Strong finish preps Bears for playoffs McNeese St. tapes reviewed

The primary job this week for University of Maine football coach Jack Cosgrove and his staff is to prepare the 16th-ranked Black Bears for Saturday’s NCAA Division I-AA playoff game against No. 10 McNeese State (La.).

The job is much more difficult when you don’t have a lot of information with which to work.

After taking Wednesday through Sunday off for the Thanksgiving holidays, UMaine conducted its first practice as a postseason team Monday.

However, the Bears were forced to move back the time of Tuesday’s session. UMaine and McNeese sent each other four game tapes to study, but they didn’t arrive until Monday morning.

That forced UMaine to move its Tuesday afternoon practice to 8 p.m., which actually may have some benefits since Saturday’s playoff game at Cowboy Stadium in Lake Charles, La., begins at 8 p.m. (7 p.m. Central time).

“We exchange the last four games of the season,” Cosgrove said. “At this time of year, you don’t have the time to do a much larger breakdown than that.”

The UMaine staff planned to spend the better part of Tuesday reviewing the McNeese game films in order to discover tendencies, evaluate its personnel and start putting together some semblance of a game plan.

Cosgrove said he and the staff have been poring over McNeese statistics and calling the coaches of some of its opponents to find out whatever they can about the Cowboys.

“I was on the phone [Sunday] night, you can count on that,” Cosgrove said.

Logistical problems and some added incentive aside, this week shouldn’t seem foreign to the Black Bears. They played their last three regular-season games, two of them on the road, realizing they could not afford to lose if they wanted to make the postseason.

“The way we look at it, we’ve been in the playoffs for the last three weeks,” said UMaine associate head coach and offensive coordinator Bob Wilder, who was a senior captain on the Bears’ 1987 playoff squad.

“We had to beat Rhode Island on the road; we had to come home and beat UMass; then we had to beat New Hampshire,” he said. “Our kids knew that.”

The logical way to approach the McNeese game is simply as the next game on the schedule.

“We didn’t get a chance to play our 11th game of the season, so we’re just going to take this as our 11th game. It just has a little more at stake,” said senior captain Malik Nichols, referring to the game at North Dakota State that was canceled after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

The Bears’ mindset hasn’t changed, save for a bit more excitement.

“We’re just going to go out there and practice with the same intensity that we have been over the past couple weeks, which got us to this point,” Nichols said. “It’s a great opportunity.”

And don’t expect the Bears to get too caught up in the aura of getting the chance to fly to Louisiana and play a playoff game in front of a large crowd in a raucous stadium in the deep South.

“It’s a business trip,” said senior captain Chad Hayes of Old Town. “It’s going to be fun going to Louisiana, no doubt about it, but we’re gonna be focused and that’s all we’re going to be thinking about is Saturday and the game.”

BEAR TRACKS: UMaine will hold a public rally in support of the Black Bear football team Thursday, 12:30 p.m. in the Maine Marketplace, located in the Memorial Union addition.

The Black Bear band and cheerleaders will be part of the event which will feature speakers, including President Peter Hoff, Athletics Director Suzanne Tyler, coach Jack Cosgrove and members of the team.