“Jose!”

“Cuervo!”

“Who wants a shot?”

“I do!” The Maine student section sang, raising their hands.

The Black Bear players on the ice must have raised their sticks in agreement as Maine outshot Rensselaer 57-13 in a dominant 4-1 victory to open the season Thursday night at Alfond Arena.

However, the highly anticipated Home Opener in front of a large and raucous Alfond Faithful started differently than Ben Barr and his team hoped. A relatively soft penalty against Maine minutes into the opening period put the Black Bears immediately on their heels. The Engineers capitalized early on the Power Play as Lynden Breen was entirely caught out of position, allowing an open Rensselaer player to take the pass in the slot and fire it past Ostman before Bradly Nadeau could cover the shooter.

The Alfond crowd grew nervous and angsty as RPI swarmed all over Maine in the opening five minutes. Perhaps it was the nerves of the first home game or trying too hard to impress the big crowd. Either way, it looked as if the Black Bears were gripping their sticks too tight and trying to make the perfect play. This led to sloppy passes on the breakout, being unable to control the puck in the neutral zone, and overall being completely outplayed by Rensselaer in the first few minutes of the first period.

It took a captain’s performance from Junior Defenseman David Breazeale to take the early game by the scruff of the neck and turn the momentum toward Maine’s favor.

Breazeale quickly turned into the best player on the ice, both offensively and defensively. His agile skating ability allowed him to frequently step up in the neutral zone, picking off RPI passes before using his strength, speed, and stick-handling abilities to break the Engineer’s forecheck and not only get the puck into the offensive zone but deep in the offensive zone, where his team could set up, control, and start to dictate the game.

The most senior defensemen led a young and inexperienced Maine blue line to an excellent overall game. Sophomore defensemen Luke Antonacci, Brandon Holt, Brandon Chabrier, and Grayson Arnott stepped up and performed faultlessly, and the Freshmen defensemen Liam Lesakowski and Bodie Nobes did not look overmatched or daunted in their collegiate debut. This young defense shut down RPI’s attack all night, only allowing 13 shots in the game, of which only a handful were grade-A chances that tested a relatively idle Victor Ostman in net.

As the first period wore on, Maine started to move the puck more crisply and accurately on their breakouts and through the neutral zone but still had trouble executing passes and making plays while in their offensive zone to create many solid scoring opportunities. Centering passes into the slot were continuously fired into the feet of RPI’s defensemen, or pucks kept bouncing away from Black Bear sticks as Maine could not string enough good passes together to set up enough quality chances to test the Rensselaer goaltender.

It could have been during the first intermission that Barr relayed a pivotal message to his team: RPI’s goaltender could not handle rebounds adequately, and the defense in front of him struggled with loose pucks.

From the start of the second period, Maine started to pour on the shots, shooting for rebounds as much as trying to hit the back of the net. Rensselaer netminder Jack Watson allowed heaps of rebounds to bounce directly back in front of the goal instead of being directed into the corner away from danger. The goaltender’s struggle to effectively deal with these shots, coupled with RPI’s defensemen’s inability to clear loose pucks near the crease, allowed Maine’s talented forwards to pounce on rebounds. All night, some of Maine’s best goal opportunities didn’t come from elaborately setting up plays but instead firing the puck low and hard onto the net, where Maine forwards are swarming for the rebound. The dirty goals.

It was highly touted Freshman Bradly Nadeau who pounced on a loose puck early into the second period to send the Alfond into its first frenzy of the season. It was the younger of the Nadeau brothers who scored his first goal for the Black Bears during a highly memorable night for the New Brunswick native.

The goal sparked the Alfonders as the atmosphere grew inside the rink. The taunting of the famous student section up in the balcony and the ever-increasing pressure from the Black Bears down on the ice led to Rensselaer taking penalty after penalty, desperate to stop the Maine onslaught on their goal by hook or by crook.