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UMaine Black Bears, 2016 2017 season thread

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Re: UMaine Black Bears, 2016 2017 season thread

walrus said:
Quinippiac lost, RPI lost, UNH lost, Maines opponents record is pretty dismal.
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Good point Wally. Five of Maine's seven wins have come vs. the bottom 10% of D-1; there are some truly bad teams in that group, among the worst in D-1.

The Bears' only quality win was vs. UML, and IIRC, that was a rather lucky result.

Not to wee-wee on anyone's parade, but Maine's resume is far weaker than even their mediocre record would seem to indicate. Their schedule has been truly pathetic in terms of SOS, and the toughest stretch is still ahead.

If this team is going to show me anything, it will have to be against HE competition. Not holding my breath on that one. This team has improved from God-awful to merely awful, IMO.
 
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Re: UMaine Black Bears, 2016 2017 season thread

Fishman'81 said:
Good point Wally. Five of Maine's seven wins have come vs. the bottom 10% of D-1; there are some truly bad teams in that group, among the worst in D-1.

The Bears' only quality win was vs. UML, and IIRC, that was a rather lucky result.

Not to wee-wee on anyone's parade, but Maine's resume is far weaker than even their mediocre record would seem to indicate. Their schedule has been truly pathetic in terms of SOS, and the toughest stretch is still ahead.

If this team is going to show me anything, it will have to be against HE competition. Not holding my breath on that one. This team has improved from God-awful to merely awful, IMO.
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Okay, fine.

Maine is pretty much at the nadir of their history as a D1 team.

Takes a little time to figure that stuff out.

They can score. That's for sure. The D needs work, yeah. Well, more than work but whatever.
But as I recall last year UVM was in the pits as well and tweaked a few things.
End of the season, they almost embarrassed BC on home ice in the HE quarters.
Now they're looking pretty good.

The frosh forwards are good, no question.
McGovern would look better with a better D-line. He ain't great, he ain't crap, he's middling. Probably above average.

Takes some time to gell.

Outside of the BU weekend, all of their opponents are beatable.

It's just staying out of the box, that's pretty much it for this season.

It's just a question of how well they can work that dynamic, ie finding-their-way D + solid scoring + okay goal tending

Penalties are the x factor.
 
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Re: UMaine Black Bears, 2016 2017 season thread

I guess the point is that momentum is hard to recognize in the early stages.

Bears are making the right moves or at least one (cutting penalty minutes) and progressing.

Them not taking at least one from UNH came down to box time.

If they cut that S, they'll take UNH next time around assuming the 3 week hiatus wasn't negative as far as preparedness goes.

If they can finish the season with home ice for round 1 of HE tournament, awesome. If not, I think next year would be solid.

** Even though it was against AIC, I like how they finished the game on Saturday with intensity. They know they're not the kind of team that can give an opponent "mercy rule" privileges even if they're up 7-2.

Buck Up, Maine Nation. Good times are ahead. You've gotta go through Crap Gulch before you can hit the heights.

It'll just make it that much better when they're acting like a Walsh-Era team.
 
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Re: UMaine Black Bears, 2016 2017 season thread

Its a lot easier to look good against AIC, they probably have one line that can keep up. Maines problem is they can't keep up with HE teams and when exposed they hook, grab interfere, the same thing AIC did . I take very little out of a weekend against AIC other than Maine did what they had to do and thats beat them twice. Its great the PP made them pay for those penalties so maybe I take that out of the weekend :) With a couple new faces coming in maybe that will help. Maybe some time off will help. Like to see them do well in 2nd half.
 
Fishman'81 said:
Good point Wally. Five of Maine's seven wins have come vs. the bottom 10% of D-1; there are some truly bad teams in that group, among the worst in D-1.

The Bears' only quality win was vs. UML, and IIRC, that was a rather lucky result.

Not to wee-wee on anyone's parade, but Maine's resume is far weaker than even their mediocre record would seem to indicate. Their schedule has been truly pathetic in terms of SOS, and the toughest stretch is still ahead.

If this team is going to show me anything, it will have to be against HE competition. Not holding my breath on that one. This team has improved from God-awful to merely awful, IMO.
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FWIW- Based on today's USCHO top 20, Maine played 8 games in the 1st half against top 20 teams. They went 2-5-1. Not impressive.

In the 2nd half, they play 4 games against the same top 20 group.

First half to me was both disappointing and frustrating. This team has 30-40% better talent than last year's. (if one can estimate such thing in percentages). The tie and loss at Miami was poor. The tie and loss at Colgate was worse. The tie and loss at Vermont just as bad. The thorough 6-1 shellacking by BC in Portland was the bottom of this year's apex IMHO. Worse than bad. Almost enough to make me throw out my Bauer Maine Hockey jacket. Sure, let's start #36 in goal against BC because Robbie was whacked for some unknown disciplinary issue.
I do believe the 2nd half will be better, much better. A couple new strong players coming in. Herner, Hoglund, Doherty are huge unknowns for 2nd half. Maybe Herner anchors a defensive corps that improves significantly in 2nd half. Hopefully Robbie can stay out of trouble and stay healthy. Fossier and Pearson have a chance of being scoring threats against the better teams as do Vesey, Byron and Shea. Series like UConn, Providence, Northeastern will all be tough weekends even though none of them are currently top 20. For no tangible reason, I see them improving, gelling and and decreasing box time. But McGovern has to stay healthy. Period. Or this crew isn't going anywhere.
 
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DoubleA said:
FWIW- Based on today's USCHO top 20, Maine played 8 games in the 1st half against top 20 teams. They went 2-5-1. Not impressive.

In the 2nd half, they play 4 games against the same top 20 group.

First half to me was both disappointing and frustrating. This team has 30-40% better talent than last year's. (if one can estimate such thing in percentages). The tie and loss at Miami was poor. The tie and loss at Colgate was worse. The tie and loss at Vermont just as bad. The thorough 6-1 shellacking by BC in Portland was the bottom of this year's apex IMHO. Worse than bad. Almost enough to make me throw out my Bauer Maine Hockey jacket. Sure, let's start #36 in goal against BC because Robbie was whacked for some unknown disciplinary issue.
I do believe the 2nd half will be better, much better. A couple new strong players coming in. Herner, Hoglund, Doherty are huge unknowns for 2nd half. Maybe Herner anchors a defensive corps that improves significantly in 2nd half. Hopefully Robbie can stay out of trouble and stay healthy. Fossier and Pearson have a chance of being scoring threats against the better teams as do Vesey, Byron and Shea. Series like UConn, Providence, Northeastern will all be tough weekends even though none of them are currently top 20. For no tangible reason, I see them improving, gelling and and decreasing box time. But McGovern has to stay healthy. Period. Or this crew isn't going anywhere.
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I agree with a lot of what you said. It was kind of a weird schedule where they played teams who were either good or really bad. Miami and UNH were the only teams that were middle of the road. In the second half most of the teams are middle of the road except BU and potentially Notre Dame. One thing that I find odd is that between Miami and UNH Maine had to travel seven straight weekends. I'm not sure I've ever seen that before and probably didn't help. It's also strange that over the next six weeks Maine will only play one real game. I noticed the story in the BDN didn't mention Doherty and at this point I'm assuming he is lost for the season.

Hopefully in the second half they can be more consistent and stay out of the box. They need to make sure they take care of teams like UMass and Merrimack. If there is one thing that frustrates me about the first half it is that Maine wasted the two weekends against Colgate and UNH. They should have had two or three wins out of those games and didn't have any.
 
NorthMike said:
A glowing article on Creech in BDN by Solari. Agree? Predicts that Creech will be gone next year

http://thedrive.bangordailynews.com...is-making-big-black-bear-paw-prints-in-orono/
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I agree with the article. He's been a major improvement over the last few AD's. The only real problem I see at present is men's basketball and there are no easy answers there. There are a couple things I wonder: Why would they give him a contract that ends in February and have they offered him an extension and he hasn't signed it or has he not been offered one?
 
Re: UMaine Black Bears, 2016 2017 season thread

Just want to wish a happy Christmas, etc. to all you die-hard Maine fans. You people keep me interested through good times and bad.
 
Re: UMaine Black Bears, 2016 2017 season thread

Inspiring gendron quote relayed by dave starman during world junior telecast.

"You can coach em any way you want, the team that has the best players on the bus generally wins"

;)
 
J.D. said:
Inspiring gendron quote relayed by dave starman during world junior telecast.

"You can coach em any way you want, the team that has the best players on the bus generally wins"

;)
Click to expand...

John Wooden was actually the person who originally came up with that. After way too much time watching sports I can attest to its accuracy. Hopefully next year Maine finally has the talent to get to the NCAA's again.
 
Re: UMaine Black Bears, 2016 2017 season thread

J.D. said:
Inspiring gendron quote relayed by dave starman during world junior telecast.

"You can coach em any way you want, the team that has the best players on the bus generally wins"

;)
Click to expand...
Yes and No....a real good Coach gets the BEST out of his players and knows how to make what he has work....without excuses...case in point Bazin @ UML and Leeman @ Union then onto Providence...then turned what they had into a positive and from there the winning brought in better recruits. Talent has a lot to do with it, but if you don't use it right....you can still have blank for a team.
 
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