The Hockey East regular season title appears to be a three-team race between defending champ Boston College, which won its fifth regular season crown in the six-year history of the league; upstart Boston University and the University of Maine’s Black Bears.

Boston College and Boston University made it to the NCAA Tournament’s Final Four where both were beaten in the semifinals.

Maine, which finished second to BC in the league by a point with third-place BU three points behind the Bears, reached the NCAA Tournament’s quarterfinals where it was ousted by eventual national champ Wisconsin in Madison, Wisc.

BC won the Hockey East Tournament title with a 4-3 win over Maine in the finals. The Eagles thus became the first HE team to win more than one league tournament title even though the Eagles have been in the finals on five occasions.

“The top three (of a year ago) will be at the top again,” said New Hampshire Coach Bob Kullen. “None of them lost enough to make them come back to the pack which means the pack would have to improve significantly to catch them.”

“I like Maine’s forwards, BU’s defense and BC’s goaltending and first line (David Emma between Marty McInnis and Steve Heinze),” added the UNH boss.

“I don’t think you can pinpoint just one team,” said Lowell Coach Bill Riley. “I really think BU, BC and Maine are at the top of the pack in the country, not just the league.”

All three are currently ranked among the nation’s top 8 teams in the WMEB College Hockey Media Poll and the Albany Times Union College Hockey Top 10.

“It’s kind of scary,” said BC Coach Len Ceglarski. “Last year, we almost had three teams in the Final Four. This year it could happen again. BU is particularly strong. They’ve got some big kids and a lot of talent on that team. We’re going to be up there someplace and so will Maine.”

Maine’s Shawn Walsh, the coach of the only Hockey East team to qualify for the NCAA Tournament in each of the last four seasons, does not think his Bears are in the same category with BC and BU.

“I think BC and BU are a cut above everyone just based on their returning talent and experience and the number of seniors on their clubs,” said Walsh, who has just one senior regular in defenseman Brian Straub. “I like BU’s blend and they seem to have gotten a real desire to win. They have good speed and Jack (Coach Jack Parker) really prepares them well. They grew a lot from their playoff experience of a year ago.”

“BC should get equal billing simply because of (goalie Scott) LaGrand,” added Walsh. “Providence is a real darkhorse as is New Hampshire. You can put us in that category. We may make a run at the league title if things fall into place properly.”

Parker said he sees a “little more of a split in the league this year.”

“There’s BU, BC and Maine and you could pick any of them (to win the league title) in my mind,” said Parker. “If any of us falters, UNH would be the team to take over. Northeastern has yet to be anything but competitive, I think you’ll see a big change in Lowell and they’ll be tougher to reckon with. Providence is the biggest question mark. They lost a lot of seniors but they had a good recruiting class.”

The Terriers went 12-7-2 in league play a year ago and the parity in the league this year prompted Parker to say, “It’ll take a heckuva’ team to go 12-7-2 this year.”

BU’s Terriers lost defensemen Mark Krys and Tom Dion due to injury and were left with just six defensemen last year. But all six got a lot of ice time; Krys came back at the end of last year, Dion is back this season and Parker recruited four freshmen defensemen.

“If we stand out in any area, compared with the other teams in the league, it’s on defense,” said Parker, whose defense corps features Alex Legault, Phil von Stefenelli and HE All-Rookie team member Peter Ahola.

All-Hockey East second teamer Shawn McEachern and All-Rookie Teamer Tony Amonte headline a talented group of forwards and goalie Scott Cashman was chosen second team All-Hockey East and to the All-Rookie team.

Boston College graduated just one forward, Bill Nolan, but the loss of All-American and Hobey Baker finalist Greg Brown will have to be overcome.

“Greg was so fast, he made up for so many little things we didn’t do,” said Ceglarski.

Heinze and Emma were All-Hockey East and All-Americans but Ceglarski hasn’t decided whether or not to keep them as linemates with Marty McInnis.

“They play very well together and they may end up together,” said Ceglarski. “But we’re experimenting with them on other lines right now.”

Maine went from experienced in goal to inexperienced when senior goalie Matt DelGuidice decided to sign a Boston Bruins contract.

But Walsh has been quite happy with the play of goaltenders junior Garth Snow and freshman Mike Dunham, who was a third round draft choice of the New Jersey Devils.

They will be young on defense but they do return second team All-American Keith Carney, Straub and the improved Dan Murphy. Ten non-league games and going up against their own gifted forwards in practice should benefit freshmen defensemen Matt Martin, Chris Imes and Jason Weinrich mature more rapidly.

New Hampshire should be improved up front and on defense as the Wildcats graduated just two of its top 10 scorers: defenseman-winger Jeff Lazaro and winger Dave Aiken.

“We hope to keep moving up but we realize that’s tough to do because the teams ahead of us haven’t fallen back,” said Kullen. “I think it’s going to be like last year. I don’t believe we have one or two players who can carry us. We have to have 16-18 playing good hockey to do well. That’s why we did well at the end of last year.”

Pat Morrison returns in goal.

Providence lost 11 players but Friar Coach Mike McShane returned five players who scored 10 or more goals a year ago and he should get some goal production out of his freshman class, also.

“We should be in the middle, somewhere, which is not bad for a team that lost 11 guys,” said McShane. “I’ve been pleased with our progress and I know we’ll be better in two weeks.”

An injury to All-HE first-team center Mike Boback that will keep him sidelined until December won’t help the Friars but McShane has been happy with the balance on the lines. Boback has been a key on the power play.

The defense is good but, like Maine, PC will be inexperienced in goal.

Northeastern is another team with uncertainty in goal.

Tom Cole was both brilliant and bad at times last year and Scott Hopkins was also inconsistent.

“Both are pretty good goaltenders but they aren’t steady,” said Coach Don McKenney.

McKenney thinks his Huskies will be “pretty good” even though they lost leading scorer Harry Mews.

“We’ve got some good forwards and all of our defensemen are back,” said McKenney. “We’ve got to look after our own end of the ice a little better.”

Lowell Coach Bill Riley said, “We’ll be a young team for at least one more year and I think we’ll be a little bit better.”

This will be Riley’s 22nd and final year of coaching at Lowell as he will take a faculty position next year.

Former Maine assistant Bruce Crowder will take over the reins next year after serving as the associate head coach this year.

Team defense is being stressed.

“We’ve got to do a much better job defensively in the neutral zone,” said Riley.

Merrimack is in its second season in Hockey East and Coach Ron Anderson is looking for improvement.

“We should be better just based on experience,” said Anderson. “We’ve been around the block once. We lost Andy Heinze and he was our best player offensively. We weren’t a real good offensive team and we just have to hope the entire team production is up this year. We have more to work with than we did last year and if it all comes together, we should be better.”

He is particularly hopeful that at least one of his three goalies who played last year (Yannick Gosselin, Steve D’Amore and Mike Doneghey) will emerge to give them consistent goaltending.