The University of Maine men’s hockey team is currently in sixth place in Hockey East.
The Bears will resume league play on Jan. 3 when they host Vermont. That will trigger a string of eight league games in January in which the Black Bears will also play New Hampshire at Fenway Park and two-game road series at Merrimack and Boston University sandwiching a two-game home set with Boston College.
Where do you think they will finish in Hockey East? Why?
It’s amazing how little I care.
Watch this space for all the ‘slap-down’ action to surely come!
The game at Fenway is just about the only thing that excites me about the team this year. It’s unfortunate that it has come to that but after a few years of mediocrity you start to lose some interest.
I might catch some of a game on the radio or TV but until Timmmmmay is gone I wont spend another dollar at Alfond Arena !!!!!! He has ran a once proud program to the bottom of Hockey East !
I gave up my season tickets because of that. Plus donated money every year. I wonder how many more have done that. We will never find another Walsh. But there must be another college hockey coach out there that wants to win and could get us back to the Frozen Four.
I am sure there is another coach out there but the University has to take resposibility for this too. They have used a band aid approach and even extented Timmmay to another contract not that long ago. I am sure they have lost alot of Alumni dollars as well, because of the frustration of mediocrity within the program itself. They are walking a fine line now because they have been bad for so long who as a recruit is going to want to come to a bad program and lose? You cant preach the glory days of almost twenty years ago and expect it to have the same effect on a top tier player of today. You cant even bring a recruit to a home game expecting to sell our great Hockey aptmosphere and tradition because you cant expect the Alfond to be packed anymore. Money is hard to come by these days and even harder to hold onto, who wants to spend it on a beyond his time coach who is destroying a once proud program one season at a time. Especially when the University itself is standing idle and watching it happen now for years.
I believe Whitehead would be an excellent coach at a high school or perhaps a school like UConn or Holy Cross. But not in HEA. And not at UMO, where we take our hockey seriously…
Jim Montgomery, Grant Standbrook, Bob Corkum. There’s your staff.
I think Maine will go 2-6 in their 8 HE games in Jan because of the coach. Maybe the team would go 0-8 under a different coach. Don’t know ’til they try.
If I was given a choice of Maine going 8-0 with Tim, or 0-8 with someone else, I’d pick the later.
Ahh, I misread your question at the end there Lar. So, I’ll say: Maine will finish in 7th or 8th in league play because of the coach. I guess my answer is basically the same. Go figure.
Horribly…….because Tim Whitehead hasn’t recruited enough talent and cannot motivate the current players to play at a level that is needed to win games in Hockey East on a consistent basis…..???
They’ll go 2-6-0 in January H.E. play and will be in a fight to finish no higher then 6th…with a more likely chance that 7th place will be there spot and be bounced out of the Quarterfinals in 2 straight games…then the real season begins…after this is all done….what the A.D. does following the season.
They might win a couple in January and 6th place in HE. Another great season
Why should anyone expect them to do any better in the 2nd half than the first….nothing has changed. Larry, are you paid by UMaine or are you related to Timmy? A sports writer with stones would be reporting on the true ‘news’ of Maine Hockey…and in case you can’t see it Larry: the news is the demise of the program and what needs to be done to resurrect it!
2 wins vs lowly UVM. It’s not rocket science! McHomey’s lack of credibility clock is still counting down until he pulls up his panties and writes about what the problems really are. Warner did it last year with Blodgett to an extent, so why can’t McHomey?
Who cares. Best thing for this program is to finish at the top or the bottom. The first option brings top players into the program, and the latter possibly brings a coaching change. All the finishing in the middle of the pack the past few years is really not helping the situation. Either way, this is a 7th or 8th place team. Outside of UVM, they are the worst team in HEA.
the bottom line is that players go where they will be best prepared for the next level. Maine has had ONE future physician and only a couple future engineers play hockey. They go play for the coach that will develop their talent. Whitehead does not develop talent, so the players who come to Orono are really the guys who cannot get in anywhere better. You have seen your last future NHLer in Orono until Whitehead moves on.
Check out the cover story at collegehockeynews dotcom. Finally a write who at least attempts to address the real issues….
I don’t care how they do this year. I’m more concerned that the academic mission of our great university is maintained.
I can buy into that. BUT, when you want to talk abut the academic mission and how you do not care about the hockey program’s future, then, in my opinion, YOU MUST get on a soapbox and question how a BAD coach can make more money than almost every other state employee. Name 3 prominent professors and list their salaries, would ya?
If UM could found a way to go 4-4 I think it’d be a blessing….and I honestly think they could, they always find a way to skate and play better with the better competition then the slower teams…so Im thinking they will go 4-4….and go into FEB, with a hopeful chance of going number 4 or 5…..go ahead and beat me all down with this, but gotta be positive at times, right? I mean come on….no snow on the ground, who would of thought that? lol