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All 10 freshmen will play for the University of Maine men’s hockey team on Saturday night in the exhibition opener against the United States National Team Development Program’s Under-18 squad at Alfond Arena. Game time is 7.
“We have a small window to evaluate our team before we get on the flight to Denver [for their season-opening series against the Pioneers on Oct. 12-13]. We have a lot of evaluating to do with so many new faces in the lineup,” said Maine coach Tim Whitehead.
“And we’ll also want to see which of the upperclassmen are ready to step into bigger roles. We’ll need to continue to evaluate them as well,” said Whitehead, who lost seven of his top 10 scorers off last year’s 23-15-2 Frozen Four team.
Since it is an exhibition game, both teams will be allowed to dress two extra skaters, according to Whitehead.
Sophomore center David deKastrozza, who played in 21 games and had three assists a year ago, will miss the game with a knee injury obtained during practice recently, according to Whitehead. Whitehead said de Kastrozza could be out “three to four weeks.”
Maine will have two, one-hour practices this week leading up to their first official full practice on Saturday morning.
Whitehead said the NCAA has altered its rules to allow teams to have two hours of on-ice practice per week in the preseason beginning on the first day of school.
The team and coaches used to have to wait until the first official day of practice.
Team USA has played seven games and two of its players, defenseman Ryan Hegarty and forward Kelen Corkum, will attend Maine next fall.
“They’re some of the top kids [in that age group] in the country and this will be a great opportunity for Ryan and Kelen to play in front of the Alfond Arena crowd,” said Whitehead.
He said teams are allowed to play two exhibition games, one against the Under-18 team and the other against a Canadian college, so they wanted to schedule them.
“From a recruiting standpoint, it also helps to spread the word about what kind of university we have. They get to tour the campus and enjoy the atmosphere at Alfond Arena. It isn’t just for the Under-18s, it filters down to the Under-17s,”
said Whitehead.
UM-Hofstra football on ESPNU
UMaine’s Colonial Athletic Association football game at Hofstra on Saturday will be broadcast nationally on ESPNU.
The contest kicks off at 1:30 p.m., but will be shown on tape delay at 10 p.m. on ESPNU, which is channel 187 on the Time Warner Digital Cable Package in Maine.
This brings to seven the number of Black Bear football games that will be televised this season.
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