It was two hours before the Thursday opener of his team’s American Hockey League playoff series against the Cornwall Aces and former University of Maine hockey assistant Jay Leach was preparing his Hershey Bears for the task at hand.

There are 16 former Black Bears on the playoff rosters in the AHL and International Hockey League and three of them play for Leach’s Bears: left wing Mike McHugh, center Jim Montgomery, and defenseman-left wing Shawn Anderson.

“They’ve done a great job for me. They’ve done the school proud,” said the 41-year-old Leach, who is in his second year with Hershey. “Mike has had a decent season. It took Jimmy a while to get going, but he has been lighting it up for us lately. And Shawn has been holding up the blue line.”

“We’re going to need Shawn and Jimmy to come through on the power play,” added Leach.

McHugh, meanwhile, is one of the team’s best penalty killer

McHugh, meanwhile, is one of the team’s best penalty killers.

Leach spent four years as an assistant at Maine before becoming an assistant coach with the NHL’s Hartford Whalers in 1988. He became the head coach of the AHL’s Springfield Indians, Hartford’s top AHL affiliate, before taking the Hershey job.

Hershey is Philadelphia’s top minor league team.

Ex-Black Bears Matt Martin, Garth Snow and Patrice Tardif are with the NHL’s Toronto Maple Leafs, Quebec Nordiques and St. Louis Blues, respectively, but Martin and Snow could be returned to their minor league affiliates in St. John’s and Cornwall. Tardif will stay in St. Louis but one of his former teammates, Eric Fenton, was just added to Peoria’s roster.

Here is a list of former Black Bears involved in the AHL or IHL playoffs:

Name Team GP G A Pts PIM +/-

Jay Mazur Detroit 64 23 27 50 64 – 7 Claudio Scremin Kansas City 61 8 30 38 29 +14 Patrice Tardif Peoria 53 27 18 45 43 +16 Dave MacIsaac Milwaukee 2 0 0 0 5 – 1 Chris Imes Minnesota 2 0 0 0 4 – 1

AHL

Name Team GP G A Pts PIM +/-

Scott Pellerin Albany 74 23 33 56 95 +14 Jean-Yves Roy Binghamton 67 41 36 77 28 +12 Chris Ferraro Binghamton 13 6 4 10 38 + 6 Peter Ferraro Binghamton 12 2 6 8 67 + 7 Andy Silverman Binghamton 5 0 1 1 2 E Mike McHugh Hershey 68 24 26 50 102 -28 Shawn Anderson Hershey 31 9 21 30 18 -13 Jim Montgomery Hershey 16 8 6 14 14 + 1 Matt Martin St John’s 49 2 16 18 54 – 3

Goalies

Name Team GPI Avg W L T SPCT

Mike Dunham Albany 35 2.80 20 7 8 .898 Garth Snow Cornwall 62 2.73 32 20 7 .900