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Believe it or not, there is a scenario in which the University of Maine men’s hockey team can win Hockey East’s regular-season championship.
Maine is one of four teams that can still win the title as New Hampshire, Boston College, Boston University and Maine are separated by only three points.
In a unique scheduling situation, those four teams are facing each other to close out the regular season this weekend.
New Hampshire, which has 33 points, visits Boston University (31 points) on Thursday night before entertaining the Terriers on Saturday evening.
Maine (30) travels to Boston College (32) for a Friday-Saturday night series.
To claim the title, Maine would have to sweep Boston College and Boston University would need to collect a win and a tie vs. UNH.
That would leave Maine, UNH and BU tied with 34 points apiece and Maine would win the tie-breaker because it went 2-1 against UNH and 1-1-1 vs. BU. UNH and BU would be 1-1-1 against each other.
“I’m glad we have an opportunity to win the league,” said Maine coach Tim Whitehead. “We know we have something to shoot for. But there’s plenty else to play for like the NCAA ramifications and trying to finish as high as we can in the league.
“We know what we’re up against. We need to focus on our task at hand which is to win as many games as we can. If we do that, everything else will take care of itself,” added Whitehead.
In the Hockey East tie-breaking procedure, the first tie-breaker is head-to-head; second is number of conference wins and third is head-to-head results vs. the first-place team, then the second-place team, etc.
Maine is 0-1 against Boston College and is just 1-4-1 in its last six trips to Conte Forum.
“This is just fabulous for everybody involved. From the fans to all of us who are involved every day. It’s great for the league. It’s exciting knowing that when a lot of people thought we were down and out, we’re back in the mix. We’re still clawing to make the NCAA Tournament,” said Whitehead.
He said the tight race “shows how competitive the league is. And we’ve seen first hand how good the teams are that aren’t in the top four: UMass Lowell, Northeastern, Providence and UMass. Those teams are all very good.”
Maine is the only team to sweep UMass Lowell but the three games were decided by just five goals. Maine is 1-1-1 vs. Northeastern, 2-1 vs. Providence and 2-0-1 vs. UMass.
UMass Lowell and Northeastern, separated by one point for fifth place, are Maine’s likeliest best-of-three quarterfinal opponents beginning March 11.
“They will be very tough matchups,” said Whitehead.
Whitehead has been encouraged by Maine’s recent play and the fact it has regained its home-ice advantage after a 3-4 start at Alfond Arena. Maine is 8-0-3 in its last 11 home games.
“That has meant a lot to us in the second half,” said Whitehead. “Now we’ve got to continue to move forward. We’ve got to keep playing with the same urgency.
“It’s exciting to be hosting again but we’ve got a big weekend at BC first,” added Whitehead.
Maine has moved up to 12th in the USCHO.com/CSTV poll but is still just 15th in the PairWise Rankings that seed the 16-team NCAA Tournament field. The Bears were 14th in the national polls and 18th in the PairWise Rankings last week before sweeping UMass Lowell this past weekend.
BC is 20-6-6 and rated third in the PairWise and fifth in the weekly poll.
Brent Shepheard is on a roll
UMaine sophomore left wing Brent Shepheard is in the midst of his first four-game goal-scoring streak at Maine and he has scored the game-winners in Maine’s last three victories.
“I’m happy to help the team out any way I can,” said Shepheard. “I’m obviously feeling better [after an injury-marred freshman year]. I started off the year playing fairly well. Since after Christmas, I wasn’t scoring as much as I was before but I was still getting the chances. It’s nice those chances are starting to go in again.”
All of his goals have been scored from close range as a result of his determination and willingness to drive to the net front.
“That’s where I score all my goals. I’m not really a perimeter-type player. I just get to the net and hopefully find rebounds,” said Shepheard.
Whitehead said Shepheard has been an “impact guy for us physically, on the scoresheet and defensively. He blocks a lot of shots. He is our most consistent hitter.”
Shepheard now has 11 goals and 8 assists in 31 games.
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