University of Maine men’s hockey coach Tim Whitehead has always understood the situation.
As the adage goes: You never want to be the coach who replaces the legend. You want to be the coach who replaces the coach who replaced the legend.
He took the reigns from the late and legendary Shawn Walsh in 2001 and led the Black Bears to four Frozen Four appearances and six NCAA tournament berths in his first six years, including two one-goal losses in NCAA championship games.
But the program has fallen on hard times the last two seasons and attendance was down 9.1 percent this past season resulting in a revenue drop of approximately $183,000.
Whitehead, who makes more than $155,00 per year, has two years remaining on his contract at Maine.
“I’m confident that if I do a good job, I’ll get a contract extension,” he said.
Maine athletic director Blake James said the next two seasons will determine Whitehead’s fate.
“He has two years in place,” said James.
Maine went 13-18-3 last year and missed the Hockey East playoffs for the first time, excluding 1996-97 season when the league’s coaches and administrators voted to leave the Bears out of the tournament for NCAA violations that resulted in an NCAA Tournament ban.
Maine just concluded a 13-22-4 season, including a 3-17-3 mark over the 2009 portion of the schedule.
The back-to-back, 13-win seasons are the worst two-year marks since Walsh’s first two seasons (1984-85 and ’85-86).
However, the eighth-seeded Bears did force the nation’s top-ranked team, Boston University, to a third game in their three-game Hockey East quarterfinal series after snapping BU’s 17-game unbeaten streak (14-0-3) with a come-from-behind 6-3 victory in game two. Maine had lost game one 2-1, and BU won Sunday’s deciding game 6-2.
James is confident Whitehead can get things turned around.
“Our guys never quit against BU. They fought all the way to the end. That [attitude] starts at the top and carries through to the team,” said James. “At times, it would have been easy to quit, like when they fell behind 3-1 on Saturday night to the No. 1 team in the country on their ice. But I saw a lot of commitment and a lot of passion.”
He said he is disappointed with the last two seasons because, “I want to see us compete for a national title.”
“It’s disappointing for everyone from the fans to the players to the coaches and that’s why they’re [coaches and players] working so hard,” said James.
Hockey has been the flagship program at the school and owns two national championships, so James said, “We need hockey to be good.
“Everyone is aware of that. Our hockey program has earned national recognition and brought national exposure to the athletic program, school and the state.”
He has heard complaints about Whitehead, “but I get both positive and negative feedback about all of our coaches. When you have a down year and don’t meet expectations, there’s obviously going to be some people who are very disappointed in the results. I’m disappointed in the results and we have to formulate a plan to get the program where we expect it to be.”
He said boosting attendance requires a “number of things” like a winning team, attractive ticket packages and aggressive marketing.
“We need to make the whole product better,” said James.
Whitehead knows fans and alums are restless. It goes with the territory.
“That will always be the case, no matter how well I do at Maine,” said Whitehead. “There will always be a corps of people who won’t be satisfied. That’s a reality I have to live with.”
“The last two years have been frustrating, especially considering our success over the first six years,” said Whitehead. “We had a great run there and I felt we could have continued that run if we hadn’t lost players early to pro contracts. Unfortunately, it was too much for us to overcome and we couldn’t sustain it.
“We’ve had a tough stretch and that has made us even more resolved to get Maine back into the national picture again. It’s something we take very seriously and we’re looking forward to it. We’ve done it before and I know we can do it again.”
Maine lost Hockey East Rookie of the Year Teddy Purcell after his freshman year in 2006-2007, and the team’s top freshman scorer Andrew Sweetland and All-Hockey East second team goalie Ben Bishop left after last season. Bishop was a junior.
Whitehead has had three recruiting coordinators over the past four years: longtime recruiter Grant Standbrook, Guy Perron and now Dan Kerluke, who is in his first season.
“There’s no question it’s difficult to maintain consistency in recruiting when you have three coordinators in four years,” said Whitehead, whose 10-6 NCAA tournament record at Maine is the best among all Hockey East coaches and second best among all active coaches. “But things have settled down now.
“[Kerluke] is doing a wonderful job. I see a lot of Grant in Danny as far as building relationships with recruits and their families. He’s a tireless worker and a great recruiter. He has really stabilized our recruiting situation and you’re starting to see the benefits.”
The BU series heightened Whitehead’s expectations for the future.
“I’m very excited. Going toe-to-toe with BU is certainly a good indicator of the potential we have for next year and beyond. I’m really looking forward to that challenge,” said Whitehead.
Maine had 13 freshmen and sophomores in the lineup against BU this weekend and will lose just three seniors. It was the fifth youngest team among the nation’s 58 Division I hockey teams.
Whitehead added that they have an excellent class coming in and “some great commitments down he road.”
Whitehead, a six-time finalist for national coach of the year in 13 years at UMass Lowell and Maine, has earned the opportunity to try to return Maine to the nation’s elite over the next two years.
Significant progress is a realistic expectation.
There are a lot of programs that used to be perennial national contenders who began to struggle and have since dropped out of NCAA tournament play (i.e., Bowling Green, Lake Superior State).
Maine can’t afford to become another.
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