The Black Bears wheel away to celebrate with their bench after Taylor Makar's first goal on Saturday night against AIC. (Photo Courtesy of Sophia Santamaria — UMaine Athletics)

The new season couldn’t have started much better for the Maine Black Bears, who stormed out of the gates, thumping the American International College Yellow Jackets 6-0 in a rip-roaring start that left fans giddy with excitement over the prospects of another magical year.

A picture-perfect start for a highly touted transfer, the development of a dynamic new-look-line, a shutdown dominant defensive performance, and the team’s new ability to roll four high-quality lines had the Alfond Faithful buzzing almost as much as the Black Bears did.

“I don’t think we had anybody who had a bad game. We have a lot to grow on, to work with, off that game.” Barr said on the Black Bear Coaches Show on Wednesday.

Black Bear Nation will not have to wait long to see their mouthwateringly exciting team back in action as another Atlantic Hockey American opponent is tasked with the long journey north this weekend. This time, the Army Black Knights from West Point’s United States Military Academy are set to do battle against Maine in an exhibition game at Alfond Arena on Saturday afternoon.

While playing an exhibition game after already opening the competitive season is an odd scheduling quirk, for Head Coach Ben Barr, it provides a valuable opportunity for his team to continue their preparation for the challenging gauntlet of Hockey East play looming on the horizon.

“It’ll be good for us to get some more live action.” Barr said.

Orono’s geographic remoteness and the difficulty that poses on schedule-making has created this situation. But while Barr would have rather played an exhibition game before jumping right into regular-season play, he is glad to find an opponent to fill the hole in Maine’s schedule, allowing his team to stay sharp and keep their competitive juices going early in the season.

“Last week was the only time that really worked for them [AIC] to play, so we agreed to play and then we found the date.” Barr explained. “Then when I looked back at it in the Spring, I said, ‘our guys are going to be grumpy if they have to practice for two weeks again after playing our first game.’”

Longtime Army Head Coach Brian Riley has a longstanding relationship with Barr, going all the way back to Barr’s high school days at the notorious hockey program at Shattuck-St. Mary’s School in his hometown of Faribault, Minnesota.

While Barr was an underclassman at Shattuck-St. Mary’s, Riley was the Head Coach of the Boy’s Prep team. Although Barr was still playing for the younger Bantam-level team, Riley was an Academic Advisor to Barr and the two formed a close relationship. Riley would go on to leave Shattuck-St. Mary’s after two seasons in Faribault, to join his brother Rob as an assistant coach at Army for five seasons before taking over for Rob as Head Coach of the Black Knights in 2004. Born in West Point, Riley continues a long legacy of Riley’s behind the Army bench (seventy-three continuous seasons) as Brian and Rob’s father, Jack Riley, served as Head Coach for thirty-six seasons starting in 1950.

Now Brian Riley, who announced his retirement at the end of the season over the summer, will take the Black Knights up to Orono for the program’s first game at the Alfond since 1992, a 15-5 victory for the Black Bears. Behind the bench for his twenty-first season, Riley has considerably influenced Barr’s career, which almost saw him as a Cadet at West Point.

“Funny story, he [Riley] then recruited me and that’s where I probably would have gone had RPI not happened at the end of the day, so I was really close to actually going there and playing for him.” Barr said. “I went on a visit out there and I had my appointment and all that kind of stuff, which is kind of a process to get an appointment to get to go to a service academy. It was really close to happening and obviously it didn’t at the end of the day.”

The hockey world sure is small.

Saturday, being an exhibition game, would in theory allow Barr and his staff the opportunity to put out a completely changed lineup, trying out different line combinations and getting a gauge on the players who did not dress on Saturday against AIC. But this will not be the case.

Instead, Barr and his team are approaching this exhibition the same way they would any other contest, with an emphasis on improving some of the details of their game that he would like cleaned up. 

“We’re treating it as a normal game, the guys who get in the lineup, get a chance to play [have] got to earn their way into the next one. There are a lot of areas we can be better and we might see a few guys who haven’t gotten the chance to play yet, so it’ll be a good opportunity for those guys to show what they can do.” Barr said on Tuesday after the team’s practice.

It’s hard to improve upon a 6-0 scoreline, especially one that was brought on by a complete performance with a clinically efficient and effective breakout that kept the puck out of Maine’s end and released the Black Bears up-ice, stretching the neutral zone, and putting Maine’s high-octane attack into their offensive zone with dynamic speed off the rush. But Barr was unhappy with how his team closed the game, taking their foot off the gas midway through the third.

“The last ten minutes it got a little loose.” Barr explained. “Most of their [AICs] shots and most of their quality scoring chances came in the last ten, fifteen minutes of the game. That happens sometimes. We were up four or five [to] nothing or whatever and then you start playing a different way.”

Last Saturday’s performance is the baseline for Barr’s team this season. The standard has been set. The minimum expectation is clear.

Now, the team and staff will look to find the next one-percent, incremental improvement in any and all aspects of their game in their never ending search for perfection.

“I think the depth of the team showed and I think there is a lot to grow from that game. A lot of things that we can get better at we know as certain individuals and as a team. For the first game, I think it’s a good starting point.” Barr said.

Senior forward Taylor Makar echoed his coach’s sentiment after his electric two-goal start to his Maine career.“Obviously, there’s so many little details behind the scenes that maybe fans don’t see, stuff we’re always trying to build off every single day, like personal stuff, and team stuff. Obviously, there’s always ways we can improve with work ethic. Overall, I think we had a decent start.”

A main reason Barr isn’t overly concerned about using the exhibition game to give young players a look is because there aren’t actually many young players on the team. By far Maine’s most experienced team under Barr, there are only four freshmen on the roster. While only one of them — Oskar Komarov — saw ice time on Saturday, two are goaltenders in Patriks Berzins and Gage Stewart, and defenseman Brian Morse was the only freshman skater not to dress last Saturday. With the rest of Maine’s newcomers being mostly experienced College Hockey veterans, the Black Bears this season have the luxury of not needing to bed in a large group of rookies.

“We have a pretty good idea of who we have on our team. There’s some guys who’ve played one game and some new players that haven’t gotten in there necessarily yet, but we’re more of a veteran team right now than we have been.” Barr said. “Even our new players that are transfers have a lot of experience, so we’re trying to tweak this or that and trying to get as prepared as we can. And we’re going to play it just as we would play a regular game.”

While Maine will prepare for Saturday’s game just as they would a regular game, their opponent is no regular opponent.

All of Army’s players, alongside all Cadets after graduating from West Point, are required to enlist in the military for at least five years of service. Needless to say, Maine can expect a well-drilled, well-disciplined, hard-working team from their service-member opponents.

“They’re a really aggressive team, obviously always really tough and physical being naturally where they are and what they’re made up of at West Point. It’ll be another good challenge for us, a little bit of a different style of play, but I think it will help prepare us and keep it moving forward.” Barr said.

The Black Knights have had an up-and-down past couple of seasons under Riley and began this campaign with a 3-4 loss away at Union in overtime last weekend. Ending last season with a 10-23-2 record, Army is one of the youngest teams in the nation, with sixteen underclassmen on the roster.

Having lost two of their top point-getters from last year to the transfer portal, the Black Knights will rely heavily on senior forward Joey Baez #23 (15-16-23) and sophomore forward Bren Keefer #28 (13-11-24) to carry the team’s offense.

But it is on the backend where Army struggled the most last season, allowing four goals per game and an Atlantic Hockey worst .879 save percentage last year.

Nonetheless, the Black Bears can’t sleep on these Cadets and will need another strong start come puck drop at 2 o’clock on Saturday, which Barr emphasized is especially important when playing an aggressive team like the Black Knights at an earlier time in the day than they are used to. Hockey players, known to be creatures of habit, will have to make plenty of pre-game adjustments to make sure they are mentally and physically geared up for the early start.

“It’s going to be really important, for a 2 o’clock game, that we’re ready to play right from the drop of the puck. When you play a really aggressive team, if you are sleepy, you’re not as mentally locked in as you need to be. That’s when they can jump on you early and create some turnovers, which can obviously lead to scoring chances and goals.” Barr explained. “I think being mentally into the game the first five minutes is going to be really important, especially playing at a time we don’t usually play at. I think just being mentally prepared will be the most important part of that game.”

For Maine, a team that relies on its foundational culture of hard work, it will be interesting to see if they can produce the same electric energy for an afternoon exhibition as they did for the evening home opener in a full-throated, sold-out Alfond Arena.

“It’s easy to get up for the first game, but can we get up for the second game, the third game, the fourth game. That’ll be our challenge.” Barr stated.

While it may only be an exhibition, every game played at the Alfond is a special occasion and should be thoroughly enjoyed. Never take it for granted.