The University of Maine men’s hockey team leaders acknowledged that the team has had an up-and-down first part of the season but they are optimistic about the future.
co-captains Brandon Holt and Thomas Freel and assistant captain Frank Djurasevic
UMaine is 8-5-1 overall, 5-3 in Hockey East, and ranked 10th in the U.S. College Hockey Online poll and 11th in the USA Hockey poll.
The Black Bears, who have 13 newcomers this season, will complete the 2025 portion of their schedule with two-game home series against New Hampshire (Dec. 5-6) and Lindenwood (Dec. 13-14) sandwiching a Wednesday (Dec. 10) game in Portland against UMass Lowell.
While the team has shown “flashes of greatness” at times, it still has a long way to go, said co-captain Brandon Holt, a senior defenseman. Despite the roller coaster season to date, Holt is optimistic about the future.
“I’m really happy with where we’re at. I’ve seen some really good things from this group. We’re headed in the right direction,” said the 2024-25 All-Hockey East third team selection and runnerup for the league’s best defensive defenseman award.
Senior left winger and co-captain Thomas Freel said the team has come a long way from its 2-2 overtime tie in the exhibition game against New Hampshire on Oct. 3 at the Sidney J. Watson Arena on the Bowdoin College campus in Brunswick. UNH outshot UMaine 38-18.
“I feel pretty good about the team right now. Overall, we are playing a lot tighter and a lot more structured hockey than the start of October,” Freel said. “We’ve been unlucky in the last few [losses]. We didn’t get the results we were looking for because we had breakdowns at crucial points that led to goals against us.”
Assistant captain Frank Djurasevic called the game at Bowdoin “eye-opening.”
“Since then, we’ve grown a lot as a team within the locker room, our culture, our standards, all things like that,” Djurasevic said. “We’re playing good hockey. We obviously are having some lapses throughout the game that are costing us. But, for the most part, the ship’s pointed in the right direction and we just have to keep pushing every day.”
One prime area of focus for the team in moving forward is winning the net front battles, according to Freel.
“That’s where a lot of the goals are scored for both our team and the other team if you look back at these last few weeks. Being better both offensively and defensively at finding loose pucks and either putting them in the back of the net or getting them out of there is going to be key moving forward,” Freel said.
Penalty-killing has been problematic for UMaine as its 76.3% success rate is 45th among 63 Division I teams. The Black Bears have allowed 14 power play goals, which is second most behind Long Island University and Omaha, who have each given up 15.
“We have a lot of new personnel on the penalty kill so there is a bit of a learning process,” Holt said. “It’s about being on the same page. It seems at times we’re disjointed. We have one guy doing one thing and he’s expecting the other guys to be joining him and they’re not, which leaves holes in the coverage and other teams are taking advantage of it.”
The team has to play with more discipline and stay out of the penalty box, Djurasevic said.
Maine is averaging 12 penalty minutes per game, 19th most in college hockey.
The Black Bears are aggressive on the penalty kill, so it is essential that they have to be in sync.
“We talk about having a tight four-man box as you enter our zone or go through the neutral zone. If you don’t see that box, that means someone is disconnected. And when there are loose pucks, we want to be aggressive and go get it but, at the same time, the other three guys off the puck have to make the right read as well,” Djurasevic said.
The power play hasn’t been much better, operating at a 17.9% success rate which is 38th.
But it has been a little better of late, operating at 21.7% over the past six games.
“It’s moving in the right direction. We’re starting to score a little more on the power play which is good for us,” Djurasevic said.