight?”

Was it going to be the mighty Maine machine that raised their game into the stratosphere in the Mile High City, the best version of themselves who played to their highest, most complete potential throughout February?

Or were the traveling Alfonders going to witness the team that had let them down so many times before during this season, most recently last weekend in Vermont?

On Friday evening, the latter of the two-faced Black Bears showed up to the heartache of Mainiaks everywhere.

Maine’s season was put on life support even before all 5,695 in attendance had managed to escape the Boston traffic and take their seats, when Boston College stormed out to a commanding 2-0 lead in the blink of an eye.

A BC dumped puck took a home-ice carom off the end boards, falling kindly to the alert Teddy Stiga, who fired the hosts into an early lead.

39 seconds later, the Eagles were celebrating once again, the Conte crowd in a frenzy after James Hagens corralled his initial shot that went off a Black Bear shin guard and doubled Boston College’s advantage with the second attempt.

Two quick-fire strikes on BC’s third and fourth shots of the evening had Maine’s season suddenly hanging on by a thread, leaving Black Bear Nation shellshocked barely five minutes into the Quarterfinal.

“That first goal was, I think, a set play. They bank it off the backboards, and our D just gets beat up the ice, and then you’re down 1-0. That was really the first chance they probably had,” Barr said. “ They got two in the first five minutes or whatever. Then you’re just kind of playing on your heels the whole night.”

Two bad bounces for the Black Bears, on St. Patrick’s Day Weekend, the luck of the Irish was all with the Bostonians.

On the ropes just like that, Maine was kept completely at arm’s length for most of the first period, chasing the scoreboard and chasing the puck, which seemed to stick to the Eagles’ stick blades like glue.

Boston College dictated the game, playing a skilled and controlled puck possession game that felt like a cruel game of keep away from the Black Bears. Maine was never really able to implement their own brand of blue-collar hockey during the first period and break open the game, unable to wrangle the puck off the Eagles, who were skating circles around the visitors on the cycle in their offensive zone.

Boston College generated an expected goals total of 4.12 on Friday, which was tied for the third-highest xG allowed by the Black Bears this season, alongside an xGa of 4.12 in Maine’s 5-2 win over Denver on January 2nd, and behind an xGa of 4.13 in their 4-4 tie at Quinnipiac on October 17th and 4.29 xGa in aa 7-3 loss at Boston College on November 21st.

Meanwhile, Maine only had five shots on Louka Cloutier’s net in the opening stanza, three of which came during their first of three unsuccessful power plays, with BC completely controlling the pace of the game.

At times in the first, it felt like a cat toying with a mouse.

Although Boston College wasn’t allowing Maine to build up any sort of steam, the Black Bears still held the high-flying Eagles offense to only six shots on Mathis Rousseau’s net during the first period. It wasn’t as if the Black Bears were playing loose and feeding BC’s blistering transition game; Maine played a structured, defensively solid style that forced the Eagles to chip-and-chase. The problem was that Boston College forechecked hard, heavy, and relentlessly, hemming Maine into their own end and allowing the dangerous BC cycle to get to work.

“I thought we were okay. We were trying to take away their transition; we were playing in a way to keep them out of the middle of the ice. So they’re dumping the puck, and they were playing the way they needed to play,” Barr explained.

“We had a good start in the first period. Going up one and then two against a good team like that is enormous,” BC Head Coach Greg Brown said. “We were playing simple, we were getting pucks behind them, getting in on the forecheck, managing the puck really well.”

Unfortunately, on the fleeting occasions when Maine did have the puck on their tape, they often looked disjointed and out of sync with simple passes they’d made all season now skidding wayward, handing the puck right back to the Eagles.

The Black Bears’ best opportunity of the first period came in the final minute when Brandon Holt was able to walk into the high slot and fire Maine’s first clean look at the net, but shot wide.

Trouble finding traction

After being manhandled in the first period, Maine created a couple of grade-A scoring chances during a second-frame surge.

Desperately needing to score the next goal of the game and change the contest’s momentum, Maine was forced to stretch the game, with each team trading back-and-forth chances in the second period. Aggressively sending all three forwards up the ice into the neutral zone when breaking out of their defensive end, Maine was able to create a couple of scoring looks on the rush, but in doing so had to risk leaving themselves exposed for BC’s rapid north-south counterattack.

The Black Bears were denied a golden opportunity to cut the deficit in half when, to the agony of the traveling Alfond Faithful, Thomas Pichette clanked a rush chance wrist-shot off the inside of the post.

A few minutes later, Owen Fowler’s opportunity at the backpost during a fast-developing two-on-one was stuffed by Cloutier before Fowler’s second attempt on a forehand wraparound was denied.

“We had a bunch of chances in the second. Hit a pipe and had some other good looks. So if we get one of those, maybe you feel a little bit better about yourself,” Barr said. “We really needed to get one in the second.”

“They made a good push, especially in the second, and fortunately for us, Cloutier was there and made three really big saves that kept the multi-goal lead, which was huge for us. We survived the second,” Brown said. “There was a stretch there where it looked a little dicey.”

But even when Maine did gain a bit of momentum and offensive confidence, the Black Bears were never really able to sustain their offensive zone time, put Boston College against the ropes, ramp up the pressure, and establish a foothold in the O-zone. Much of this had to do with the Eagles routinely slipping past the Black Bears’ forecheck, finding open pockets to break out of their zone in the middle of the ice, not allowing Maine the ability to drag Boston College into the cave and get their forechecking game going. Brown credits Cloutier’s puck-touching ability in helping negate Maine’s forecheck by quickly reacting to rimmed pucks, getting his paddle on it to stop the puck behind the net, and not allowing the Black Bears to muddle up the play in the corners and up the half-wall, where they excel.

“Cloutier getting out to stop pucks, and I thought our D found the middle of the ice on breakouts really well. I thought we had a few outstanding breakouts out the middle, which makes it a lot harder if you have that as an option. The forecheck is much tougher because you can’t just take away the walls,” Brown explained. “He made great plays on their dump-ins. Maine is such a good forecheck [team], so the fact that he was able to stop pucks and deliver him to our defense really helped us limit our time in our zone.”

Maine’s forecheck game, key to generating scoring chances, was nullified by Cloutier’s touches behind the net, and the Black Bears’ offense struggled significantly. Maine managed only 18 shots on Cloutier’s net, their fewest total of the season, while creating an expected goals total of only 2.00, their second-lowest xG generated of the season, after a 1.77 xG in their 4-0 loss at Quinnipiac on October 18th.

With offensive territory hard to come by, Barr was disappointed to see a number of his offensive attacking weapons neutralized as they overcomplicated their play, veering away from trusting in the game plan, rolling up their sleeves, taking the game to the dirty areas of the ice, and putting in the hard yards in the trenches.

“I think the level of compete it takes to be a good player at this level, that was a challenge for some guys. [For] some of the guys that you [usually] see on the score sheet, it’s [finding] the next level of their game when they’re not [scoring]. We didn’t really have a foundation this year of [whether] I’m scoring or I’m not scoring, I’m just gonna go work. So rather than compound it and turn four more pucks over and try to be a hero, I’m just going to get it in, go to work, and we’re going to find our traction,” Barr said.

During what is sure to be a muddy Maine march, the Black Bears were never able to find their offensive footing, get to playing their brand of hockey, stamp any sort of authority on the game, or find traction in the contest after being forced to chase the scoreboard right from the get-go.

“It’s hard to get traction when the second one goes in a minute later or whatever. So you’re just kind of fighting an uphill battle the whole night,” Barr said.

Yet still, with nothing going their way, the Black Bears refused to roll over and play dead, fighting gallantly to the bitter end.

But an Oskar Jelvik goal early in the third period put the contest completely out of reach. Then back-to-back empty-net daggers put the final nail in Maine’s coffin.

A roller coaster season that began with sky-high expectations ends in humbling deflation.

A transition campaign was marred by inconsistency, cultural questions, and roster-construction queries in this new and rapidly changing college athletics landscape.

It’s only a lost season if lessons aren’t learned and Barr is intent on figuring out the best next course of action.

“I think we learned some really tough lessons this year about the makeup of our team and about the identity of our team. We try to have a certain identity, and we were fighting it the whole year because the makeup of our team wasn’t all there, and that’s not on our captains. They can’t play the game for other guys, and that’s not a knock on certain players or anything like that, but that’s today’s day and age. Constructing your team is different than it was two, three, four, five years ago. We had a lot of new guys come in here this year, and some of them thrived, and it was the right place for them, and some of them it was a fish out of water for them. That’s ultimately on me. You live and learn, and then you go forward and try to fix it. When the dust settles here, that’s what we’ll do,” Barr said.

The Journey North is never linear; there are peaks, valleys, and everything in between.

Just think of how far we’ve come in such a short amount of time.

A few years ago, getting to the Garden felt like a pipe dream. Now, not getting there is a disappointment.

If finishing a season 18-14-3, 5th in Hockey East, and #20 in the NPI is a down-season, well then, we’re in pretty good shape.

We’ll be back, better than ever.

Mark my words.

Is it October yet?

Thank you, Freeler, Holter, Anrie, and Chabs – Champions of our hearts always.

Win or go home.

On Friday night, the #20 Maine Black Bears travel to the Conte Forum in Chestnut Hill to face off with the #18 Boston College Eagles in a do-or-die Hockey East Quarterfinal clash, with the winner securing a spot in the Hockey East semifinals at TD Garden next weekend and the loser’s season over.

Unable to secure an at-large bid to the National Tournament, Maine must win the Hockey East Championship outright to earn an automatic invitation to their third-straight NCAA Tournament Playing in a must-win game this ‘early’ in the playoffs is an unfamiliar situation for them.

During the previous two seasons, the Black Bears had already secured a bid to the National Tournament by the time the Hockey East playoffs rolled around, with the conference tournament a bonus tune-up before the Big Dance.

But this time around, given how up-and-down the Black Bears’ regular-season has been, it truly is a matter of living to fight another day, with Boston College in the exact same boat.

“The last couple of years since I’ve been here, we’ve had a bid for the tournament already there. There’s always been that motivation with Hockey East, but going into Hockey East playoffs, it hasn’t been for the last couple of years necessarily do-or-die, whereas we find both teams right now are in that do-or-die mode, so it’s really just who is more urgent, who is more desperate to continue playing hockey, and who is ready for their season to be over,” Thomas Freel said.

The Black Bears have never fared well in these must-win scenarios under fifth-year Head Coach Ben Barr, with a 0-4 record in win-or-go-home contests, outscored 6-18 in these four season-ending games. Their campaign was ended by Merrimack in the 2022 Hockey East First Round, by Vermont the next season at the same stage, and by Cornell and Penn State in the NCAA Regional Semifinals the previous two seasons.

Fueled by memories

Maine’s motivation heading into Friday’s quarterfinal clash isn’t solely fueled by the desperation to win just to play another game and keep their season alive. The Black Bears also want to win and play that next game under the bright lights of TD Garden in Boston in front of a sea of blue and white.

The story of Maine’s triumphant Hockey East Championship last season was as much about the sheer mass of Mainers flooding Causeway Street and propelling their beloved Black Bears to victory as it was the team’s on-ice heroics that allowed them to lift the program’s first Lou Lamoriello Trophy since 2004.

For Maine’s veterans, playing at Alfond South was a once-in-a-lifetime experience they are now clamoring to relive. Meanwhile, the thirteen newcomers who have heard their teammates’ stories ad nauseam are desperate to taste the sheer magnitude of playing for Maine at the Garden for themselves.

“We were going down memory lane there with a few of us last week, talking about the Garden and what it means, and talking to the young guys about how insane it is when Maine plays there, and we have 15-plus thousand Mainers down there. It’s something you can’t even really put into words. And so I think that all the guys were – like that motivation to be one game away from another trip to the Garden is surreal. So that’s what’s kind of been in everyone’s mind and fueling us,” Freel said.

“We’ve been telling the boys how much fun it is to play in the Garden, and so we all want to get back there. If we can find a way to play our best hockey for 60 minutes, I have no doubt that we’ll be back there. It’s exciting for the young guys, too,” Brandon Holt added.

A tale of two inconsistent teams

It hasn’t been the smooth-sailing regular season campaigns the two blue bloods could have hoped for. For Maine, it’s been an up-and-down, topsy-turvy season full of false dawns and letdowns. Most recently, the Black Bears’ four-game win streak, in which they finally found their groove during the month of February, was ended last weekend by a 5-3 defeat at Vermont, a loss that also killed Maine’s momentum heading into the playoffs. The scoreline in Burlington favored the Black Bears, who were kept on their heels after Mathis Rousseau muffed the first UVM shot of the game. They chased the contest for the entire evening, outworked, outfought, and outplayed by the Catamounts.

Many negative patterns of the Black Bears’ season reared their ugly head last weekend. Maine took 22 minutes in penalties (their most since January 9th at Providence), won only 30.5 % of the faceoff draws (their lowest of the season), allowed three Vermont power play goals on six chances (the most power play goals allowed since January 9th), and gave up four non-empty net goals. UVM created just 1.79 expected goals (the largest differential between goals allowed and expected goals allowed), which once again brings into question the team’s goaltending situation.

Last Saturday was a step back from a brilliant month of February on a whole number of fronts. In essence, Maine beat themselves, unable to get traction in the game, behind the eight-ball right from the get-go, and with nothing going seeming to go right.

“When the first shot goes in the net, and it’s not even really a scoring chance, it puts you on your heels. Then they get a power play, and the second shot goes in. Then, you’re fighting an uphill battle, and for four games, we had at least an equal performance in net. We’re not trying to put everything on one guy. That position, especially at this time of the year, is so important. Vermont played great,” Head Coach Ben Barr explained. “[Vermont’s] work ethic was great. I thought ours got better as the game went along. Our first period wasn’t very good. The second and third, we played fine, [created] plenty of chances, then every mistake we made seemed to end up in the back of the net, and that kind of just sets you back.”

But while Maine heads into the playoffs with their defeat at Vermont as an outlier compared to their last month, Boston College enters Friday’s game on a four-game losing streak. The Eagles have struggled ever since their Beanpot Championship victory over Boston University on February 9th, with a record of just 3-5-0 since claiming Boston’s bragging rights, dropping from well inside the NCAA Tournament bubble at #12, to now #18 in the NPI. The Eagles’ high-flying attack that was scoring well over three goals a game before the Beanpot hasn’t scored more than two during this four-game losing skid.

Barr and the Black Bears are looking past BC’s results, however, believing that even during their skid, the Eagles have played well enough to have won in at least three of those four games. Although BC was handily outplayed in their first of the four straight losses, a 5-1 loss to BU at Agganis, they have actually carried much of the play in the following three games. The Eagles generated a greater or equal xG and shots on goal than their opponents in all three games, but continually ran into goaltenders standing on their heads, such as was the case when UMass’ Michael Hrabel stopped 34 of 35 BC shots on net two games ago.

“I watched them play the entire game against UMass the other night. They played great. UMass’s goaltender was unbelievable. Then, UMass gets a chance and goes in, and I think it was similar against Northeastern. Northeastern plays a “make them come through [you” game] and [BC] didn’t beat themselves in that game, played a really smart game. BC still had a ton of chances. Northeastern’s goalie made some great stops,” Barr said. “They’re playing really well, [but] they haven’t got the results that they wanted.”

Two very different brands of hockey

Friday’s quarterfinal is a fascinating matchup between two teams that play completely opposite styles of hockey. Representing their respective communities, Maine plays a blue-collar, muck-and-grind, in-your-face, hard-and-heavy, lunch-pail effort brand of Black Bear hockey that emphasizes defensive solidity and responsibility and creates its offense through a chip-and-chase forecheck game.

Meanwhile, Boston College, reflecting the white-collar character of their Jesuit-founded institution and $70,000 out-of-state tuition, plays a dazzling skill-based game that emphasizes puck possession, speed in transition, and flow in the offensive zone and boasts a team chock-full of future NHL stars drawn to the luxuries of BC’s multimillion-dollar facilities.

Much of Friday’s game will be decided by which team can implement their style of hockey and dictate the proceedings to their liking. If Maine can drag the Eagles down into the dirty areas, keeping the game against the boards and below the faceoff dots, the Black Bears’ intensity and physicality will wear on Boston College’s skilled stars. But if Maine plays an open game, getting into a back-and-forth, north-south track meet conducive to Boston College’s stick skills, the Eagles could very well soar past the Black Bears.

“We play different styles. When we’re playing at our best, we’re a simple team, a get-in-on-the-forecheck type of team. They’re a quick-transition, make-plays-off-the-rush kind of team. For us, it’s going to be about being disciplined. There are going to be plays to be made out there. But sometimes it’s going to be live to fight another day and get the puck in deep and don’t give them easy offense,” Holt explained. “Their game is easy to fall into the trap of going up and down the ice and trying to make plays and trading chances, and I think that’s where they thrive. I mean, we can get away with that type of game, but you never really know. It’s just up in the air. But if we play the way we want to play, simple and we make them earn everything, I think it gives us the best chance.”

It’s been a mixed bag for Maine when playing against opposition sides oozing with talent and offensive impetus. When the Black Bears are able to stamp their authority and brand of hockey on the game, they have fared well against teams such as Denver, Northeastern, and BC in the fall. But when the Black Bears’ eyes light up, and they get dragged into playing a basketball-type of run-and-gun game against these teams with more firepower, it hasn’t gone their way more times than not. In early February, against a BU team that plays very similarly to BC, Maine played what Barr called “goofy hockey,” trying to out-skill the Terriers in open ice, trading chances up and down the ice, and eventually losing 3-2 in overtime.

“When you look back at our results this year, the games we’ve won against teams that are high-strung offensive teams in transition, when we try to go toe-to-toe with them, we lose. Whereas we look back and see with games we’ve won, it’s been games that we’ve been above the puck, play the right way, just take zones and get pucks in it. The numbers don’t lie, and it shows that when we play a certain type of way, we give ourselves a chance. And when we just try to beat them at their own game, it doesn’t typically work out for us,” Freel said.

Last time out versus Boston College, a split at the Conte Forum in late-November in which Maine lost Game One 7-3, but then won Game Two 3-0 behind a Mathis Rousseau shutout, the Black Bears more than held their own against BC’s arsenal. They did it by committing to playing a simple, defensively sound game, but were punished when coughing up the puck in dangerous areas.

“Believe it or not, we actually played better in the game that we lost 7-3 than we did in the 3-0. We got great goaltending by Rousseau in the second game. In the first game, we had great energy, we had great jump, we had plenty of good looks, but we made some really bad decisions when we didn’t have the puck and just gave them full ice two-on-ones, three-on-ones, that kind of stuff. They really feed off that because they’re so dangerous in transition, so we’ll have to learn from that and make sure we’re making good decisions with the puck,” Barr said. “They’re an explosive team, and they’re great in transition, so [we’re] going to have to be really smart with the puck, and when we don’t have the puck, we’re going to have to stay on the right side of them.”

For Maine to resist playing into Boston College’s hands, the Black Bears will have to make the safe, responsible plays with the puck, not trying to force a play that might not be there and inadvertently feed BC’s blistering odd-man rush the other way.

Simplicity and safety with the puck will be key for Maine.

“A lot of it’s just decision making. When there’s not a play, you have to put it into a space and go get it rather than try to make a backwards pass or a cross-ice pass that gets picked off, and away they go. When we try to force things against teams like this, it’s not the type of game you want to get into. So really it’s just about being smart and making the right decisions and then winning your one-on-one battles when you do get the puck down below their goal line,” Barr explained. “We don’t want to be in an up-and-down, trade-chances game with these guys.”

When Boston College has the puck on their tape, it will be paramount for Maine to stay on the right side of the puck, keeping as many Black Bear bodies between the puck carrier and their net, backchecking diligently, and not allowing the Eagles to gain a numerical advantage on the rush.

“We play two pretty different games. It’s kind of just making it favor our style of game. Slowing it down, making sure we’re above pucks, making sure they’re coming through four or five of us rather than giving up odd man rushes, I think that’s going to kind of give us an edge. But if we just kind of trade chances back and forth with them, two-on-ones, three-on-twos. That plays into their favor, not in ours,” Freel said.

A major factor in which style of hockey the game will be played will depend on which team scores first and forces the other to chase the contest and stray from their brand.

Each team’s record when scoring the game’s first goal compared to when giving up the first goal is night and day. Maine’s record when they score first is 12-3-2 and 6-10-1 when they allow the opening goal. Boston College’s record is 14-4-1 when they light the lamp first, but just 5-10-0 when they give up the first tally.

Digging deeper, Maine’s record when leading after the first period is 12-2-1 compared to 4-7-0 when trailing during the first intermission. When the Black Bears lead after two periods of play, their record is 14-2-1, but only 1-9-1 when behind during the second intermission.

For BC, the Eagles are 11-2-0 when leading after one period and 2-7-0 when trailing. Boston College is also undefeated with a 17-0-0 record when leading after two periods and 2-7-0 record when trailing after two frames.

To say that the first goal is huge would be a profound understatement.

Between the pipes

Before Maine’s loss last weekend at Vermont, Mathis Rousseau looked to be the nailed-on starter for the Black Bears’ playoff run, having started all four games during the win streak and played particularly lights out against Northeastern. But Rousseau’s struggles against Vermont, beginning with allowing a nothing shot to spill through his glove once again, bring into question who Maine’s starting goaltender should be.

Both freshman Rousseau (.897 SV% – 2.56 GAA) and junior Albin Boija (.899 SV% – 2.59 GAA) have had nearly identical seasons statistically. Barr mentioned on Tuesday that the starting job for Friday’s must-win game is still up for grabs, contingent on who looks sharper in practice. Rousseau is the hot hand (UVM aside), but Boija has been in these situations before and was named Hockey East Tournament MVP last season, stopping 87 of 93 shots faced during Maine’s three conference playoff games. On the other hand, Rousseau has the lived experience of shutting out Boston College at the Conte Forum earlier this season, facing 21 BC shots on goal in the process.

Either way, no matter who gets the nod for Friday, the Black Bears will be heavily counting on them to stand tall as BC’s high-flying offense will still create plenty of grade-A scoring chances even if Maine’s defensive game is spotless.

Goaltending is by far the most important position in hockey and is exponentially paramount in the playoffs.

We know they’re going to make some plays, and they’re going to get some chances. We’re going to need some saves, and hopefully, we get the same amount of looks. At this time of year, a lot of it does come down to the goaltending piece,” Barr said.

Meanwhile, BC’s Head Coach Greg Brown, stated this week that he will go with freshman Louka Cloutier (.909 SV% – 2.37 GAA), who has had his own struggles down the stretch, especially on his high-blocker side.

Playoff intensity

Friday’s contest will see each team try to achieve the hardest thing to do in sports: end the other’s season. Both will be playing with unparalleled desperation to live to fight another day. There will be less time,space, and open ice, and the game’s intensity will be through the roof, with each and every bounce of the puck having the possibility of ending one of the two teams’ season in the blink of an eye.

But Maine feels as though its recent games have been as close to a playoff-like intensity as you can find in the regular season, with each and every weekend being critical to determining the bottlenecked conference standings’ positions.

“To be honest, the last month or so, it’s felt like we’re playing playoff hockey. So I think we’re going to be ready for the intensity, but that’s what it is. It’s the intensity, the desperation, and it’s just kicked up a notch,” Holt explained. “It’s an extreme circumstance for sure. But I think everybody at this point in their career, everybody’s been in a situation like that. So we do our best to treat it as just another game because if you get too caught up in the stakes and whatnot, you can kind of feel that pressure. But if you can just find a way to get out there and play the game like a normal game, there’s going to be a little bit of jacked-up intensity, but it’s just about finding a way to get into the game.”

There certainly will be an enormous amount of pressure with the season riding on this one game. Nonetheless, Barr sees regular-season college hockey, with the limited number of games played during a season as compared to junior hockey or the professional ranks, as not being too far off from playoff intensity, with each and every one of the 34 regular season games as having an enormous impact on the team’s season. Yet still, the mental aspect of a must-win playoff game is the biggest difference.

“College hockey is so intense every night. In the playoffs, it’s in a one-and-done scenario, [you’re] really just trying to find that mental clarity every night. I don’t think the intensity necessarily is different. Obviously, the situation’s different when you have to win, or you don’t get to play anymore. So there’s a little bit of mental piece of that where it’s not like we’re in these seven-game series or whatever. It’s just about finding the mental clarity and going into these games confident and wanting the puck on your tape, wanting to be the person to make that play, that’s really usually the difference. Are we confident with the puck on our tape? Or is it, oh, it’s playoffs, it’s a little bit panicky?” Barr explained.

Do-or-die, win or go home, live to fight another day, there’s truly nothing better than single-elimination playoff hockey.

Play your game, leave everything on the ice, and have no regrets.

There’d be no sweeter feeling than ending a Boston team’s season, on their home ice, and punching a ticket back to the Garden.

This is what we live for.

Welcome to the second season.

00:28: Intro / UVM Review

12:29: Cultural Questions Rear Their Head Again

19:12: Finding Consistency in the Net

22:41: Hockey East Accolades for Holt & Fowler

32:44: BC Preview

56:11: Mailbag / Outro

Back to being irritatingly inconsistent.

One week after Maine’s most complete weekend of the season earned them their fourth-straight victory, the Black Bears laid an egg in their final regular-season tune-up before the playoffs begin, thumped 5-3 by the Vermont Catamounts on Saturday Night at the Gutterson Fieldhouse in Vermont.

Head Coach Ben Barr believed that the final score reflected kindly on his team’s performance.

“It’s amazing we were as close as we were,” Barr said after the game. “There was nothing good in that game. Nothing good at all.”

Maine entered the contest fighting to lock up 5th-place in Hockey East and earn a First Round bye with a win of any sort. Out-of-town results across the conference spared the Black Bears the daunting prospect of hosting a First Round contest on Wednesday, against these very Catamounts. Mercifully for Maine, 6th-place Boston University also slipped up, falling 4-3 to UMass-Lowell, maintaining the Black Bears’ narrow one-point lead for the final First Round bye spots.

Meanwhile, a Providence win over UConn and a Northeastern defeat of Boston College mean that Maine will avoid facing their kryptonite, Connecticut, in the Quarterfinals and will instead travel to Boston College on Friday night. The Eagles have lost their last four games.

Outfought, outworked, outplayed

Barr warned all week that Vermont’s last-placed standing – which they couldn’t move up from, no matter Saturday’s result – was deceiving. While on paper, the 12-20-1 Catamounts, who were winless in their last seven contests, didn’t possess an overabundant threat, watching the video on UVM, Barr saw a team that was firing on all cylinders, even if the results weren’t following.

“I think they’re actually playing as well as anybody in our conference right now. They just haven’t got the results to show for it. They played great last weekend at Merrimack,” Barr warned on Wednesday’s Black Bear Coaches Show. “Then they played great against Providence, who’s one of the best teams in the country twice the week before, and didn’t get the results.”

With Vermont known for being one of the hardest-working teams in all of college hockey, the Black Bears didn’t need to just match them with their own increased effort and attitude, which has taken a step up over the last month; they were going to have to raise it beyond.

Instead, things took a step back.

Right from the opening puck drop, the alarm bells were sounding. Deep in the sloped Green Mountains, Maine came out as flat as the Midwest prairie. Vermont played like a group of Catamounts defending their territory, pouncing all over the Black Bears right from the get-go.

Outintensified and wholly outworked by the Catamounts, the Black Bears were bullied all over the ice. They were thrown into the boards and down on the ice, left, right, and center, the noise of Maine bodies being rattled into the glass constantly reverberating off the wooden barrel-shaped roof overhead.

“We just got outworked the whole night. Every position, every puck. I tried to explain that this team has been playing as hard and as well as anybody in our league, and we just didn’t have the same energy that they have,” Barr said after the game. “I don’t know, [if we were] out of juice tonight. That’s on me, but we’re really playing with probably two lines, two and a half lines right now.”

The Black Bears looked as though they weren’t up for the fistfight and spent most of the game on their heels, just trying to keep their head above water, unable to gain much of a foothold in the contest, unable to hold on to the puck in the O-zone much at all. This was especially the case in the first period, where Maine had zero traction offensively and was held to just three shots on goal, their joint-fewest single-period total along with the third-period in Game Two at Quinnipiac all the way back in October. Only some Black Bears seemed committed to gaining the red line, putting the puck in deep, and rolling up their sleeves to go to battle in the trenches. As a result, UVM broke through Maine’s forecheck with relative ease, not allowing the Black Bears to establish themselves below the faceoff dots and generate offensive zone time of much substance.

Vermont, through their physicality and playoff-like intensity, made the game extremely hard and uncomfortable for Maine, who looked like they wanted the contest to be anything but hard.

“We just couldn’t find any juice. Every time we hung on to a puck in the O-Zone and took a step with it, it felt like we got a scoring chance. But it was too hard for us to do that,” Barr said. “We’re just not hard enough. Like we have some young guys that just go in and fall down.”

Not helping the Black Bears’ cause was that with what felt like every restart, the Catamounts came away from the faceoff with the puck. This kept Maine chasing for much of the game and had a mighty hard time winning the one-on-one battles necessary to take the puck off the Vermont sticks. Maine was woeful at the dot, winning just 30.5% of the faceoffs on Saturday, the team’s worst percentage this season since winning only 35.8% of dropped pucks in the Friday game against UConn in February.

“That was the worst face-off performance in years for us. We got absolutely destroyed on face-offs. You’re starting every play with chasing the puck,” Barr said.

Sully Scholle was just 1-for-11 in winning faceoffs, Owen Fowler 4-for-15, and Oskar Komarov 3-for-12.

Chasing the game on the ice, Maine was also very quickly chasing the contest on the scoreboard after Mathis Rousseau muffed a glove save, spilling the puck into the back of the net on a harmless-looking shot, giving the hosts the lead just four-minutes into the game.

Rousseau had started every game during the four-game win streak, playing solid, albeit not lights-out, over the last month. But he was shaky on Saturday night, allowing five goals on 26 shots, just an .808 save-percentage.

“It felt like everything was going in,” Barr said.

Maine made Vermont’s offense, which entered the weekend with the 5th-lowest goals per game average in the nation (2.0 G/G) and the 17th-fewest average shots per game (27.9 S/G), look like the Soviet National Team. Vermont skated through the heart of the neutral zone efficiently, cycling the play around their attacking zone by utilizing their big frames to hold off Maine puck pursuers. They forced the Black Bears to run around in their D-zone, spreading thin structurally and sucked into the play on the boards, thus leaving holes for UVM to feed lateral passes directly to Catamounts uncontested and in the slot.

“They were just beating us up the ice. They finished way more hits than we did. They played hard, heavy, detailed hockey, and we didn’t. It felt like we’re chasing the game all night,” Barr said.

There wasn’t any area of the ice or any aspect of the game where Maine was better than Vermont. Even UVM’s special teams, which entered the weekend as the 6th-lowest producing power play in the country (13.0%) and second-worst penalty kill in all of college hockey (71.4%), was outright superior to Maine’s. The Catamount man-advantage, which had only scored more than one power play goal in a game once this season (two PP goals at BC on February 6th), put three past Maine on Saturday. Cedrick Guindon doubled the hosts’ lead late in the first period with a power-play goal, finishing off a quick passing move set up by Colin Kessler, who cut through the Black Bears like butter. Kessler would then score two more Catamount power play goals, his first late in the second period to negate a Josh Nadeau goal from earlier in the frame. He then capped off UVM’s win with another tally on the man-advantage in the final minute of the game, just after Owen Fowler got Black Bear Nation’s hopes up with a late goal that brought Maine back within one at the time.

Every time Maine found a bit of traction, they shot themselves in the foot with a turnover or by committing an undisciplined penalty. After Miguel Marques had brought the Black Bears back within one with his late second-period, stick-poke goal, Lukas Peterson overcomplicated a breakout pass. He tried to reverse the play behind his net with a spin-o-rama, but handed the puck right to a pressuring Catamount who eventually stuffed UVM into another two-goal lead early in the third period.

Maine took 22 minutes of penalties on Saturday night, their most since committing 25 penalty minutes at Providence on January 9th. This undiscipline severely hindered them from working up any sort of momentum, for example when Miguel Maruqes took his second minor of the night six minutes into a Maine power play, or when Oskar Komarov was called for interference with a minute left to go in the game, the Black Bears only down a goal with the rare breeze at their backs after Fowler’s tally made it 4-3.

“We’re beating ourselves, with bonehead penalties, and awful goals,” Barr said.

This left the Maine bench frustrated beyond belief, taking their anger out on the officiating crew. After Vermont scored to make it 5-3 in the final minute of the contest, the Black Bears’ bench was left incensed at a non-call in the lead-up to the goal, and it crossed the line when Frank Djurasevic threw his stick at the scorekeepers’ box, being promptly ejected in the process.

“We’ve got immaturity, ego, whatever you want with all that. We’ve been trying to get all that out of our game, and for that to show up at this time of the year. Hopefully, it’s a wake-up call for us heading into the playoffs,” Barr said. “You get frustrated when you get outworked. That’s what happened to us tonight. You see the immaturity come through in a lot of different forms.”

Outfought, outworked, outplayed, and outclassed, second-best in every aspect of the game, it amounted to a big step back after so many steps taken forward over the last month.

Arguably, this was their all-around worst performance of 2026, coming at the most inopportune time of the season.

That wasn’t the look of a team ready to go on a deep playoff run.

They’ve used up their mulligan, one more of those and they’ll be on the golf course in no time.

Instead of flying into the postseason full of self-confidence and belief, the Black Bears will limp, bloody and bruised, down to Chestnut Hill.

Wouldn’t want to be the poor folks who have to play Vermont on Wednesday. Sucks to BU.

Can’t lose again.

Full of steam, the Black Bear Express rumbles deep into the Green Mountains this weekend as Maine takes on the Vermont Catamounts for their final regular-season contest, a single-game Saturday night clash at the Gutterson Fieldhouse in Burlington.

Marching down the stretch, the Black Bears have heated up at the right time of the year. Playing their most complete hockey of the season, they are currently riding a four-game win streak after sweeping Northeastern last weekend.

Clicking on all cylinders, everything has been going right for Maine during the last month. Dare we say it? The Black Bears are looking more and more like a team possessing all the pieces of a side with realistic championship aspirations.

From goaltending to special teams, forwards through defensemen, Maine is all checkmarks at the moment.

All the right pieces

Starting from the net out, Head Coach Ben Barr has finally found the reliable backbone every true championship caliber candidate team needs in freshman goaltender Mathis Rousseau. Having split time between the pipes with junior goaltender Albin Boija for most of the season, Rousseau has firmly taken the starting job by the scruff of the neck, starting all four games during Maine’s win-streak, stopping 88 of 95 shots, accumulating a save percentage of just .926, allowing an average of only 1.75 goals against during the stretch, and pitching a 25 save shutout on Friday in Portland in the process.

“[Rousseau’s] found a little bit of a groove playing four games in a row,” Barr said on the Black Bear Coaches Show. “We’ve had a little bit of stability in net with Mathis the last couple of weeks, [which] we haven’t really had this year, to be honest. It’s been great to see him grow and step up. We’re going to need solid goaltending. That’s the most important part of the position, always, and especially at this time of year when you’re really just kind of do or die every night.”

In front of Rousseau, Maine has also gotten stellar performances from every Black Bear in the lineup. This has allowed Barr to roll all four forward lines and three defensive pairings without much drop-off between them, never allowing the opposition a shift to catch their breath with wave after wave of Black Bears keeping their opponent on their heels. The relentless pressure, of Maine’s heavy forechecking game wears down the opposition’s legs, enabling the Black Bears to win the war of attrition.

“We have to be able to play everybody; we’ve always been that way,” Barr said after practice on Tuesday. “We’re not a team that’s just going to go out and out-skill anybody, and we’ll never be that team. But that’s really what it is. We need everyone who has a chance to be in that lineup. It doesn’t have to be A+, but it can’t be a C or D. So it’s got to be an A or B.”

Then, on top of Maine bolstering the weak spots in their lineup, the Black Bears’ veteran core has stepped up to be the team’s best players, leading the charge from the top. Brandon Holt continues to be a horse for Maine, spearheading the team effort by logging an average of 22:50 a game and also topping the team in assists (24) and points (30). One of the most assured defensemen in all of college hockey, the co-Captain’s exemplification of the Black Bear work ethic has helped solidify a defensive core half-full of freshmen that leaked turnovers left and right earlier in the year, transforming it into a unit that has only allowed the seventh fewest shots against in the country (25.5).

“His numbers are incredible. He wasn’t a kid when we recruited him four years ago; we thought would be an all-league player. He was last year, and I have no doubt he will be again this year. Obviously, taking on the leadership role, he’s playing with Lukas Peterson, who’s a freshman, and we have three or four freshman defensemen playing for us every night. He just does everything right, so we rely on him in every aspect. He’s not a guy who talks a ton; he’s just a guy who does everything, and people kind of want to emulate him, so we’ve been lucky to have him here for four years,” Barr praised. “His work ethic is incredible; his attention to detail defensively is what allows him to be a guy that produces offensively, too. If he does make a mistake, he always recovers from it just because he’s one of those guys who’s very accountable and he buys into everything we do.”

Fellow veteran defensemen Frank Djurasevic has also come to the party, playing his all-around best game on Saturday in Lowell and looking the most like his offensive-minded best self from last season, firing off a team-leading seven shots on net in Saturday’s game and blasting the red goal light on twice.

“He just got the puck to the net. They were both great shots. He’s got a really heavy shot, and when he gets it down there, good things happen,” Barr said.

On the forward side of things, Owen Fowler was once again an unstoppable force to be reckoned with. Leading the Black Bears’ barrage against Northeastern with his typical combative edge, Fowler opened up the scoring on Friday with a workmanlike five-on-five goal before his individual effort for a shorthanded tally unraveled the Huskies. Maine’s motor, Fowler has been hands down the Black Bears’ most reliable forward this season. Like the rest of the team, he seems to have found yet another gear, but it’s been his off-ice leadership growth that has been as instrumental as his on-ice production.

“His game in the second half of this season has found a new level. He works extremely hard. He’s a guy who can produce at this level, and he does. He plays in every situation, but he’s kind of stepping into a leadership role here with Holter and Freeler and those guys moving on. It has been really great for us. We were kind of a meandering team for two-thirds of the season, as far as just our day-to-day, what we’re doing [where] we look good one day, the next day it doesn’t. You really rely on your older [players], your leaders, and your veterans to fix that, and those guys have done that. Fowles has been a huge part of that,” Barr explained. “He’s just kind of a guy that leaves it all out there every night. He’s got a lot of fight in him, and he likes to get under the other team’s skin a little bit. He’s a guy you want to have on your team. I think he’s really taken another step maturity-wise this year, and he’s realized that we needed that [from him] where maybe we didn’t need it as much last year.”

Fowler’s centerman, Sully Scholle, has also been enjoying his highest producing stretch of the season, during this, the most consistent campaign of his collegiate career, pulling the strings behind the scenes for the team and being rewarded with seven points in his last four games.

But no Black Bear is hotter than Josh Nadeau at the moment as everything the New Brunswicker’s stick touches turns to gold of late. Since returning from a bout with mononucleosis, he has looked like the best version of himself, matching even his rampant freshman season form when he and his brother Bradly were the two-headed monster that took Hockey East by surprise in the Fall of 2024. Oozing confidence, Nadeau has been lights out since rejoining the team at BU. Hands down he has been central to the man-advantage’s recent resurgence, having scored six goals and six assists in his last four games.

“Josh has really kind of sparked the power play. He’s been great five-on-five and on the penalty kill, too. But the power play has gotten a lot better, and a lot of that is that Josh is back, feeling good again. I think he’s healthy, and he has a lot of jump right now, and obviously, his production is showing that,” Barr explained.

The power play, which at one point went an ice-cold 1-for-27 in the New Year, is now a red-hot 5-for-13 over the last four games. Meanwhile, the penalty kill has been a perfect 11-for-11 against opposition power plays during the win-streak, with a shorthanded goal to their name as well. Barr credits Assistant Coach Rick Bennett for the power play’s recent success and timely goaltending, helping shore up the penalty kill.

“[Bennett’s] done a great [job], he’s a great hockey guy, he’s worked really hard, and the units are starting to get better. It’s been good, that’s been better, this time of year, the special teams, goaltending, that kind of stuff, a lot of times that decides games,” Barr explained. “The penalty kill has gotten better, a lot of that is you’re going to give up scoring chances, and goaltending is a huge part of penalty killing. And Mathis has come up big the last few games when we needed him on the kill. So those things hopefully get a little bit better every day.”

All in all, there’s no part of this mighty Maine machine that hasn’t been working as part of a well-oiled machine over the past month. They are all playing full of confidence and delivering by far their best hockey of the season, even when results weren’t falling their way against UConn right before the win-streak began.

“It gives us a lot of confidence these last few weeks, just knowing that our work and practice is starting to pay off in games for us with the results. We’re not a result-oriented team; we care about the process, but it’s good to see the points falling in the right direction,” Frank Djurasevic said. “I think it’s really the mentality of the team. I think there was a lot of belief this weekend on the bench.”

A confident pack of Black Bears, coming out of hibernation, battle-tested, hungry, feeling good, and hitting their stride down the stretch, is a terrifying proposition for the rest of Hockey East.

“Obviously, there’s definitely been some ups and downs throughout the whole year, which you can look at it a couple of different ways. But I think we’re trying to look at it as we’ve learned a lot throughout the year, we know how to attack certain scenarios when things are going really well and things are going not really well. Our culture in that room has definitely been growing a lot in the second half. That UConn series is really kind of the turning point where the results weren’t there, but we were really happy with our game and knew stuff was going to start falling for us at some point. That’s kind of how the hockey gods work a little bit,” Owen Fowler explained.

The playoff picture

Thursday night’s results across Hockey East didn’t go Maine’s way, to the disappointment of the Alfond faithful. Boston College and UNH’s losses to UMass and UConn officially ended the Black Bears’ bid for a third-straight Quarterfinal game at the Alfond, since the highest Maine can finish is now 5th (a Quarterfinal game on the road) with Boston College holding the tiebreaker over Maine in terms of wins in regulation.

That said, if 6th-place BU is victorious at UMass-Lowell, Maine could drop out of the First Round bye spots and be leapfrogged by by the Terriers should the Black Bears fail to win at Vermont. Maine holds the tiebreaker over BU in terms of head-to-head record, so a Black Bear win in any fashion (even a tie and shootout “win) would seal 5th-place for Maine. Whatever points the Black Bears accumulate, the Terriers would have to surpass. If Maine picks up one point in Burlington (an overtime loss or tie and shootout “loss”), BU would need three points (a win in regulation).

But for all intents and purposes, if Maine wins over Vermont the Black Bears are into the Quarterfinals, one win away from the Garden. But lose, and Maine will have to host a First Round on Wednesday, which would be a rematch with Vermont.

Although Saturday technically isn’t a must-win, it is the final regular-season tune-up before things truly do become win or bust. So the Black Bears are treating Saturday like a playoff game, wanting to maintain their surge of momentum into the playoffs when it really is win-or-go-home. It’s a new, totally different proposition for Maine, who, during the last two seasons, were shoo-ins for an at-large bid to the National Tournament regardless of how they fared in the Hockey East playoffs. This season, their only shot at punching a ticket back to the big dance is through repeating as conference champions.

“It’s do or die for us the rest of the year. If we have that mentality, I think we’ll be in the fight every night. But that’s really what it’s been for the last month. We put ourselves in that position by having an up and down first half,” Barr said. “It’s kind of fun.”

The Catamounts

Awaiting the Black Bears deep in the Green Mountains will be last-place Vermont, stuck in 11th-place regardless of Saturday’s result, and currently winless in their last seven games.

While on paper the Catamounts appear clawless, Maine will be prudently entering Cat Country with full caution. If the Black Bears decide to relax on the banks of Lake Champlain, they might have to be ready for a quick rematch with Vermont on Wednesday back in Orono.

“They’ve been taking it to a lot of teams that they haven’t gotten probably the results that they deserve. So this is going to be a phenomenal test for us because they’re playing their final home game. They played great last week, and they played great two weekends ago against Providence and didn’t get the results that they probably deserved. We’ll have to be at our best,” Barr warned. “This is going to be a really tough test for us.”

“Vermont’s a great team. You can’t really look too deep into their record. The last two months or so, they’ve been playing really hard hockey. They’ve had some tough losses where they’ve outworked their opponents,” Djurasevic added.

Although just 4-9-1 in Hockey East in 2026 and 1-6-1 in the month of February, Maine knows all too well what happens when you don’t take Vermont seriously, having lost to the Catamounts 2-1 at the Alfond in November, a night after a 7-0 victory reflected a contest that was much closer than the scoreline hinted.

By all accounts, UVM has come on leaps and bounds since the team that stunned the Alffond Faithful in the Fall. Vermont’s seniors will also be playing their last-ever game at “the Gut” and will be playing full of pride and spark on top of everything else.

“They’re a completely different team, and we’re a completely different team at this time of the year. It’s the last regular-season game, but I think it’s going to have the intensity of a playoff game. I think for us, it’s going to be so big to continue playing the way that we’ve been playing. Obviously, [for] Vermont, it’s a big night for them. It’s their last game, it’s their senior night. Like Coach said, they’ve been working hard, outworking most teams they play every night. So if we go in there thinking it’s going to be an easy game because it’s their last place in our league, I think we’re going to be surprised. We have to be ready to go, and I think we will be,” Brandon Holt said.

Maine will have to be willing and able to stick to their guns, deploying the same recipe that has brought them success over the last month. This means playing simple hockey below the offensive zone faceoff dots, funnelling chaos on goal, then, when the Catamounts’ defense collapses down-low, and utilizing their point-men to get shots through traffic where the Black Bears will have to be willing to roll up their sleeves and manufacture dirty area goals.

“We’ve really been preaching, keeping the puck below the dots and working as a line below the dots. When you get the opportunity, that causes their wings to come down on and play a little tighter, so then we can work it up to the D, and the D have been doing a great job getting pucks through into the net and just kind of, kind of causing havoc,” Fowler said. “It’s just when we’re managing pucks through the neutral zone and committing to the hard plays or the plays that aren’t going to stick out, these skill plays or anything like that. I think our bread and butter is just wearing teams down below the dots when we do that, I think we can generate a lot of stuff.”

Meanwhile, on top of playing with a physical edge and committing to taking the game into the trenches, Djurasevic sees Maine as having a speed advantage that will allow the Black Bears to get out of their own zone, through center ice, and into Vermont’s end quickly and efficiently, not getting bogged down by UVM’s own suffocating, hard, and heavy forecheck that takes away the middle of the ice.

“One thing we emphasize is their work ethic. They work really hard, they’re going to reload hard, they’re up and down the ice pretty fast. They’ve got a pretty physical team as well. They like to forecheck and get it on you on the defense, and their defense is kind of bigger, maybe slower guys. I think we can use our foot speed against them. But if we play within their hands, they’ll be able to grab their forwards and kind of a lot of hitting pins to slow us down. So I think for us, it’s going to be playing fast,” Djurasevic said. “I think a breakout starts with a good shoulder check, going back for the dump, and kind of seeing what’s developing behind you. And then I think our keys for us, we use the walls a lot, obviously, with our wingers, I think it’s important to try to find the wings quickly, if the wings aren’t there, look for your center. If their center is not there, then probably high-flipping a puck or using the glass and trying to live to fight another day. Same for the neutral zone, we try to play super fast. Whether the D gets it, turns right up, finds his wing, or D to D, snap it up, get a pound, try to get the puck right down there, stuffed down their throats as quickly as we can.”

Meanwhile, on the other side of the puck, the Black Bears will look to repeat their swarming 200-foot defensive game that stifled the Northeastern attack for most of the weekend. They’ll be looking to play an aggressive yet responsible forechecking game to keep the Catamounts leading goalscorers #17 Colin Kessler (8g-15a-23pts), #12 Jonah Aegerter (7g-7a-14pts), and #29 Jens Richards (5g-8a-13pts) as far away from the Maine net as possible.

“I think for us, the key is just playing to our systems, getting pucks in, getting pucks out really fast. Good F-3’s, defense playing tight and connected, and if we can do that for 60 minutes, we’ll play with anybody,” Djurasevic said.

“It’ll be a dogfight out there. But, I think if we just keep playing the way we are and bringing the same mentality and playing for each other, I think hopefully we have a good outcome,” Fowler added. “It’s something almost bigger than scoring the goal. It’s making the play for that guy to score the goal. Just caring for each other and doing whatever it takes, really. If that’s getting the hit, taking a hit, blocked shots, just sticking together throughout everything.”

Maine hasn’t had the best success this season against teams that are as hard working as they are. They’ve been able to rely on their work-ethic against more skilled team, such as Northeastern, BC, and BU, but against the likes of grinding stalwarts such as Providence, UConn, Lowell, and UVM, it’s been much more difficult for the Black Bears to play their preferred game. Saturday night will be no different and according to Barr, the result will ride on which team is hungrier to pick up the scraps in the loose puck battles.

“I don’t think they’re going to change too much what they do and we’re not going to change what we do. It just really comes down to who wins more puck battles, who back checks harder, blocks more shots. That’s really what the game is at this time of the year. Hopefully you’re disciplined and your special teams get the job done when you need them,” Barr said.

It’s all about desperation at this time of the year. Who’s going to play with more urgency? The team riding a four game win streak? Or the one desperate to snap a seven game winless skid on Senior Night?

“This is going to be as hard of a test as we’ve had. To go up there, it’s their last game at home. They’re a very well-coached team, and they’re playing really hard, and I think they know it. They’re a much better team than they were when we played them [at home] and they beat us. So we have to have that desperation and that resilience that we’ve been trying to develop here the last few weeks. We have to take that and then some up there,” Barr warned.

There’s no more runway left. It’s learn to fly or die trying.

Take care of business in Burlington and soar into the playoffs on a five-game heater.

Two wins from the Garden.

Welcome to March. Welcome to playoff hockey.

Don’t take the foot off the gas now.

Intro / Northeastern Sweep, Four in a Row: 00:28
HE Standings Roundup and Playoff Implications: 17:01

UVM Preview: 23:11

Mailbag / Poirier Situation: 30:33

Jersey Advertisements / Outro: 38:17

Someone stick a thermometer in the Black Bears’ mouth, because they are burning up.

On a weekend that saw countless conference heavyweights succumb to the bloodbath that is Hockey East, the Maine Black Bears just keep chugging steadily along, their 3-2 win over Northeastern on Saturday night at the Tsongas Center in Lowell their fourth-straight victory.

As daylight rapidly grows longer by the day, the outlook on Maine’s season, which just a month ago was bleak, now shines brighter than ever.

Everything’s clicking at the moment for the Black Bears. Mathis Rousseau has solidified himself as Maine’s starting goaltender, the special teams are playing as strong as ever, all four forward lines and defensive pairings are gelling as one, Maine’s best players are stepping up, and overall, it simply looks like the Black Bears are at last playing as a team instead of an assortment of individuals donning the same colored sweater.

You couldn’t ask for anything better at this time of the season.

After an up-and-down season where cultural buy-in was questioned, and ever since Maine’s overtime loss at Boston University four weekends ago, a noticeable shift in the team’s dynamic seems to have occurred.

“We’ve been through a lot of ugliness this year, in the first half, ups and downs. There’s been some ugliness as far as things that we’ve done and behind-the-scenes things that, culturally, [it] hasn’t been very good. I think we kind of put all that behind us, maybe after that BU game on the road, where it reared its head again. We haven’t had as much of that of late; we’re just out there working, pulling for each other,” Head Coach Ben Barr said. “It’s fun as a coach when your team is growing a little bit. Really, it was that UConn weekend where you could start to see where maybe there’s a little bit of buy-in and just playing hard and letting the game happen, playing for each other. For the last few weeks, it’s obviously been a little bit better each game.”

“I think it’s the togetherness of the guys. I think the culture’s really come together, the last few weeks. Even that UConn weekend, we felt we deserved a little bit better. We played pretty good hockey, and we didn’t let that keep us down. We kept working throughout that next week, had a good weekend last weekend, and were able to carry it into this weekend,” Frank Djurasevic added. “It’s a snowball effect.”

Watch out, there’s nothing more dangerous than a whole pack of Black Bears waking up from hibernation, hungry, and out hunting their prey as one.

Ferocious first, scintillating second

On Saturday night, Maine followed up their most complete performance of the season, a dominant 4-1 stomping of the Huskies in front of 5,600 rabid Black Bear fans in Portland, with a strong first two periods.

Nomadic Northeastern, playing their “home” games on the road because of the ongoing demolition of historic Matthews Arena, saw Saturday’s contest, which was one of the biggest games of the season for both teams, played at the Tsongas Center in Lowell. The sparse crowd of just 985 in a rink that holds over 6,000 was largely made up of Maine fans, their cheers echoing around the nearly empty rink. The most vocal section was a handful of the Mainiaks student fan group set up behind one of the nets, joined by a couple of members of UMass-Lowell’s Blue Crew student section group.

It reminded Barr of the oddity of playing during COVID, when he was an assistant coach with UMass during the Minutemen’s 2021 National Championship-winning season, their Frozen Four contests played in front of just a handful of fans.

“During COVID, we played the whole year with no fans, so it felt a lot like that, to be honest, which we knew it was going to, but I don’t think any of these guys ever experienced it,” Barr said. “It’s a little different, but I thought the guys handled it pretty well.”

The atmosphere inside the rink felt more like a library than a hockey game. For the Back Bears, who rely so heavily on their work ethic, the challenge of playing in an environment the exact opposite of the Alfond made it paramount to create their own energy and juice.

For the first two periods, you couldn’t have asked them to play any harder, given the circumstances.

“I thought for two periods, [the energy] was pretty good. The first period was great, the second period was fine,” Barr said.

Maine jumped all over Northeastern early, once again putting the puck in behind the Northeastern defensemen, going to work on the forecheck, cycling the puck around the boards, utilizing their point-men, and hemming the Huskies into their own end.

With Northeastern being as skilled and quick in turning defense into attack as any, Maine had to commit to playing hard and heavy below their offensive zone faceoff dots, winning the one-on-one battles down low, while also making sure that in doing so, they wouldn’t leave themselves exposed to be hit on the counterattack.

This relies heavily on the third forward in Maine’s forechecking system (the F-3) to avoid getting pulled down into the play. It’s vital for the F-3 to act as a safety valve, staying above the puck to support the two more aggressive forechecking forwards (F-1 and F-2) by occupying the middle of the ice around the high slot and top of the faceoff circles. This allows the F-3 to not only prevent an easy opposition breakout pass through the center of the ice (with the defensemen sealing the walls), but also provides the F-1 and F-2 an outlet pass in a shooting position if they are to grab control down-low on the forecheck. When the F-3 sniffs an opportunity to jump in on the forecheck and pursue a loose puck in the corner, either the F-1 or F-2 needs to rotate above the play and become the new F-3. If the F-3 drifts out of position and gets caught recklessly pursuing the puck down low with only the two defensemen behind him, the opposition will usually have the numeric advantage counterattacking the other way, which is especially important since the Huskies aggressively spring one of their defensemen to join their three forwards in the attack.

Djurasevic credits Maine’s F-3 for limiting Northeastern’s blistering transition play to only a handful of odd-man rushes all weekend.

“Our F-3 was great this weekend when we needed them to be. I think kind of reloading through the middle of the ice with good sticks. They like to go east-west a lot through the neutral zone, and trying to disrupt those plays was really big for us. I think we did a pretty good job with that. They had some chances, obviously. They’re a good hockey team, but I thought for the most part we were able to limit them that way, and that really hurt their offense,” Djurasevic explained.

To say the Black Bears dominated the Huskies in the first period would be putting it lightly. Maine controlled much of the play, dictating the game, patiently playing keep away with the puck on their sticks for most of the period, managing the play brilliantly, and outshooting Northeastern 12-1 in the opening stanza.

Yet Northeastern, completely against the run of play, went into the lead on their first and only shot of the first period, a howitzer of a one-timed slap shot set up by Tyler Fukakusa, blasted in by Joe Connor.

Later in the frame, Maine had their best clear-cut scoring chance when Northeastern’s captain Vinny Borgesi was ejected for a high cross-check on Josh Nadeau’s neck that handed the Black Bears a five-minute power play. The chance fell to Miguel Marques all alone on the backpost for an easy tap-in on a gaping net. But the puck rolled on Marques and was shanked wide as Northeastern would kill off the major.

The Black Bears headed into their dressing room, which was the UMass-Lowell basketball team’s locker room, frustrated to be behind on the scoreboard and unable to capitalize on the five-minute major.

Just over a minute into the second, however, Frank Djurasevic quickly dispelled those anxieties with back-to-back net-seeking missiles within three minutes of each other that gave Maine the deserved lead.

Djurasevic’s first bomb came when he stepped into one down by the right-wing half-wall, sending a bazooka that clipped the underside of the bar.

Three minutes later, Djurasevic once again tested the durability of the net. This time, he shot from the opposite point with Sully Scholle feeding Frank the Tank, putting the puck perfectly in his wheelhouse for the junior defensemen to one-time the clapper past Lawton Zacher.

Both goals were created through strong play down low by Maine’s forwards, able to keep Northeastern’s defense running around and therefore less likely to cover the Black Bears’ defensemen at the points.

“Those two goals were one-timers. Good job by the forwards down low to get the puck up high. On the first one there, [Gerrior] was working hard below the dots and popped out to me, and I just put everything I could into it, and luckily it went in. Then the second one, I think we had a delayed penalty against them, and we were kind of working around the zone, and I found myself open on the top left side for a one-tee and just let it hammer and found a way home. I had a lot of shots tonight, I think, credit to our forwards down low getting pucks up high and I thought their wings were doing a pretty good job trying to take us away but when our forwards are working that hard it’s tough for them to cover us and I was able to get across the line pretty well and get some shots through,” Djurasevic explained.

Goals aside, Barr believed it was his alternate captain’s best game of a hot-and-cold campaign for the New Rochelle, New York native who rifled off a team-leading seven shots on net.

“That was maybe his best game of the year. He obviously got the first two goals there, got us going. I thought he had a good weekend all the way around. It’s good leadership from him,” Barr said.

You need your best players to lead you down the stretch, and Djurasevic is another shining example of a veteran playing his best hockey at the most important time of the year.

Sully Scholle, who has been instrumental in pulling the stings for linemates Josh Nadeau and Owen Fowler’s rampant production of late and has been one of Maine’s most reliable and consistent forwards, put his name on the scoresheet later in the second, poking home a rebound opportunity one-handed that was knocked in by Northeastern defenseman Matthew Maltias. It was the second “own goal” from Northeastern over the weekend. Maine, after having tough puck luck for much of the second half of the season, is finally being rewarded for their efforts.

No longer the Bad-Luck Bears, when it rains, it pours, and with everything going their way at the moment, Maine is enjoying dancing in a torrential downpour.

You make your own luck afterall.

Hanging on in the third

With a solid 3-1 lead after playing their most complete, mature hockey of the season during the first five periods of the weekend, the Black Bears’ last frame was by far their worst.

After being on their toes all weekend, Maine came out of the second intermission on their heels, the roles suddenly reversed with the Huskies in attack mode and the Black Bears passive and hanging on for dear life.

Instead of trying to put the nail in Northeastern’s coffin and score a fourth goal, Maine played a ‘we hold what we have’ game.

“I don’t know if we got in our heads. I don’t know, we’ve got to figure that out, obviously, but we just started playing on our heels. That’s a credit to [Northeastern]. They got some guys that can make plays, and they did,” Barr explained. It got a little shaky there.”

A rare moment of poor puck management halved the Huskies’ deficit when the fourth line couldn’t get the puck in deep and get a line change, allowing Northeastern to walk up ice with Giacomo Martino finishing off the two-on-two past Rousseau.

“Their second goal was just a poor decision on the rush at the end of a shift, and we don’t get it all the way in, and it’s in the back of our net. We go for a line change, it’s in the back of our neck. We managed the puck for five periods really well this weekend, and then we didn’t do the third today,” Barr said.

Scrambling to hold on to their lead, the Black Bears got something they haven’t had much of all season, a steady, reassuring figure in their net to bail the team out and shut the door. Rousseau, starting his fourth straight contest, earned his fourth straight win coming up huge with a number of big-time saves in the third period, including one midway through the frame on Huskies’ leading goalscorer Dylan Hrycowian in tight.

It looks like Barr has found his number one down the stretch, and it’s the red-hot Rooster from Québec.

“They took it to a third and a third. Rooster made some big saves, and that was really good to see,” Barr said. “Obviously, Albin is a very capable goalie behind him, but the Rooster’s won four in a row, so you’re trying to find a guy down the stretch that you can go with.”

“Russo was great. He’s been on a bit of a roll now for us, and that’s kind of what we’re looking for: a goalie to get hot. Rooster getting hot is really big for us. It’s good to know that we got a backbone back there. Anytime there’s a breakdown, he’s making big saves for us, which is huge,” Djurasevic added.

With Rousseau ten-feet tall in net, the Black Bears crawled over the line, winning the dogfight, their fourth in a row, and the first time Maine has swept in back-to-back weekends all season.

Owen Fowler and Sully Scholle dove on the puck off a faceoff in the final seconds of the game, as the buzzer sounded around the nearly-empty rink. Frustrated, Hrczowian fired a shot on Rousseau after the final horn, prompting the ire of Thomas Freel and other Black Bears to stand up for their netminder, the final clash between the two teams during a chippy weekend.

All bark, no bite from the Huskies. Northeastern, who began the weekend ahead of Maine, has now dropped all the way to 7th, while Maine sits in 5th, and they left the ice slamming sticks, heads dropped, and shoulders slumped.

Right now, that’s what the Black Bears will do to you, frustrate you to no end, and leave you exiting the rink feeling as empty as their ‘home rink’.

Firing on all cylinders, everything is clicking at the moment for Maine, and may it long continue.

May we never lose again.

Poor Huskies.

Take shelter, New England. A mighty monsoon is picking up steam up in the Gulf of Maine, the storm’s path churning south toward Boston.

Everything is clicking at the moment for the Maine Black Bears, whose roaring 4-0 victory over the Northeastern Huskies on Friday night at Cross Insurance Arena in Portland jumped them into 5th place in Hockey East, their third straight win, now the longest current streak in this bloodbath of a conference.

Maine’s late-February resurgence has Black Bear Nation quickly gobbling up hotel rooms and tickets to Hockey East Championship Weekend. But the Black Bears, donning the famous Maine script on the ice, are still taking it one shift at a time, one game at a time.

“We’re not really trying to think about that right now, we’re trying to just take it game by game, but we definitely want, at this time of year, to be playing our best hockey, coming together, and just playing a winning brand,” Brandon Holt said.

“Honest to God, I don’t pay attention to [the standings]. All we’re trying to do is make sure we’re playing the right way,” Head Coach Ben Barr added, “We’re just not a team that is thinking about any of that.”

But there’s a buzz around the Pine Tree State at the moment. The long, cold winter is nearing its end, with brighter sunshine just around the corner.

And best of all, the Black Bears are playing a winning brand of hockey at the right time of the year.

Let’s enjoy the moment and bask in its warm glow.

The Maine machine

Friday’s contest began as a back-and-forth basketball-esc game, with each team trading odd-man rushes and golden-scoring opportunities. Maine was denied a highlight reel tic-tac-toe goal between Josh Nadeau and Brandon Holt less than a minute into the contest by Northeastern’s netminder, Lawson Zacher. A few minutes later, Zacher’s counterpart, Mathis Rousseau, answered, denying leading Husky goalscorer Dylan Hrycowian at point-blank range.

“I thought Mathis played pretty well, which was great,” Barr said. “When we needed him, Rooster made some good saves.”

Although the over 5,000 strong in attendance on Portland’s Peninsula enjoyed the early edge-of-your-seat, up-and-down the ice spectacle, getting into a track meet with the super-skilled Huskies was the last thing the Black Bears wanted to do. It allowed blistering odd-man rushes through their lightning-fast transition play by Northeastern’s talented, opportunistic forwards.

“I think in the first period, we played into their game a little bit up and down the ice,” Holt said.

Against a team as skilled and quick in counterattacking as the howlin’ Huskies, Maine had to walk a tightrope. They needed to keep the play as far away from their net as possible, beneath the offensive zone faceoff dots through their forecheck, while also making sure that in doing so, they weren’t leaving themselves exposed at the back for a rush chance the other way.

In the first period, Maine’s forecheck wasn’t clicking in tandem. Too often, it got caught with all three forwards aggressively pursuing the puck down low, leaving their two defensemen with too much numerical advantage to handle behind.

Barr believed that his team was overeager during the first period on the forecheck, while his defensemen were getting caught out wide by the boards, leaving the center of the ice exposed.

“We can’t play a reckless game against them because they’re so skilled on the rush. You can’t have three guys diving into the corners offensively. And with the D, when the play’s not on, they’ve got to get inside in the middle of the ice and not get stuck on the walls. We got stuck a few times in the first,” Barr explained. “When there’s a scrum in the corner, your third [forward] has to know that when they flip it out, we can’t have guys skate past us, and then those guys in the corner can’t get beat up the ice. They always have four guys in the rush. They’re a really good offensive team. So it’s just those little details, and it’s easy if you fall asleep for one second, then all of a sudden it’s a four-on-three, and then it turns into a three-on-two or a two-on-one. That’s what they’re really good at.”

But as the first period wore on, with neither team able to capitalize on their grade-A chances, Maine’s forecheck ironed out their wrinkles. The Black Bears got back to their bread-and-butter, managing the puck well in the neutral zone, not forcing overcomplicated passes, gaining the redline, chipping the puck in deep, and dragging Northeastern’s defensemen into the trenches where Maine could funnel the play into their second and third forechecking forwards, sealing the wall, and forcing turnovers.

This kept plenty of Black Bears on the right side of the puck, limiting Northeastern’s transition offense while also allowing Maine the opportunity to possess the puck with more extended offensive zone time.

“I think we just managed pucks through the neutral zone a lot. They generate their offense over turnovers, in the neutral zone, or right over their blue line. They like to spring their guys, and I think when we manage our pucks in those areas, it makes it tough on them. Their D have to go back on pucks constantly,” Owen Fowler explained.

It’s a much simpler style of game that relies much more heavily on work-rate and tenacity rather than the puck possession, run-and-gun style of hockey that the Boston schools, including Northeastern, have established as their identity. Maine’s nuts-and-bolts style put the Huskies in an uncomfortable position, with the daunting task of breaking a full 200 feet up ice past the swarming Maine defense, facing an unenjoyable proposition: getting mauled down in the Black Bears’ cave.

“I think after [the start of the game] we played a really simple game, and we made it hard on them. We got pucks in deep, and I don’t really think they wanted to go back and break it out all game. We forced them to do that in the second and third periods. They didn’t really create much unless we gave it to them. It’s a pretty simple formula; sometimes it’s hard to stay disciplined in doing it, and I think we’ve been a lot better at doing it recently here,” Holt said.

The Black Bears’ opening goal came through doing just that.

Maine broke the puck out from behind their net, with Frank Djurasevic feeding D-partner Jérémy Langlois at the red line. The rookie blueliner gained center ice, rimmed the puck, which careened around the boards and behind the net. In the corner, Sully Scholle grabbed possession, the play went up to the point, then back down low with Maine cycling the puck below the dots. Josh Nadeau sealed the wall behind the goal, not letting Northeastern clear the zone, and allowed Owen Fowler to scoop up the puck, skate around the goal, and stuff a backhanded shot past Zacher.

“I just tried to filter it to the net. I was hoping Josh was going back door or something like that and could pick up the rebound, but luckily it went in. Honestly, I didn’t really know it went in at first, but then I heard the cheers. I feel like it’s one of those lucky ones, but you take those,” Fowler said.

Simplistic, unselfish, nitty-gritty, and mechanical, it was the brand of Black Bear hockey that makes its own fortune. All players working as one, each a crucial component to allow the mighty Maine machine to hum perfectly, its pistons all firing in sync.

Sometimes the simpler the better, and that is certainly the case for Maine.

“I thought we did a great job getting it in and working it down a little bit, below the dots. I thought that was huge for the game, and I think overall we held on to pucks when we needed to and filtered them through the net when we did,” Fowler said. “We’re just playing the right way, honestly. I think we’re just playing for the team and not really making selfish plays out there or anything like that. Just sticking to the game plan; it’s just simplicity, and it’s working for us.”

A monsoon of momentum

Hockey is a game that is more often than not decided by momentum.

When you have it, everything looks and feels ten times easier. Passing lanes open up, skates feel lighter on your feet, and stickhandling becomes more rhythmic. But when a game’s momentum is against you, the play seems to spin around you like a whirlwind, the opposition skaters mere flashes of color darting by, the ice seemingly tilted uphill.

For Maine and Northeastern, Friday’s contest was decided by a few momentum-swinging minutes early in the second period, when the ascendant Black Bears roared out to a 4-0 lead, and the game became an avalanche snowballing against the unravelling Huskies.

This sliding doors moment began when Will Gerrior was sent to the penalty box for cross-checking, handing Northeastern their first power play of the night. If the Huskies had scored during their man-advantage and tied the contest, who knows how the rest of the game would have played out.

But Maine’s penalty kill not only held Northeastern off the scoreboard; they added to the Black Bears’ lead.

Fowler, covering the point in the defensive zone, hopped on a bouncing puck that rolled off a Huskies’ stick, springing the Tewsbury Tornado to breeze down ice on a breakaway and coolly slot a shot between Zacher’s wickets.

It was the Alfond Southern Maine’s ice, registering an assist for the home team.

“Their flank went up to their D, and the ice was a little brutal out there, I’m not going to lie. So it luckily bounced over them, and I saw that, I just kind of went with it, and luckily it went in,” Fowler said.

Now with four goals in two games, Fowler has been as lethal as his chirps. There’s something about Portland that must get the best out of Fowler, who was the catalyst and overtime hero in Maine’s 5-4 victory over UMass-Lowell in Portland in December.

“A good night for myself and the team, and a big three points for us. That’s really big. Obviously, we love playing out here in Portland,” Fowler grinned.

With the Black Bears buzzing, riding the wave of momentum created by Fowler’s shorthanded goal, Northeastern was kept on their heels, desperately trying to find an answer by hook or by crook. The Black Bears blitz in and around the Northeastern net in the minutes following the goal, had the Huskies scrambling to fight the fires raging around their goaltender, and holding on for dear life. Eventually, Maine’s pressure forced Northeastern to take three minor penalties in the matter of 37 seconds.

After beginning the season as the more penalized team than their opponents, more often than not, it’s now the Black Bears’ opposition taking more penalties than Maine. In each of their last six games, Maine’s opposition has taken more or equal to the number of penalties committed by the Black Bears. It is no coincidence that this trend correlates with the vastly improved work ethic that Maine has shown in recent weeks.

“When you work harder, you tend to draw more penalties. The first two-thirds of the season, we take two seconds off, and we reach instead of skating to get on the right side of the puck and take a penalty. It all comes down to our work ethic. It’s all about our effort in playing the game the right way. When you do that, good things happen. When you don’t, bad things happen. So it’s all connected,” Barr explained.

With the wind at their backs and the Huskies in the dog house, the Black Bears scored back-to-back five-on-three goals in the matter of just eighty seconds.

The Black Bears’ battering ram sparked by Fowler’s shorty.

“That was a huge goal short-handed. Fowls has been awesome for us recently. That line has been great, you know, everyone’s chipping in, which is really good. You score that, and then we get a five-on-three and pot a couple. We haven’t taken advantage of those momentum changes often this year. We have a couple of times in the last few games,” Barr said.

Brandon Holt continued the siege, blasting a howitzer bar down from the high slot before Josh Nadeau’s red-hot stick scored his sixth goal in three games. It was a fluky goal from a stretch pass by Rousseau that caught Northeastern out on a linechange, with Miguel Marques and Nadeau playing a two-on-one passing move that ended up bouncing off a Northeastern defenseman’s leg and into the net.

Everything Nadeau’s stick touches at the moment seems to turn to gold, even if it wasn’t how he drew it up.

Meanwhile, for Holt, the goal was the co-Captain’s seventh point in three games.

“I’ve just been trying to shoot the puck on the power play, keep it simple, and luckily I got a good wood on it, and it went in,” Holt said.

Maine’s power play was ice cold during the month of January, at one point just 1/27 on the man-advantage. It’s now 7/16, popping in power play goals left, right, and center.

When it rains, it pours.

Holt credits quicker, more confident, and simpler puck movement as having been the main key to the Back Bears’ rampant power play of late.

“I think we’re moving the puck quicker, and we’re just simplifying. We’re not making the perfect play every time. A lot of it comes from taking a simple shot or getting the puck in deep and winning a battle. It’s not tic-tac-toe every single time. And then I think when you do the little things, and you score the dirty goals, the pretty goals come after,” Holt explained.

Meanwhile, Barr credits both Assistant Coach Rick Bennet, who runs the power play, as well as Nadeau’s return to the ice at BU three weekends ago, as being the x-factor for Maine’s head-and-shoulders improved power play. Nadeau, playing in the bumper position, is the commander for the Black Bears’ first power play unit.

“Josh Nadeau has been playing phenomenally. He calms that unit down, the puck kind of goes through him, and he makes the right decisions, and he’s also shooting the puck,” Barr said. “Rick’s done a great job with it.”

Clicking on all cylinders, and with a resounding 4-0 win to show for it, the Black Bears will look for their fourth win in a row Saturday night at Lowell, once again against Nomadic Northeastern.

Maine’s monsoon of momentum is growing by the day.

Don’t get too close to the Black Bears; they are scorching hot.

Has the page truly been turned, or will it once again be the Black Bear shuffle: one step forward, another step back?

The only consistent theme of this Maine Black Bears’ season has been that you never know which version of them you’re going to see on any given night.

The Halloween weekend sweep over BU was thought to have been lift off, only to come back down to earth two weeks later against Vermont. Their mountainous performance at Denver had Maine flying high, only to free-fall the following weekend at Providence.

Now, off the back of a Senior Weekend sweep over the Merrimack Warriors, Maine’s weekend series against the Northeastern Huskies will test whether the Black Bears are truly in the ascendancy or if it’ll be the same-old seesaw story.

“Our trend this year has been that every time we do something good, we take six steps back,” Head Coach Ben Barr said.

Fight to the finish

This weekend’s battle with Northeastern isn’t only a chance for Maine to maintain their momentum and prove that last weekend’s success wasn’t just a flash in the pan. It’s a golden opportunity to leapfrog past this weekend’s opponents in the bottle-necked Hockey East Standings.

Maine is currently in 6th-place and would therefore host a First Round playoff game against 11th-place if the standings remained the same come two weeks from now.

The Huskies, in 5th position, hold a two-point lead over the Black Bears. Northeastern occupies the final First Round bye position, and, if the season ended today, would play a Quarterfinal road game at 4th-place UMass, also on 32 points. Meanwhile, right on the Black Bears’ coattails is BU, just one point behind Maine, while Merrimack is four points behind, and 9th-place UMass-Lowell is just five points back.

A weekend sweep over Northeastern could catapult Maine all the way up to 4th (a First Round bye and home Quarterfinal game) if other results went their way. At the same time, being swept by the Huskies could drop the Black Bears all the way down to 9th (a First Round game on the road).

For Maine, and especially the senior class, who potentially played their final-ever contest in Orono last weekend, there will be desperation to earn a home playoff game in order to play one final match in front of the adoring Alfond Faithful.

“Our goal is to play a playoff game at home, for everyone in that room, and obviously the fans at home. To get one last playoff game at home, it will mean everything to the guys in the room and obviously the fans in the stands. That’s what we’re striving for and really pushing for down the stretch,” Owen Fowler said.

Maine may still have three regular-season games remaining, but the level of urgency in their dressing room has already been ratcheted up to playoff mode for the last month or so.

“Three games left, it’s playoffs from here on out. I think we control our destiny, honestly. The standings are so tight right now, and any points can go either way. You can drop, or you could go up. Obviously, it’s a big weekend for us ahead,” Fowler said.

The Nadeau factor

The age-old saying is that at this time of the season, you need your best players to step up and be your best players.

For much of the second-half of the season, Maine hasn’t been able to get consistent offensive production or all-around strong performances from any of their upperclassmen bar Brandon Holt. Veteran players have had their moments in the sun, as have underclassmen, but all too often, the Black Bears that Maine relies on to lead the charge have been just good, not great, and down the stretch, playing just ‘good’ isn’t going to cut it.

That wasn’t the case last weekend against Merrimack as a number of Maine’s vets broke out of scoring slumps and led the charge to the Black Bears’ sweep. Sully Scholle scored a goal and registered two assists last weekend, his goal the first he’s scored since January 24th at UMass-Lowell. Scholle’s linemate, Owen Fowler, scored twice over the series, adding an assist, breaking his 11-game scoring slump going back to December 14th against Lindenwood.

Meanwhile, Holt had five assists on the weekend, earning the Hockey East Defender of the Week Award.

But no Black Bear was more impactful than Josh Nadeau. The now on-fire junior’s five goals and three assists earned him Hockey East Player of the Week Awards, while his hat-trick on Friday was his first goals since December 10th against UMass-Lowell in Portland.

Having been out for two weeks with mononucleosis, Nadeau returned to the ice three weekends ago against BU. Although he didn’t score until Friday, since getting healthy, he has looked vastly more confident on the puck. He’s rolled off hits with composure, created plenty of scoring opportunities for himself, played with defensive diligence, and overall has looked like the best version of himself, a manifestation that can creep into opponents’ nightmares.

“[Nadeau] and Holter and Fowls were great. Those are the kind of performances you need to win games at this time of year. It can’t always be those guys; you need other guys stepping up,” Barr said.

Nadeau credits the forced time off as allowing him to hit the mental reset button.

“I took a little break from hockey and just reset mentally, and that really helped me,” Nadeau explained. “It sucked just being at home on the couch getting rest, but now that I’m back at it, I’m happy to get going with the guys.”

For Maine to make a run deep into March and, dare I say, April, it will be critical for individual veterans to get hot and step up. This is what will be crucial for the Black Bears as a team if they are to go on a tear down the stretch and into the playoffs, especially with leading goalscorer Justin Poirier still out with a ‘day-to-day’ injury and no update on his potential return.

With these upperclassmen setting the tone last weekend, it was no coincidence that rookies such as Miguel Marques, Jaden Lipinski, Will Gerroir, Luke Peterson, and Loïc Usereau all played well, following in the vets’ footsteps. For Maine, the Black Bears can’t afford to carry any extra weight. They need all dressed players to have a positive impact on the game and, at a bare minimum, bring their lunch-pail effort, which Barr credits as the biggest improvement in their recent resurgence.

“If you have one, two, three guys that are out to lunch in a game, you have no chance. Our league is too good. College hockey is too good,” Barr said. The work ethic has been better. So if we’re working hard, you’re always encouraged by that, and that’s been a challenge for us to do as a team.”

Nomadic Northeastern

This weekend’s series, the first meeting between Northeastern and Maine since the Black Bears’ triumphant double-overtime thriller in the Hockey East semifinals at TD Garden last March, will be an unusual ‘home-and-home’ series.

Except that neither game will be played at the historic Alfond Arena nor Matthews Arena.

Instead, Friday’s contest will be played at Portland’s Cross Insurance Arena, while Saturday’s game will be in Lowell at the Tsongas Center.

In December, the doors finally closed on Northeastern’s century-old relic, Matthews Arena, due to irreparable structural failings. The Huskies, without a home, have played their second-half “home” games at BU’s Walter Brown Arena and Bentley Arena in Waltham, Massachusetts.

Nomadic Northeastern has also had to switch what were supposed to be home games into road contests at their opponents’ rink due to their hosts having done all the legwork in terms of gameday operations prep, ticket sales, and staffing. That is the case with Friday’s game in Portland, which was recently switched to a road game for Northeastern.

Although they started the season hot with a 10-7-0 record while Matthews Arena could still be occupied, the no-longer Huntington Hounds have struggled significantly after playing their final game at Matthews, recording just a 5-9-1 record since December 13th. Not only no longer playing any home contests, the Huskies also have had to practice at Booch Ice Center in Dedham, Mass, ten miles as the crow flies away from Northeastern’s campus, often a nearly 45-minute commute.

Maine has already played a contest this season in Portland, outlasting UMass-Lowell on December 10th in a gritty, ugly overtime win thanks to Owen Fowler’s heroics. For Fowler and the Black Bears, the chance to play another game in front of Alfond Southern Maine is a cherished opportunity.

“It’s always fun playing down there. Always good crowds. Different scenery for some fans to get down there and support,” Fowler said.

Barr is treating this weekend as any other business trip.

“It’s just two road games. Obviously [in] Portland, it feels like a home crowd usually, but it’s two road games,” Barr said. “We have to have that mentality.”

Although Northeastern’s 2.7 goals-per-game average (tied for 40th in the nation) and 25.7 shots-per-game (45th) aren’t anything to write home about, the Huskies are opportunistic with their chances, playing a rapid north-south game, turning defense into a clear-cut scoring chance in the blink of an eye. This allows talented forwards #13 Dylan Hrycowian (15g-18a-33pts), #14 Joe Connor (11g-10a-21pts), #15 Giacomo Matrino (10g-11a-21pts), #81 Jacob Mathueu (9g-17a-26pts), and reigning Hockey East Rookie of the Week #33 Amine Hajibi (5g-17a-22pts) the opportunity to make their low quantity of offensive looks into high-quality chances.

Maine will need to limit their turnovers in all three zones, be precise with the puck, make sure they are backchecking diligently, and not get caught out of position, allowing an aggressive offensive move to backfire into an opportunistic Northeastern odd-man rush the other way.

“They always have a lot of really good stick skill. They don’t give you a lot, and they force you into making [a] turnover. So you think you have time and space on the outside of the ice, whether it’s in the O-zone or the neutral zone, if we try to make plays that aren’t there or come off the page for a second, they create turnovers, and then they get scoring chances. So they’re a very opportunistic team, and when they get chances, a lot of them end up in the back of the net, as evidenced by if you watch their games from last weekend. So it’s going to be really important for us to manage the puck and get into the forecheck, and that’s easier said than done because they usually have five guys on the right side of the puck. So, as always, it’s going to come down to our work ethic,” Barr explained.

As per usual with the Black Bears, making the simpler play is often the better way to go, and never has this been more critical than against Northeastern. If Maine decides they want to repeat their track-meet, run-and-gun style of game they played against BU, the Black Bears very well could get burned. But if they stick to their knitting, put pucks in deep and go to work as they did against UConn and Merrimack, this could be another big weekend for the Black Bears.

“I think just playing simple, honestly. I think when we complicate the game or try to go one-on-one or one-on-three, whatever scenario it is, it definitely does not work in our favor. Just playing together and playing simple and getting pucks in, doing everything for each other and letting results take care of themselves,” Fowler said. “[In] the neutral zone, they try and clog it up. I think we just need to advance pucks through the neutral zone and find a way to get pucks out of the corners in the O-zone, [and] generate chaos at the net.”

In order to slow down Northeastern’s speed and skill, the Black Bears will have to bring out their punishing physicality and grind the Huskies down over the course of 120 minutes.

“I think they’re a more passive team, but very talented, so we’ve just got to be really physical on them and play hard,” Nadeau said.

A polar opposite to the Huskies’ poor offensive statistics, their defensive game is one of the best in college hockey, in large part thanks to goaltender #47 Lawton Zacher’s unbelievable season. Boasting the third-best save-percentage (.934 sv%), tied for seventh fewest average goals allowed (2.04 GAA), second-best CHIP rating for all goaltenders in college hockey (72.9), and second-best expected goals saved (+22.95 xGA+), Zacher has been Northeastern’s X-factor all season, stealing the Huskies wins when they’ve not been the better team.

A fortnight ago, against a similarly rated netminder in UConn’s Tyler Muszelik, the Black Bears had a tough time manufacturing dirty area goals, scoring only three goals on 53 total shots on goal over the course of the weekend, even with Muszelik spilling plenty of rebounds. But then, last weekend against another elite goaltender, Max Lundgren, Maine was much better at generating traffic at netfront, scoring most of their goals via either deflected redirection, screen, or rebound.

“They’re a really good defensive team in front of [Zacher]. They do a good job of not giving up a ton of grade-A’s, and [Zacher] plays the puck really well, and he’s composed,” Barr explained. “We’re just going to have to put pucks in there and win some battles. I think almost every single goal last weekend was a screen, a tip, a third or fourth chance. That has to be something we take a lot of pride in.”

Meanwhile, Maine’s own goaltending situation doesn’t look quite as great as Northeastern’s. Mathis Rousseau started both games last weekend, allowing five goals on 47 shots, a 0.894 save percentage, including a number of soft goals, showing a five-hole weakness. Although Rousseau started back-to-back contests, neither he nor Albin Boija has done nearly enough to take the starting job. Maine will desperately need one of their two goaltenders to play their way into the starting job if they are to make a significant push in the playoffs.

Against an opposition goaltender as dominant as Zacher, either Rousseau or Boija will have to at least come close to matching the Northeastern netminder if the Black Bears are to have a good chance of winning these games.

“I don’t think we’re at a point where you look at, statistically or anything, where [we say] that’s our guy. We have a couple of guys who are under a .900 save percentage. It’s day by day in practice, and those guys have been working really hard in practice,” Barr explained. “[The starting job is] still up in the air.”

Maine needs one of them to step up.

After all, this is the time of year when heroes are born.

Nadeau put on his Superman cape last weekend. Who’s it going to be this time around?

Is Maine on the march, or will this be another whiplash weekend?

00:28: Intro / Merrimack Review

07:53: Josh Nadeau’s massive weekend

19:05: Brandon Holt’s Impact

29:24: Northeastern Preview

46:17: Keys to the Weekend / Outro

Dare I say it, but the Maine Black Bears are putting it all together at the right time of the year.

For the first time in a long time, during the third period of Saturday’s game, the Alfond Faithful could sit back, relax, kick their feet up, and be at ease while watching Maine play comfortably with a multi-goal lead during their 5-2 victory over the Merrimack Warriors.

Rewind back to the first period, however, and it was anything but comfortable for the Black Bears and their crowd.

An “ugly” first

After the emotional high of getting the four-game winless monkey off their back with Friday’s victory, Saturday night’s contest was always going to test Maine’s maturity. Would they have the ability to set aside the good feelings, refocus mentally, and play with the same hungry intensity of a team starving for scraps?

Instead, the Black Bears came out in the first period with bloated bellies, outplayed by a desperate Merrimack team urgently looking to pick up Hockey East points. It wasn’t as if Maine wasn’t working hard in the first, but their game strayed drastically from the simplified, nuts-and-bolts approach that brought them success the night before.

The Black Bears were trying to skate the puck 200 feet instead of taking the ice given to them, putting pucks in behind the pinching Merrimack defense, strapping on their hard hats, and getting to work in the trenches on the forecheck. When Maine did have open ice to work with, they overpassed and overstickhandled. At one point, Maine had a three-on-one, but tripped themselves up by trying to get too fancy on the rush and didn’t even end up registering a shot.

“That was pretty ugly, the first period,” Head Coach Ben Barr admitted after the game. “I think [it’s] just the immaturity again. Last night was an emotional night, just finding a way to get a W [after] we hadn’t won in a while. Then we come out, and we’re gonna start stickhandling through people and just complicating everything.”

Maine was outshot 13-5 during the opening frame, with most of those shots coming during a successful power play, which was a redirected tip from an Owen Fowler shot, off Josh Nadeau’s blade for the junior’s fourth goal in as many periods of the weekend.

Nadeau’s tally was sandwiched between two Warriors’ goals, the first from Caelan Fitzpatrick and the second by Michael Emerson. Both of Merrimack’s goals were courtesy of suspect Black Bear defending that didn’t close down time or space, and both were soft goals tucked between Mathis Rousseau’s wickets.

“I thought he was shaky [in] the first period,” Barr said about Rousseau. “Those first couple of goals were yikes, to be honest.”

A surging second

But after coming out of the gates slowly for arguably their sloppiest period of the past month, Maine ultimately looked like a completely different team during the second stanza, although it took a little bit of time for the Black Bears to get going, since they were slowed down by the long line change and hemmed into their own end quite a bit early on. Maine iced the puck a number of times and struggled to break the puck out in the face of Merrimack’s more aggressive forecheck, which the Warriors unleashed, having failed to slow the Black Bears down with a neutral zone trap on Friday.

Despite this, Miguel Marques broke the floodgates wide open early in the second on the power play. The game-tying goal came at the end of a barrage of Black Bear shots, collapsing and scrambling the Merrimack penalty kill. With all four Warriors down underneath the faceoff dots, Brandon Holt, the power play’s point-man, received a Nadeau pass in the high slot, quickly shifting it over to his left, setting it on a tee for Marques to one-time slam it home with authority.

Owen Fowler would put the Black Bears into the lead later in the frame after Jaden Lipinski motored the puck through center ice, gained the blueline, spun off a check, and fed Fowler in the high slot to snap it into the back of the net past Max Lundgren’s glove side.

“Great play by Lipper getting the blue line. They were pinching really hard tonight, so I think getting that blue line was huge. Taking care of pucks in high ice, and luckily, he found me. I was just going left to right and trying to shoot against the grain,” Fowler explained.

After Fowler fired Maine into the lead, Nadeau kept the pedal to the metal, padding the hosts’ lead for his fifth goal of the weekend and another on the power play.

The go-ahead strike came from Nadeau’s wrister up by the point, a seeing-eye shot that Lundgren never saw with Freel setting a screen at the goalmouth.

Nadeau missed three January games due to sickness, but ever since returning to the ice against BU three weekends ago, he has looked more and more like the confident, playmaking, sublimely skilled forward Black Bear Nation learned to love his freshman season and late last year.

This past weekend, though, may have been his best weekend ever as a Black Bear. He not only broke his goalless drought that dated back to December 10th with a hat-trick on Friday, but scored two more on Saturday, and earned three assists during the weekend, playing full of swagger and confidence.

“He had a great weekend. It’s good to see, hopefully, he continues that trend. Might not get two goals or three goals every night out of him, but he’s playing the game the right way, and again, I think simplifying the game, getting more pucks in [has been key],” Barr said.”

Just your typical five-goal, eight-point weekend for Nadeau.

No big deal.

Are we sure Josh isn’t still sick? Because he is burning up.

“I think just keeping it simple,” Nadeau explained the key to his success. “That break when I was sick really helped me just to get my mind right. I came back strong and playing with Owen and Sully made it so easy for me to have a good week.”

Barr looks to have struck gold with the Fowler, Scholle, and Nadeau line. A well-balanced trio mixing sublime skill and gritty edge, all three tallied goals this weekend, as well as exercising defensive responsibility.

“[Josh is] one hell of a player. So is Sully. I’ve been lucky enough to play with Sully pretty much all year, with some injuries and stuff like that. Getting Josh on the line, he’s unbelievable, a playmaker. He can shoot the puck, obviously, you can tell this weekend. Both of them are unbelievable to play with. I think all of us kind of bring a little different to the line, and I look forward to keep playing with them,” Fowler said.

Nadeau brings vision, a high level of hockey IQ, and the ability to conjure up a moment of magic, while Fowler provides feistiness, punishing physicality, and an uncanny capability to irritate and aggravate the opposition to no end. Meanwhile, Scholle is a well-rounded, reliable mix of both Nadeau and Fowler.

After Fowler’s go-ahead goal, there was plenty of jawing between a whole pack of Warriors and the grinning Cheshire Cat, chirping back. Whatever Fowler said seemed to press all the right buttons as Merrimack began to unravel, taking two more penalties in the second frame.

“That’s a part of my game that I try to get under people’s skins, and luckily it kind of worked today,” Fowler said. “Just another weekend for me, basically.”

Maine’s second stanza performance saw all four forward lines and every one of the seven defensemen firing on all cylinders, delivering a full-bore performance. The Black Bears veteran core is beginning to find their groove, the rookies are following suit, with everyone starting to play their best hockey at the right time of the year. Barr’s focus on consistent effort and attitude is finally enabling the Black Bears to find their groove at the eleventh hour. With Justin Poirier and Max Scott injured, everyone is stepping up, filling bigger shoes, and taking on greater roles.

“[For] some of these young kids, to play at this time of year, it’s really hard, it’s physical, and a lot of these young guys haven’t ever seen anything like that. So we make mistakes, but the effort and attitude of the last couple of weeks have been there. That’s really foundational for us. If we can do that, we can cover missing some guys that are key for us,” Barr said.

Power play cooking

Maine’s man-advantage had gone into an ice-cold 0-for-17 spin during this bitterly frigid, old-fashioned winter, but a power play goal last weekend finally gave life to the man-advantage. Now, it seems to be wide awake after its long slumber.

Fowler secured his second of the contest late in the third period, capitalizing on a Merrimack five-minute major committed by Nick Pierre. The fifth goal of the game and Maine’s third on the power play came off a wristed point shot from Josh Nadeau, quarterbacking the play by the blueline, which was deftly redirected by Fowler’s stick blade. Against a Warrior penalty kill that entered the series with the 15th-best PK percentage in the nation (83.2%), the Black Bears power play purred, going 3-for-7 on the weekend.

Barr credits the power play’s night-and-day turnaround as being down to quicker puck movement and simpler plays, coached by Assistant Rick Bennett, who runs the man-advantage unit.

“I thought they had more pace to what they did. Rick has worked with them a lot. We’ve spent a lot of time on that over the last few weeks and haven’t really seen the fruits of it until tonight. But they just kept it simple, and then we got them running around, and they didn’t complicate things and just got pucks to the net,” Barr said.

Maine has also seen a steady increase in their ability to manufacture goals through deflections, screens, and rebounds. Last weekend, all three of the Black Bears’ tallies came from stuffing in rebounds, while this series, of the ten goals Maine scored, two came from redirections, one was from a screen play, and another was a rebound.

Fowler’s goal put the icing on the cake, sealing Maine’s weekend sweep, their first sweep since at UMass-Lowell in mid-January, first sweep at home since Lindenwood in December, and first in Hockey East play since roaring past BU during Halloweekend.

“It feels good, that’s for sure. I think it was a huge weekend for our culture. I think we took really big strides this weekend and really came together down the stretch. I feel like you can kind of see that in that third period, just play mature and get pucks in,” Fowler said.

It was the perfect way to send off a senior class that has been so instrumental to Maine’s revival during their four seasons in Orono. Joining a team that had only won seven games the previous year, they will leave Maine with the program as strong as ever, a Hockey East Championship ring on their fingers, and looking like they’re not done yet.

“It feels really good to end Senior Night on a high note. I really appreciate being able to play in this place for the last four years. It’s something I’ll cherish. So to be able to end it like that, the right way, it means a lot to me and definitely all the other seniors,” Brandon Holt said.

With three more regular-season games to go away from the Alfond, and Maine in the middle of a logjam in the Hockey East standings, there is now a strong chance that the senior class will get one more game at the Alfond in the playoffs.

But if not, what a delight it was to see them exit Alfond ice one last time with heads held high and smiles on their faces.

They may be flatlanders from Away, but Brandon Holt, Owen Fowler, Brandon Chabrier, Grayson Arnott, and Thomas Freel will forever be considered true Mainers.

All aboard, the Black Bear Express is picking up speed, accelerating down the tracks.

Punching a return ticket to the Garden may just be in our future after all.

Fill the steins, raise a toast, and breathe a giant sigh of relief because the Maine Black Bears are back in the win column after snapping their four-game winless skid with a 5-3 Friday night victory over the Merrimack Warriors.

Capturing all three Hockey East points, the evening allowed the Alfond Faithful to saunter out of the rink into the late-winter snowstorm with bellies fully satisfied for what feels like the first time in an eternity.

Not only was it Maine’s first win since January 24th in Lowell, but it was also the Black Bears’ first victory on home ice since December 14th against Lindenwood, as well as their first Hockey East win at the Alfond since a 7-0 November 14th victory over Vermont.

Meanwhile, the victorious Black Bears exiting the ice were finally able to skate off with smiles on their faces, flooded with relief, finally getting one over the line after having played so well and come up short so many times in recent weeks.

“That’s a big win for us. We’ve been fighting it all year. Not the season we wanted, not to start, but this one’s big for us. We’ll keep pushing and focus on the end here,” Josh Nadeau said after the game.

The Black Bears have had the hardest of lines in their previous four games.

5.6 seconds away from an emphatic win past Providence, only to fall in overtime.

Leading at Boston University heading into the third period, only to have hearts broken once again in overtime.

Then, last weekend, arguably playing their best hockey of the season, but unable to wrestle a win away from UConn in back-to-back nights, ending the series with just one point for their valiant efforts.

Of Maine’s previous three contests at the Alfond, none of which ended in victory, the Black Bears probably played better in all three than they did on this Friday night.

“I feel like we’ve had better games, but that was a good game for us. A huge win,” Oskar Komorov admitted. “Obviously, we’ve been in a lot of overtime games, shootout games, played good hockey, and sometimes we win, sometimes we lose. This game was huge. It just felt like we got momentum going now, and we’ll do the same thing tomorrow again.”

“It’s never pretty when you’re trying to get out of a funk. I thought the guys gave their all. That’s what we’re measuring ourselves on right now, and obviously came out on the right end of it tonight,” Head Coach Ben Barr added.

The Nadeau Show

So far, it hasn’t been the season Josh Nadeau would have hoped for. Not only because of his team’s inconsistent results, but also because injuries and illness have derailed the junior from finding his stride and hitting the same lofty heights as he did during his memorable freshman season.

Sidelined with a dislocated shoulder suffered at Quinnipiac in October, and battling a bout of mononucleosis throughout much of January, it’s been a struggle for Nadeau to get healthy, get on the ice, and find any semblance of rhythm in his game.

He’s popped up with high-producing performances this Fall, scoring a brace against Holy Cross during Opening Weekend, a hat-trick at UMass, and two goals against Vermont, but he has been as up-and-down as the Black Bears’ season. When Nadeau is going strong, there are not too many more impactful players in college hockey. However, his 13 goals on the year, second most on the team behind Justin Poirier’s 18 (who remains on the sidelines with a lower-body injury), have all been scored in just seven of the 25 games he’s played, which leans towards the sense of his streakiness.

The good news is that ever since being sidelined for three games and finally returning to full health at Boston University, Nadeau has looked like his best self. An elusive skater with the puck, Nadeau’s quick hands and core strength allow him to play through body contact and wiggle out of tight area situations with the puck, while his high-hockey IQ and vision have him regarded as one of the best playmakers in the conference.

Nadeau’s responsibility off the puck has also taken a leap this season, playing in all situations, including the penalty kill, which highlights the trust the coaching staff has in him as a complete 200-foot player; his two shorthanded goals this year being the cherry on top.

“He had a lot of looks last week, and I thought he had some really good looks in his first game against BU, too. Obviously, he’s a guy we rely on to produce for us, but he’s been a reliable 200-foot [player] too. Hopefully, he gets some confidence back after getting a couple through tonight,” Barr said about Nadeau.

But perhaps the most underrated aspect of Nadeau’s game that has grown dramatically has been the steps he’s taken as a leader. He’s no longer just the shy and quiet rookie, like when he arrived on campus as a freshman. He’s now the eldest French-Canadian of a team chock-full of young Québécois and Acadians, and has been essential to helping this still-gelling team to adapt to collegiate hockey and American university life.

“He’s a junior, but he’s figured out how to be a leader and all that kind of stuff, as a lot of our returners are,” Barr said.

Although frustrated to miss a couple of weeks in January due to illness, Nadeau admits that the forced time off allowed him to hit the mental reset button and has done wonders for his game.

“I’ve been fighting all year with injuries and sickness. A little time off was really nice. It helped me focus on my game, all the little details off the ice, and just come back stronger. Tonight was a big night,” Nadeau explained.

Nadeau’s big night, his second hat-trick of the season and third of his collegiate career, got the Maine ball rolling downhill midway through the first period. Sully Scholle, on the forecheck behind the goalline, pressured the puck to be reversed behind the net and into the corner, where Thomas Freel’s presence forced an errant breakout pass off a Warrior skate over to Scholle all alone in the slot. Scholle’s sweeping shot was saved by Max Lundgren, but Freel found the rebound, made a drop pass into Nadeau’s wheelhouse, who promptly stuffed Maine into the lead, his first goal since December 10th in Portland.

The opening goal came at a critical juncture in the game for the Black Bears, who, up until the Nadeau opener, had been completely in the driver’s seat, playing a controlled, puck-possession style of hockey that at one point in the first period had Maine outshooting Merrimack 11-1. The worry was that the longer the Black Bears went without scoring while dominating the game, the more angsty Maine would become, and as a result, begin to unravel emotionally, as has happened countless times this season.

What felt even more crucial, though, was when three minutes later, Nadeau at the backpost got on the receiving end of a brilliant Brandon Holt rush up ice and cross-ice pass, doinking the tight-angle shot off the post and in, doubling Maine’s advantage. It was the first multi-goal lead the Black Bears have had since January 24th at Lowell, the lack of which was a major factor in their two following overtime losses, as Maine’s inability to pad their lead while in the driver’s seat came back to haunt them repeatedly.

For the Black Bears to make a run in the playoffs, their best players are going to have to step up and be their best players, and Nadeau looks to be oozing with confidence at the moment.

At long last, the Nadeau show has returned to Orono.

Getting over the line

After the Black Bears had dominated the early proceedings and tore out to a deserved and comfortable two-goal lead, Merrimack worked their way back into the game and made Friday’s contest feel anything but comfortable.

Compared to Maine’s offensive generation, which had to build pressure, find momentum, turn the screw, and work extremely hard to create chances, Merrimack’s offense seemed to come from straightforward, simple, north-south passes that sprung the Warriors in behind the Black Bears’ defense for a high-quality scoring look seemingly out of nothing. Late in the first period, after Nadeau’s brace gave the Black Bears their first multi-goal lead in four games, the Warriors struck right back seconds later when an innocent-looking pass from a Merrimack defenseman into the neutral zone was chipped over Loïc Usereau’s head, allowing Justin Gil to get on the end of it, putting Maine’s scrambling defense into panic mode. This allowed Mark Hillier to sneak into the slot unnoticed and find the pass at the backpost to get the visitors on the scoreboard out of a seemingly nothing play.

“It just seems like every breakdown kind of ends up in the back of our net, and that’s just where things are at when you’re struggling a little bit,” Barr said. “That’s just kind of the nature of where we’re at right now. Like every breakdown ends up as a grade-A. We don’t recover [very well] from breakdowns. They get a two-on-one at the end of the first, and we run over, and they tap in the back door. We don’t want to play those situations like that, and we know that, but we panic and do it.”

Sully Scholle would reinstate Maine’s two-goal advantage midway through the second period when the junior forward shimmied his way off a pursuing Warrior check against the left-wing boards and took it towards the net with a quick burst of speed. Then, at the top of the faceoff circle, Sholle’s silky mitts toe-drag-released a far-side shot over Lundgren’s pad, under his glove, and tickled the twine.

Nonetheless, Merrimack would once again answer back minutes later, chipping the puck in deep where Brandon Holt couldn’t break it back out, with the Warriors sealing the wall, getting the puck unstuck from the boards, and finding Caedan Fitzpatrick at the right wing faceoff dot to fire a shot past Rousseau’s stick-side.

Merrimack would then find the equalizer a minute into the third period when Jérémy Langlois stepped up to the red line, getting caught in no-man’s land, allowing a one-touch Warrior pass by the bench spring Merrimack’s red-hot Justin Gil in on a two-on-one rush with Nick Pierre. Gil took the shot on himself, firing the puck high past Mathis Rousseau, clanking off iron and in, stunning the Alfond crowd.

“The one at the beginning of the third was just a mental error by a defenseman stepping up for no reason, and they get a two-on-one and score. So those are the things that happen when you’re fighting it and trying to turn the ship around,” Barr said.

Maine’s inability to hold on to a lead this season has reared its ugly head for the third time in just the last five games alone. Barr assures that the Black Bears didn’t become complacent when playing with a lead or change the way they’re playing on Friday, but the root cause is mental errors from young players that allow the game to spiral on them.

“It’s just the nature of when you haven’t won a lot of games in the second half. I don’t think we took our foot off the gas or anything like that. It’s just the mental errors that get you. We had a few of those tonight, and they ended up in the back of the net. That’s been kind of the theme this year, with some of our young guys just kind of breaking down mentally a little bit at times. But it’s getting better, so that’s positive,” Barr explained.

Was history repeating itself?

Was Maine going to throw away another lead and end up on the losing end once again?

Not if Oskar Komarov had anything to do with it.

Komarov’s line alongside Thomas Pichette and Will Gerrior has been by far Maine’s unsung hero this season. Beginning the year on the fourth line as grinders, the trio now has 14 goals between the three, is now listed as the first line, and has quickly become one of Barr’s most reliable goal-scoring threats. Playing a simple, nuts-and-bolts, hard-nosed, lunch-pail effort style, the line delivers the classic Ben Barr Black Bear hockey type of game perfectly.

“We’re all kind of the same [type of] players. Just hardworking guys, not over-complicating things, just getting the puck in, getting in on forecheck, playing hard, simple plays to the net, back post. It’s kind of what we’re doing, and it’s been working for us,” Komarov explained.

Three minutes after Merrimack knotted the game level, the line answered the bell emphatically. The pressuring Picchette buzzed down low on the forecheck, hurrying and harrying an errant Warrior breakout pass directly onto Komarov’s stick with oceans of space in the slot. Komarov ripped a hard wrister, scorching off of Lundgren’s glove before spinning into the back of the net to the roar of the Alfond Faithful.

“I got in the slot and just shot it,” Komarov said. “I think I tried to go high glove [side].”

King Komo to the rescue.

Maine still wasn’t out of the woods, however, and the Alfond Faithful got especially nervous when the Black Bears took back-to-back penalties late in the game. But even on the kill, the Black Bears kept their tails up, looking for the knockout blow, confident that Rousseau would lock it down at the back.

The Black Bears managed to get over the finish line with their first victory in almost a month when Nadeau sealed the win with a long-range empty net goal from the red line.

There was something supremely satisfying about watching a hat-trick get capped off by a slowly rolling empty net goal, as the hats began to flutter down onto the ice like confetti while the puck was still trickling through the blue paint and slowly but surely over the goal line.

“It’s really cool, just seeing all the support from the whole state of Maine is something special. Playing here is special,” Nadeau said.

The Alfond celebrated in equal parts joy and relief, overjoyed to see their beloved Black Bears break out of their rut, finally get rewarded for their stellar play, and get back to winning ways.

Was this the first domino to be knocked over?

Is Maine really getting hot at the right time?

Watch out, Hockey East, Maine has momentum, and the Black Bears are hungry!

Same again on Saturday, please.

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Just like that, in the blink of an eye, the #26 Maine Black Bears prepare for their final regular-season homestand at the Alfond, taking on the #24 Merrimack Warriors.

For Maine’s senior class, it’s a weekend they’ve been dreading for years.

“It’s going to be really sad this weekend to look at all my boys knowing that it’s our last run around at the Alfond,” Brandon Chabrier said. “It has gone by too fast; it hasn’t hit me yet.”

Along with Chabirer, seniors Brandon Holt, Thomas Freel, and Grayson Arnott won’t just be playing to end their Alfond careers on a high note; they’ll be desperately fighting for the chance to play one more game in Orono.

In the Hockey East standings, places 9 through 11 go on the road in the First Round of the playoffs, traveling to play at 6 through 8. Finishing 1 through 5 earns a First Round bye, with 1-4 guaranteed a home Quarterfinal contest and #5 playing on the road at #4.

With five games remaining in the regular season, the Black Bears are currently in 9th place in Hockey East, and as things stand, would go on the road in the First Round.

Owen Fowler is also a senior, but has an extra year of eligibility due to missing the entirety of his sophomore season at UMass-Lowell with a head injury and broken kneecap suffered during an on-campus assault.

Putting the cart before the horse?

This weekend allows the Black Bears one final chance to achieve something they haven’t yet been able to do in 2026: win a game at the Alfond.

Maine is currently in the midst of being winless over their last four contests (three of which have been in Orono), not having come out victorious since Max Scott’s overtime heroics at Lowell on January 24th. Since then, the Black Bears have lost three straight, heartbroken twice in overtime, before most recently snapping their losing streak last Saturday in a 3-3 tie against UConn.

Although the recent on-paper results look ugly, the Black Bears have routinely played well, yet keep falling short in the end. Last weekend, especially on Saturday, Maine churned out one of their best performances of the season, playing with a scintillating edge, dominating much of the game, and finding a whole new level to their game not previously seen this season.

UConn is one of the best teams in the nation, and Maine gave the Huskies everything they could handle. Maine ‘out-expected goals’ UConn 9.36 to 5.83 over the weekend, outshot the high-flying Huskies 172-100 in total shots, and outshot Connecticut 85-53 in terms of shots on goal during the series.

The Black Bears’ offense was firing on all cylinders; their 5.43 xG generated on Saturday a lofty 1.24 goals more than the second-highest xG UConn had allowed this season (4.19 at BU on October 24th), and Maine’s 53 Saturday shots on goal, 12 more than UConn’s second-highest total allowed (41 at Providence on November 8th).

Meanwhile, Maine played one of their better defensive weekends of the season, holding Connecticut’s dynamic forwards, who entered the game averaging a nation’s 9th-best 33.7 shots on goal average, to their lowest and third-lowest totals of the season, just 20 and 23 shots on net, respectively.

“I thought the work ethic the whole weekend was maybe as good or better than it’s been all year, even in the games that we’ve won,” Head Coach Ben Barr said. “I thought for six periods last weekend, the guys worked hard and still didn’t come out with the result that we wanted, but we have to understand that you play that way every night, some good things will eventually happen.”

Disappointingly, the desired results haven’t followed the elevated performances as one would wish. Defensive lapses, spotty goaltending, and difficulty manufacturing goals in and around the netfront have plagued Maine, routinely leading to falling short in close games. During Maine’s current four-game winless run, they’ve only been outscored 11-7.

Tight margins that continue not to fall their way.

But continue to play like they showed they could on Saturday, and surely the wins will come.

“If we play the way we played last weekend with that energy and that commitment to playing our game, we’re going to be a really hard team to beat. We’re going to give ourselves an opportunity to win every single game, whether that be the last five regular season games or in the playoffs, that’s when it really matters,” said Holt.

But although the seniors will desperately be looking for Senior Weekend wins and valuable Hockey East points, Barr isn’t putting an overabundance of weight on the results side of things. Instead, he is focusing on building off Saturday’s tremendously positive performance in the hope of shifting Maine into playing their best hockey of the season come do-or-die playoff time.

“Obviously, you play the game to win every single night,” Barr prefaced. “For us, who cares? It doesn’t matter wins or losses. If you play a certain way and you can build on something and everyone’s working, we have a team that can be in any game against anybody. I think we’ve proven that. If we’re just out there, a bunch of guys playing hockey, worrying about ourselves, it’s ugly. Eventually, the tide will turn if you keep doing the right thing. We know what’s ahead of us with the results, but really, the process is way more important at this point.”

What’s a better position to be in by the time the playoffs roll around? Playing poorly but scraping out unassured, unconvincing wins? Or performing well week-in-week-out, flying into the playoffs in fine-fiddle, playing your best hockey of the season even if the results aren’t piling up?

It’s the old cart before the horse metaphor.

What’s the point of eking out a higher standings spot if you don’t enter the playoffs with any momentum?

After all, it’s not as though Maine’s been impervious at the Alfond this season, with an in-conference home record of 3-5-1 compared to a 4-5-0 record on the road.

“For us, it’s, we’re beyond the wins and losses at this point. We’re trying to set some sort of foundation that we can be thought of every day,” Barr said.

The Warriors

Looking to spoil the Senior Weekend festivities are the Merrimack Warriors, who, as seems to be common for Maine’s opponents, enter their battle with the Black Bears red-hot. The Warriors have won five of their last seven contests, most recently splitting a home-and-home series with #14 Boston College, falling late in Game Two after having led for a majority of the contest.

“They’re playing great. Everyone seems to be playing well right now,” Barr said. They just played BC and had a chance to almost sweep them.”

Boasting a record of 15-13-1, this year’s rendition of the Warriors, led by Head Coach Scott Borek, has the chance to do something only four other Merrimack teams have accomplished in their 37 seasons at the Division I level – to end the season above .500. Having last finished with a winning record in both 2021/22 and 2022/23, Merrimack can no longer be considered Hockey East’s punching bag.

This weekend will be no walk in the park for the Black Bears.

Similar to Maine, Merrimack is a young team (at least in terms of collegiate experience) starting to really find their groove, except that for the Warriors, unlike the Black Bears, the second-half wins have been piling up.

Barr expects his team to be put to a very similar test as last weekend. Merrimack is led by an x-factor in net, the towering 6’5” sophomore goaltender #47 Max Lundgren (2.53 GAA – 0.919 SV%), whose 49.2 CHIP rating is seventh best among goaltenders in the nation, and +12.18 xGa is 11th in the country.

As with UConn’s Tyler Muszelik, the Black Bears can expect Lundgren to save every puck he is able to see. Manufacturing goals by setting screens, redirecting shots, and pouncing on rebounds will be critical for the Black Bears to break out of last weekend’s minuscule 3.53 shooting percentage. Although only scoring three times on 85 shots on goal against UConn isn’t anything to write home about, it was tremendously positive to see Maine begin to find the extra 30% effort needed to out-fight the opposition at the netfront and manufacture dirty-area goals for all three of their tallies last weekend.

“They’re playing really good defense. Their goaltending has been outstanding, which is the most important part of your team at this time of year, and they’re limiting a lot of second, third opportunities around them. It’s very similar to what we just saw,” Barr explained. “I think they have a really strong foundation in net, and that’s very similar to UConn, where [Lundgren] is going to make the first save every single time, and then they’re going to clear that net front. So it’s going to be important for us to get there and find a way to score some goals like we did on Saturday night.”

Greasy, dirty, ugly – it doesn’t matter how they go in at this time of the year, just as long as they light the lamp.

Meanwhile, Merrimack has enough offensive firepower to put the puck in Maine’s net, led by opportunistic scorers #10 Trevor Hoskin (8g-19a-27pts), #11 Nick Pierrre (12g-8a-20pts), and #12 Parker Lalonde (10g-16a-26pts). Heading the Warriors’ charge is 23-year-old freshman forward #23 Justin Gill (13g-15a-28pts), who is currently on an NCAA-leading six-game goal streak with at least one point in his last eleven games.

Maine will have to play a similarly stingy defensive game as last weekend, but this time, whoever Barr puts in net will have to match Lundgren’s performance, as Merrimack is sure to score their fair share of goals.

The Black Bears will also have to win the special teams battle against a Warriors’ power play that is 11th best in the country (24.5%) and 15th best penalty kill (83.2%), compared to Maine’s 17.3% power play (tied-44th) and 78.9% penalty kill (40th). The Alfond Faithful will be hoping that their team’s power play, which has scored as many power play goals in the New Year as they have allowed shorthanded goals against (2), finally turned the corner when Miguel Marques’s tally on the man-advantage last Saturday broke Maine out of their 0-for-17 cold stretch.

Overall, the way this season has gone, it feels like it will have to be another Herculean effort for Maine to have a sniff at the win column.

Will the results finally follow?

Can they build on last weekend’s immense showing?

Or will it be another case of one step forward, one step back?

One thing is for certain: the Black Bears will leave it all on the ice, playing for the senior class, who themselves will be desperate for this weekend not to be their final games at the Alfond.

Brandon Holt, Brandon Chabrier, Thomas Freel, and Grayson Arnott have given it their all these last four years and achieved so much. Let’s pay them back with the raucous reception they deserve.

Shout ‘til the rafters ring, it may be the final time this season after all.

We have all summer to rest our vocal cords.

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Intro / UConn Review: 00:28
How Much Does the Scoreboard Matter from Here?: 07:17

Mailbag: 35:20

Merrimack Preview / Outro: 51:54