The University of Maine men’s hockey team will entertain Merrimack College in a best-of-three Hockey East quarterfinal series this weekend. Merrimack eliminated Maine in North Andover, Mass. 5-4, 6-2 last season.
How will the Black Bears fare? What will they need to do to oust the Warriors?
They will need to Move their Feet, which I felt they didn’t do last weekend. They must play like they did at UMass Lowell. I attended that game and it was about as perfect a game I have seen UMaine have since the Kariya years. Hustle, hustle, clog up the neutral zone, and Forecheck! No doubt Joey will be pegged, so keep cool and stay out of the box. Walk away from instigating stuff and let your play speak for itself. Go Blue from Portland!
Who knows what will happen with this bunch, but no excuse not to win this series at home considering what has taken place over the past 5 seasons. IMO the 1st period will likely determine how this series turns out. UMO needs to be careful not to come out too amped up in front of the home crowd for the first time in a long time and make a costly mistake.
Nostrajimus – I can’t tell you how proud I am of you. An entire post, with positive, well thought out suggestions and no coach slamming. Thank you. We need more posts like this one.
nice condescension
You know me so well. Tell me more.
Goaltending key for both teams…has the looks of a 3 game series and with some Overtime games in the mix….Maine in 3
This will be a interesting, hard fought series, and just thrilled UMO is playing at home this time around….and Im thinking with the home crowd, Maines powerplay may be the difference, since Merrimack is the third highest penalty minutes per game in the nation….Im proud to see this team in position for the NCAA’s…..surely we need to have the top line play like it has all year, but we also need someone to surprise us from the 2nd-4th lines to score a couple times this weekend as well. Anyhow, Id like to see Maine in 2 close games, but Im going with thinking it’ll be a three game series……tonight to me is a must win! Ill be up there tomorrow night, hoping for the sweep!
I REALLY hope I’m wrong, but I say Merrimack in three.