Watch out, Hockey East, it’s that Maine man again.

The Makar family has had a busy couple of weeks out east.

Parents Gary and Laura were in Montreal and Boston to watch their eldest son, NHL superstar Cale, help lead Team Canada to a Four Nations championship earlier this month. Then, on Friday night, the Calgarians were also in town to celebrate Senior Weekend and witness their youngest son, Taylor, notch his first collegiate hat trick.

The Alberta native continued his scorching hot February feast last night; with nine goals in just eight games, Makar led the Maine Black Bears to a convincing 4-1 victory over the Vermont Catamounts at Alfond Arena.

“They traveled down for a good one, that’s for sure,” Makar said about his parents after the game. “They are enjoying it, and they love Maine.”

Using his big frame and quick feet, Makar has developed into the quintessential power forward this season for Maine. (Photo: Patience Hanley - UMaine Athletics).

All in the details

After struggling to re-find their identity in the past few weeks, Friday night saw a significantly improved Black Bear performance from the team that struggled to play their brand of hockey last weekend in an overtime loss at Connecticut.

Before the game, Head Coach Ben Barr stressed to his team the importance of simplifying their game, focusing on the details, and getting back to playing basic Black Bear hockey.

Barr emphasized cleaning up their details, which includes things like staying on the right side of the puck, keeping bodies between the puck and their net, starts and stops, not lazily looping around on a backcheck after a turnover, making sure to take their man out of the play by finishing their checks, and having an active stick when defending in their own end, on top of other countless minute aspects that together are so important.

Doing all the little things well makes a big difference, and their effect had a noticeable impact on Maine’s performance, which, while perhaps not entirely consistent, was the best it’s been in over a month.

“I thought we played really hard. I thought we took a step in the right direction, played good details, [and] physical,” Nolan Renwick said.

From the opening puck drop, Maine’s 5-on-5 play was simply heads and shoulders above Vermont’s ’ and propelled by a simplified nuts-and-bolts approach; the Black Bears were purring during much of the first period. Maine’s forecheck got their feet under them, allowing them to dictate the contest’s pace and keep the Catamounts from getting much of a sniff around Albin Boija’s net.

With their backs against the walls early, the Catamounts stacked a lot of defenders around the net, allowing the Black Bears to control the perimeter and fire plenty of shots through traffic from defensemen at the points or forwards rolling up the walls.

With most of the play around UVM’s Axel Manghbo’s goal and the Black Bears winning the large majority of puck battles in the corners and retrieving the puck after shots, the Catamounts didn’t have much to feel good about early on in the game. Maine kept Vermont at arm's length for much of the 5-on-5 play during the first two periods, holding them to just 13 shots on goal over two frames. This is after UConn managed 44 shots on goal last Friday, the most Maine has allowed all season.

“It’s like football; a good defense is a good offense sometimes. I find that when we’re at our best, we’re hemming them in on the forecheck, we’re rotating the zone and keeping them penned in so we spend less time in our zone and give up less chances against, so that’s where it starts,” Renwick explained.

For Maine, a critical aspect of the game is using their physicality to force open time and space. With more open ice to work with on Friday night than they had the entire month of February combined, the team’s significantly improved physical presence definitely got the ball rolling.

“As we get deeper into the season, teams play tighter defensively, teams work extremely hard, it’s hard to create time and space. But how you create that space is by playing physical. If you finish a check and win a puck battle, you’re going to have an opportunity to maybe make a play or something, but it starts with physicality,” Renwick said.

Physicality doesn’t have to mean constantly laying a steamrolling, bone-crunching, body-flying check. Rather, it’s making sure to put a shoulder on an opposition body in order to take them out of the play,  not allowing them to slip past and gain a numerical advantage. For Barr, this is hockey 101, which he expects all of his players to have learned at a young age.

“When you finish your hits, you take your player out of the play, and then a lot of times you force turnovers. The player you just hit is outside the game, and then you can attack inside the dots. It’s just the simplest thing. It’s very, very simple hockey, but it creates more open ice for you. The more hits you finish, the more open ice you’ll have,” Barr explained.

Undisciplined play

But for all of Maine’s early domination, the game was still scoreless midway through the first, when the Black Bears killed their own momentum, allowing the Catamounts a foot back into the game through poor decision-making, which led to penalty troubles.

“I thought we started really well, then took a couple of penalties. We’re still making some decisions that are just killing our momentum in the game. I thought, for the most part, we were playing pretty hard, and then [we] make a bad read, take a dumb penalty. It changed the momentum of the game in the first, then it’s choppy the rest of the way,” Barr said.

The play that shot the Black Bears in the foot was a Frank Djurasevic point shot that missed the net, rang around the boards, and out of the Maine O-zone. A Catamount scooped up the puck and tore through center ice, bearing down on Boija on a 2-on-2. Djurasevic couldn’t force the Catamount away from the net on the rush, missing his check and forcing Boija to make two saves in tight and in quick succession. Suddenly scrambling for the first time all game, the Black Bears were called for having too many men on the ice.

“[Djurasevic] missed a hit on the first penalty we took; he missed a hit on a 2-on-2 play that ended up in scoring chance, and we took a penalty. His defensive game can definitely improve,” Barr said. 

Although Maine’s PK killed off the bench minor, the Catamounts grew in confidence and momentum with just about all six of their first-period shots coming in and around their power play.

Undisciplined play may have been the biggest negative for the Black Bears’ performance on Friday. They were simply a class above the Catamounts 5-on-5  but frustratingly kept giving the visitors a leg up by wearing out the ice to their sin bin. Throughout the evening, Maine took 12 minutes worth of penalties.

A pivotal point in the game came early in the second when Maine, with a 1-0 lead, took back-to-back soft penalties, a Nicholas Niemo trip, and seconds later, a Harrison Scott slash that left the senior forward bewildered.

Facing a daunting 5-on-3 PK for almost a minute and thirty seconds, the Black Bears stood unwavering, weathering the UVM storm that came narrowly close to evening up the game when they pinged a shot off the post. Boija stopped all three shots that got through to him, and David Breazeale blocked just about as many, heroically sacrificing his body time and again to the Alfond’s roar of approval.

“That was a big deal. David Breazeale blocked some shots there and cleared it once. That was great leadership by him,” Barr said.

Makar’s the Man…again

Having the best couple of weeks of his college career, on top of his best season of collegiate hockey, Makar’s play for Maine has been masterful. Adopting a new power-forward style of game, the 6’4” left-winger is one of the strongest, toughest, and defensively adept members of the Black Bears team. On top of this, he is as fleet as he is strong, able to skate like the wind from north to south when he gets his feet moving. Makar’s all-around-complete play has been a godsend for Black Bear Nation.

“I think just moving my legs, keep getting good chemistry with Renny and whoever else is on our line, just playing hard, having a heavy stick, and trying to get the details dialed in,” said Makar about his recent success.

Barr, who initially recruited Makar to UMass, where the senior spent three seasons, also played a pivotal role in convincing Makar to transfer to Maine for his senior season. Barr has certainly got the best out of Makar, whose three goals on Friday put him at 16 goals and 27 assists on the season. This surpasses his three-year totals at UMass, which saw him net 15 times and register 22 assists in almost three times the games played.

Makar skates with the puck moments before netting his second goal of the evening. (Photo: Patience Hanley - UMaine Athletics)

“It’s actually funny. I tell him every game that he’s due for a goal here, but now he scores every game, so I think that doesn't really make sense. He’s been playing great. I think he’s really come into his own as a power forward who has offensive upside but can also play a physical game. He’s a great kid, and I think that’s where it starts with. He comes from a great family, and that shows on the ice with his character,” Renwick said.

A seventh-round pick of the Colorado Avalanche, Makar’s renaissance this season is remarkable. He’s been the catalyst for the Black Bears in February, equally as much as Maine has been a shot in the arm for his career.

Makar’s first goal Friday night came late in the first period on a Black Bear power play. Renwick and Lynden Breen teamed up to halt a Catamount clearance at the half-boards, winning the puck off a scrum of UVM green and gold before Breen fed Djurasevic at the point with a backhand feed. Djurasevic jumped up into the high slot, pulling two Catamounts towards him and drawing the complete focus of Manghbo and the rest of the Vermont penalty-killers. As the Alfond waited in anticipation for Djurasevic to rip a shot on net, he instead cupped his stick blade to find Makar at the back post against the grain with an absolutely picture-perfect pass. Makar could practically skate the puck into the back of the net, catching Mangbo completely out of position.

“Great play by Frank on the first one, just again, it was a great retrieval on the power play,” Makar said.

It would be Djurasevic to Makar once again on the power play midway through the second to put Maine up 2-0. With Vermont’s penalty kill defense collapsed around their net, Josh Nadeau found Djurasevic with acres of space, all alone in the high slot. Djurasevic ripped a one-timed blast down toward goal before any Catamount could close him down, and the puck clipped off of Makar’s shin pad, redirecting behind Mangbo.

After going scoreless for well over a month, the power play has finally caught fire, now having successfully scored four times in their last seven opportunities.

While Barr would like to see Djurasevic be consistently more defensively sound, nobody can fault the offensive side of his game. Quarterbacking one of the power play units, his 18 assists on the season leads the team, while his six goals are the most among the blueliners.

“Offensively, he’s been outstanding,” Barr said about the sophomore playing in his first season at Maine after transferring from Merrimack.

“He’s solid, he’s big, he shoots the puck hard, he can make plays, he can have moves and stuff like that, and I think we have a lot of trust in him on the blueline there, and he’s been doing awesome, it’s been great to see,” Makar said.

A surprising stat to Makar as well, his two power play goals were the first of the season for the winger who has played on the man-advantage unit for the entire season.

“Better late than never, I guess,” Makar joked.

With two already under his belt, Makar let the hats fly onto the Alfond ice midway through the first for Maine’s first 5-on-5 goal in over 110 minutes of hockey.

Hanging on by just a 2-1 margin and Vermont pressuring Maine, a Catamount couldn’t get his stick on a centering pass all alone on Boija’s doorstep. With Maine scrambling and UVM’s tails up, Renwick won his battle at the half-boards, letting Charlie Russell scamper up ice. Seeing a numerical advantage, defenseman Brandon Chabrier jumped up into the rush to make it a 3-on-2. Russell popped the puck to Chabrier, who was entering the UVM zone, and, seeing Makar crashing the net, threw a hard and low pass-shot off of Mangbo’s pad. The puck kicked out directly to Makar, who slammed home his third and sent plenty of hats raining down onto the Alfond ice.

Makar watched the first hats cascade down onto the ice after netting his first collegiate hatty. (Photo: Patience Hanley - UMaine Athletics)

“An unreal play by Chabs and a great play by Renny to get the puck out of our zone, and we ended up going on a rush, and it was a pass off pad, and it was easy to put in,” Makar said. “It was great; those are the things that we got to do, just be on the rush and just make those plays.”

For Maine’s third goal, Barr saw simplicity reign supreme.

“It was the simplest play there; you win a battle in the corner, chip a puck to a guy in the neutral zone, Chabs had a great shot there, put it on the far pad, and drove to the net. It’s the simplest hockey; you learn that when you’re ten years old and when you’re really good at the simple things, usually good things would happen,” Barr explained.

The Black Bears scored one more a few minutes later to put the game out of reach, with defenseman Grayson Arnott banging away at the netfront to poke a fourth past Mangbo. Arnott has had an up-and-down 2025, in and out of the lineup, but was chosen to dress as Maine’s extra defenseman over the likes of Liam Lesakowski and Jack Dalton Friday night. Arnott’s second goal of the season, both being at the netfront, with the first coming in December against Stonehill, came when he was moved up to play in a forward position after Aidan Carney went down with an ankle injury in the second period.

Only 5’9”, Arnott had no trouble battling it out in front of the net with the physically superior Catamounts during his period at forward.

“He played forward in the third because Carney was out, so he played forward, and that’s his second netfront goal this year, so if he can score netfront goals at his size, then I think everybody can,” Barr said.

While Maine’s 5-on-5 play for the first two periods completely outclassed and outmatched Vermont, their lack of discipline gave the Catamounts confidence, and by the third, UVM was arguably outplaying Maine. The Black Bears were loose at the back when playing with the lead and have yet to put together a complete 60-minute performance since perhaps the Denver series in the first week of the New Year.

“A little bit of a letdown in the third there to start, but we stuck with it and ended up getting the job done,” Renwick said.

For Makar, he still sees that his team can improve on their details and clean up their game.

“I think there were points when we were all over them in the O-zone and points in the D-zone where we were just lackadaisical a bit, and they were getting chances, so I think we have to clean up some more details and be a bit harder,” Makar said.

It was a step in the right direction as Maine was able to re-find their identity for the first time in weeks.  But it’s still only one game, and Maine has had a habit in 2025 of taking one step forward and then one step back.

I thought there were glimpses of better hockey tonight than we’ve played,” Barr said.

Saturday night will be a much more difficult test, with Vermont playing desperate, scrapping tooth and nail for every late-season point and Pairwise boost they can find. The Catamounts proved to themselves that they have the ability to get at Maine and make the Black Bears suffer.

The Catamounts won’t go quietly into the night, and Maine will have to showcase their first-period performance for a complete 60.

Makar was meant for Maine and Maine was meant for Makar.

On to March.