Defense corps end questions with solid year

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When the season began, the fingers were pointed in their direction.

Everybody knew the University of Maine’s hockey program returned both of its goalies and virtually its entire cast of forwards.

But in Keith Carney and Brian Straub, they had lost their two most valuable defensemen of a year ago.

So, the defense corps was seen as the primary weakness for the Black Bears.

Thirty-six games later, the Black Bears own both the Hockey East regular season and tournament championships and they did so in large part by limiting their opponents to 2.4 goals per game.

The Bears set a league standard for fewest goals allowed (2.57 per game) entering Saturday’s NCAA Regional.

Maine has held its opponents to two goals or less 20 times en route to its 31-3-2 record.

“Every year, we hear the same old story that the defense is our weakness,” said senior defenseman Tony Link. “But then we go oweakness,” said senior defenseman Tony Link. “But then we go out and we always seem to do OK.”

Maine Coach Shawn Walsh has affectionately dubbed them “The No-Name Defense.”

“It’s a good nickname,” said sophomore defenseman Chris Imes, who is the best known of the defense corps after being named to the All-Hockey East Second Team. “We just go out and do our jobs. We bring our lunch pails and hard hats.”

“Imes is a very good defensemen and all the other guys are big and strong and mobile enough,” said Providence Coach Mike McShane. “Maine has real good defensive forwards and they’re very experienced. That helps the defense out.”

“It’s tough for our defense to get credit because we have so many big-name forwards,” said sophomore goalie Mike Dunham.

“But (goalie) Garth (Snow) and I realize how important they are and how well they have played all year. They deserve most of the credit,” Dunham added. “Garth and I just stand in front of the puck. They’re the ones who keep the guys from getting to the front of the net. And we rarely have to see two shots at a time. They make it easier for us.”

“I think we’ve all matured a lot,” said Imes.

“Our forwards are as good as any in the country and going up against them in practice every day can only help you,” said sophomore defenseman Jason Weinrich.

“Practices are so much harder than the games,” said Link. “They make the games seem slow.”

“We’re all confident and everybody knows their roles,” said junior defenseman Dan Murphy.

Sophomore defenseman Matt Martin said a lot of the practice drills have been extremely beneficial in their development.

“We’re always doing drills in which the offensive players have a superior (numerical) advantage so we have to work hard to get the puck up and then we have to make a good pass,” said Martin.

The forwards have indeed helped the defense with their tenacious backchecking.

That enables the defensemen to step up on the opposing forwards at the red line or defensive blue line.

“We’ve worked a lot with them on their lateral movement and their gapping,” said Maine assistant Grant Standbrook.

“Our gapping has gotten a lot better,” said Weinrich. “We haven’t been giving the forwards any room so there isn’t much they can do.”

“We’re getting to the point where we’re picking up the forwards before they get to the red line so they can’t even dump it into our end (without getting an icing call),” said Imes. “That way, we don’t have to play in our own end.”

“Now we only have to backcheck to the red line,” joked senior right winger Randy Olson.

The defensemen said Standbrook has given them a lot of valuable pointers.

Another thing Standbrook has stressed lately is improving their physical play.

“We used to have the most gentlemanly set of defensemen in the league,” said Standbrook. “(Freshman) Andy Silverman was the only one taking the body consistently so I told the others to emulate Andy. They’ve all been getting gritty lately. They’ve all been finishing their checks and making the opposing forwards pay the price (for coming into the offensive zone).”

“By playing the body, it takes your opponents off their games,” said Silverman.

Maine’s defense corps is among the biggest in college hockey. Weinrich, Martin and Link all stand 6-foot-3 and weigh between 210-215 pounds; Silverman is 6-2, 200 pounds; Murphy is 6-1, 205 and Imes is 5-11, 195 pounds.

Imes had three goals and 19 assists and is a team-leading plus-37. He is on a tandem with Murphy (0 & 6, plus-26). Link (3 & 6, plus-12) is paired with Martin (4 & 14, plus-17) and Weinrich (1 & 15, plus-14) is with Silverman (2 & 9, plus-29). In addition, Maine has also received valuable contributions from sophomore defenseman Lee Saunders (1 & 8, plus-seven) and freshman Jim Burcar (1 & 3, plus-8).

The Bears have given up only four goals in three Hockey East playoff games and they hope that trend continues in the NCAAs.

“You always get more help from the forwards in the playoffs because everybody’s more intense and the games are more defensive,” said Imes.

The Bear defensemen have the green light to get involved in the offense but they tend to concentrate on their defense and get the puck to the forwards.

Still, they have combined for two goals and nine assists in Maine’s three Hockey East playoff games so far.