The University of Maine men’s hockey team never recovered from its 0-8-3 start last season. Its first 11 games included seven road games and four neutral site tournament contests.
UMaine’s first home game at Alfond Arena in Orono was on Nov. 15 against UMass Lowell.
The 2016-17 schedule is much more Alfond Arena-friendly early in the season, which should pave the way for a better start and a more successful campaign as the Black Bears seek to turn their fortunes around after two disappointing seasons.
Coach Red Gendron’s Black Bears finished at 8-24-6 overall, 5-15-2 and in 11th place in Hockey East last season and got swept by eventual Hockey East Tournament champion Northeastern in two overtime games in the first round of their best-of-three Hockey East series.
UMaine went 14-22-3 in 2014-15, 8-12-2 in Hockey East.
Six of the first 11 games a year ago were against NCAA Tournament teams including four against eventual Frozen Four teams (Boston College 2, North Dakota and Quinnipiac).
By Nov. 15, UMaine will have played six games at Alfond Arena, five road games and a game in Portland against Boston College.
Just two of UMaine’s seven nonleague opponents had winning records a year ago, and those two kick off the season when UMaine hosts Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (New York) and Quinnipiac for two-game series on Oct. 7-8 and 14-15, respectively.
RPI went 18-15-7 last season and lost to Harvard in the ECAC quarterfinals, and Quinnipiac was 32-4-7 and won the ECAC regular season and tournament titles before eventually losing to North Dakota 5-1 in the NCAA championship game.
UMaine lost at Quinnipiac 4-0 last season before squandering a 3-1 lead in the final 6:01 and settling for a 3-3 overtime at home against the Bobcats.
The Black Bears will hit the road for two-game sets at Miami of Ohio (Oct. 21-22) and Colgate (Oct. 28-29).
Miami, which is in the National Collegiate Hockey Conference, was 15-18-3 last season, and ECAC member Colgate finished at 11-24-2, including a 3-1 loss and 5-1 win in Orono.
Miami has had two losing seasons among its last three after making eight straight NCAA Tournament appearances.
The other three nonleague opponents are Brown University from the ECAC (5-19-7), Atlantic Hockey team American International College (7-29-3) and Hockey East rival New Hampshire (11-20-6). UMaine will play one nonleague game against the Wildcats in Manchester, New Hampshire, on Dec. 20, along with two league games against them in Durham, New Hampshire, (Dec. 2) and Orono the next night.
UMaine and UNH won’t also play in Portland like they did the previous two years.
The Black Bears will take on Brown at Portland’s Cross Insurance Arena in Portland on Nov. 26 and will host AIC for a pair on Dec. 9-10.
Former UMaine assistant Gary Wright retired after 32 years behind the bench at AIC and was replaced by former Army West Point assistant and AIC player and graduate assistant Eric Lang.
UMaine will take on Boston College to open its 22-game Hockey East schedule on Nov. 4 at the Cross Insurance Arena. The two teams will play in Orono the next night before UMaine plays a home-and-home league series with UMass Lowell on Nov. 11 in Orono and Nov. 13 in Lowell, Massachusetts
The Black Bears will play a Frozen Fenway game against UConn on Jan. 14 in Boston and their third and final Portland game against Notre Dame on Feb. 10.
In Hockey East, UMaine will host two-game sets with Massachusetts and Northeastern and will have Portland-Orono games with Notre Dame in addition to Boston College. The Black Bears will visit Vermont, Providence and Merrimack for two-game series and will play a home-and-home series with Boston University as well as UNH and UMass Lowell.
UMaine will play UConn in Storrs, Connecticut, two days before they play the Huskies again at Fenway Park.
The Black Bears also will play two exhibition games in Orono against St. Francis Xavier of Antigonish, Nova Scotia, on Oct. 2 and the United States National Development Program’s Under-18 team on Jan. 6.