The importance of special teams is magnified during the hockey playoffs.

The University of Maine men can certainly attest to the importance of special teams.

Power-play goals turned out to be game-winners in four of Maine’s losses in NCAA Tourney games:

. to Minnesota in the 2002 NCAA championship game (4-3 in overtime);

. to Michigan (2-1) in the first round of the Midwest Regional in 2003;

. to Denver (1-0) in the NCAA title game in 2004;

. to Wisconsin (5-2) in last year’s Frozen Four semifinal.

But Maine’s penalty-killing units certainly got the job done during the East Regional at Blue Cross Arena in Rochester, N.Y., over the weekend to help the Bears gain a berth in the Frozen Four against Michigan State on April 5.

Maine, 23-14-2, will take on Michigan State, 24-13-3, in the 4 p.m. game at the Scottrade Center in St. Louis with Boston College, 28-11-1, and North Dakota, 24-213-5, squaring off in the 8 p.m. semifinal.

The championship game will be Saturday at 7 p.m.

The Bears killed off 15 of 16 power plays in the regional, including a pair of two-man disadvantages spanning 1:18 in the 4-1 win over St. Cloud State and 1:02 in the 3-1 victory over UMass, to help pave the way to a third Frozen Four appearance in four years.

Meanwhile, Maine’s power play, the nation’s best with a 25.7 percent success rate, continued its productivity with 4 goals in 13 chances.

Maine had two power-play goals in each game and the Bears have now converted on 15 of their last 52 chances (28.8 percent) over their last nine games.

The Bears have scored two power-play goals in seven of their last nine games.

UMass junior defenseman Mike Kostka said Maine’s power play has plenty of weapons.

“They just have a great group of guys on it, guys like [Michel] Leveille and [Teddy] Purcell. They move around real well and they can all shoot the puck real well. They’ve very sound offensively with the puck. The fact they’re very talented offensively allows them to create a lot of offense on the power play.”

While the power play has been at the top or near the top of the charts for most of the year, the penalty-killing hasn’t been up to Maine standards for most of the year.

In fact, the Bears’ penalty-killing percentage of 84.1 in league play was seventh best. Maine had ranked in the top two in the league in each of the previous three seasons.

Their overall penalty-killing percentage has risen to 85.6 percent, sixth best in the league and 16th in the country.

“We knew our penalty-killing had to get better if we wanted to win,” said junior defenseman Bret Tyler. “Special teams are such a big part of college hockey. Our power play is tops in the league, but we really struggled on the penalty kill.”

Tyler said they’ve spent a lot of time on the penalty kill lately.

“Coach [Tim] Whitehead even worked on it even in our morning skate [the day of the St. Cloud State game],” said Tyler.

Senior right wing Keith Johnson said the Bears focused on “taking away the cross-crease pass to the back door.”

“And our motto was keep things simple, shoot the puck off the glass and out,” added Johnson.

The return to the lineup of 6-foot-7 sophomore goalie Ben Bishop, who missed the previous four games with a groin pull, was also a huge key to the penalty-killing effort.

“Your goaltender is always your best penalty-killer,” said Maine senior center Mike Hamilton.

“That was a lot of it. The big guy stopped the puck,” said Maine senior center Michel Leveille.

“Our penalty-killing was huge and we obviously needed it,” said Tim Whitehead.

However, the Maine coach added that his Black Bears can’t afford to take the volume of penalties they took in the regional.

“We have to show better discipline with our sticks and hands. We need to play physical. That’s a big part of our game. But we need to keep our sticks and hands down,” said Whitehead. “Fortunately, our penalty-killing was sharp, so we were able to weather the storm.”

Michigan State has good special teams.

The Spartans’ power play went 3-for-14 in NCAA Midwest Regional wins over Boston University (5-1) and Notre Dame (2-1) while killing off all 11 manpower disadvantages.

The Spartans have the nation’s eighth-best penalty-killing percentage (87.0), and their power play is tied for 16th (19.1 percent).