The United States Air Force Academy’s 1-2-1 Falcons have been a “little up and down” this season according to their coach, Major Chuck Delich.

The University of Maine’s 3-1 Black Bears will host Air Force in a two-game series on Friday and Saturday evenings (7 o’clock). Air Force is a Division I independent.

“Our goaltending has been pretty good and our defensemen played very well against West Point (Army),” said Delich, whose team posted a 5-2 win and a 3-3 tie against Army. “We’ve got some deficiencies in our forward position. We aren’t a good shooting team. We struggle a little when we get around the opposing goal. We had plenty of opportunities against New Hampshire (6-2, 8-3 losses last weekend), but we were a little slow getting the shots off or making the right pass.”

“The guys are seeing the things they are supposed to see,but they’ve got to be able to do them at a high rate of speed against teams that come at them quickly,” added Major Delich.

New Hampshire interim head coach Dick Umile said the Air Force Academy is a good team.

“They’re scrappy and they work very hard,” said Umile. “They’re well-coached and they move the puck pretty well. They have some good players. (Goalie Mike) Blank played very well against us the first night; (Bob) Ingraham is a real good defenseman and they have a couple of lines that work hard all the time. They know how to play.”

Ingraham is the top returning scorer off last year’s 16-13-1 team. He had 13 goals and 17 assists a year ago and is the leading scorer this year with 3 & 2. The Falcons also returned five more of their top 10 scorers in defenseman Dan Greene (8 & 22), RW Mike Veneri (6 & 19), C Jason Mantaro (9 & 12), C Terry Courtney (14 & 6) and RW Eric Rice (8 & 12).

Rice has 3 & 1 this season and linemate Courtney has 1 & 3 while Mantaro (2 & 1) and defensemen Mike Parent (1 & 2) and Greene (0 & 3) have three each. Center Tony Roe has 1 & 1 while C Mark Skibinski and LW Rob Haataja have 0 & 2 each.

Blank, who was 7-5 with a 3.44 goals-against average and a .896 save pecentage a year ago, shares the goaltending with Mark Liebich (9-8-1, 4.40, .886). Blank has a 1-1 record, a 4.00 GAA and a .899 save percentage this year while Liebich is 0-1-1 with a 5.28 GAA and a .863 save percentage.