|
Men's Ice Hockey Hosts UMass Lowell in Final Series of Regular Season
March 5, 2008
Complete Release in PDF Format
It is another crucial weekend for the University of Maine men's ice hockey team. The Black Bears host UMass Lowell for a two-game series with a post-season berth on the line. Maine enters the weekend two points behind UMass for the eighth and final playoff spot. Maine needs a minimum of three points to remain in contention for a spot in the Hockey East Tournament. The Black Bears, however, do not control their own destiny. Maine would win the tiebreaker with UMass, but would lose the tiebreaker with Merrimack. MAINE SHUTS OUT VERMONT 3-0: The University of Maine men's ice hockey team kept its playoff hopes alive last Saturday night with a 3-0 blanking of Vermont. Maine jumped out to a 1-0 lead 14:40 into the game when Andrew Sweetland (Bonavista, Newfoundland) fed Wes Clark (Oakville, Ontario) from behind the net and he beat Vermont goalie Joe Fallon. Travis Ramsey (Lakewood, Calif.) also assisted on the play. Billy Ryan (Milton, Mass.) gave Maine a 2-0 lead at 4:03 of the second period when he scored his fifth of the season from Keenan Hopson (Prince George, British Columbia). Chris Hahn (Fort Qu'Appelle, Saskatchewan) iced the game for Maine when he scored a power play goal at 18:59 of the third period from Ryan and Hopson. Maine's Ben Bishop (Des Peres, Mo.) was stellar for the Black Bears as he stopped all 30 shots that he faced to record his second shutout of the season. He improves to 11-18-3 with the victory. SCOUTING THE MAINE BLACK BEARS: Maine is led by Wes Clark who has 10 goals and 10 assists for 20 points. He has three power play goals. Bret Tyler (Milton, Mass.) is chipping in with six goals and 12 assists for 18 points. Rob Bellamy (Westfield, Mass.) has four goals and 12 assists for 16 points, while Andrew Sweetland is adding eight goals and eight assists for 16 points as well. He leads the team in power play goals with four. Billy Ryan has five goals and nine assists for 14 points, while Keenan Hopson has three goals and 10 assists for 13 points. Travis Ramsey is chipping in with three goals and eight assists for 11 points, while Jeff Marshall (Kyle, Saskatchewan) has four goals and six assists for 10 points. Tanner House (Cochrane, Alberta) is also chipping in with 10 points on a goal and nine assists. Chris Hahn has six goals and three assists for nine points. Simon Danis-Pepin (Vaudreuil-Dorion, Quebec) has four goals and five assists for nine points, while Matt Duffy (Windham, Maine) has six goals and two assists for eight points. Ben Bishop is 11-18-3 with a 2.53 goals against average and a .918 save percentage. He has two shutouts on the season. SHUT OUT AND SHUTOUT: Maine was involved in two shutouts last weekend in Vermont. The Black Bears were shut out 2-0 on Friday night. On Saturday, Maine shut out the Catamounts 3-0. Last season, Maine and Providence played to the same result. Providence blanked Maine 3-0 on Friday, before the Black Bears rebounded to shut out the Friars 2-0 the following night. HONOROING MAINE'S SENIORS: Saturday night will be "Senior Night" at Alfond Arena. Maine will honor Nolan Boike, Rob Bellamy, Wes Clark, Keenan Hopson, Vince Laise, Travis Ramsey, Billy Ryan and Bret Tyler before the game on the ice with their families. After the game, they will each have a chance to reflect back on the last four years with the crowd at Alfond. RYAN RECORDS 90TH CAREER POINT: Billy Ryan recorded his 90th career point last weekend at Vermont. He had a goal and an assist in Saturday's game against the Catamounts. Ryan has 34 goals and 56 assists for 90 points. He leads all current Black Bears in career points. Bret Tyler is not far behind with 25 goals and 62 assists for 87 career points. BISHOP AMONG SINGLE SEASON MINUTE LEADERS: Ben Bishop, who has played in all 32 games, has played 1849:49 minutes this season. He ranks third in Hockey East in minutes played behind BC's John Muse and Northeastern's Brad Theissen. He is just 47:57 behind Matt Yeats (1999-2001) for fifth place on the single season minutes played list. COMEBACK WIN FOR MAINE: Maine came back to win when trailing in the third period for the first time this season on Feb. 23 against UMass. With the game tied 1-1, UMass took a 2-1 lead just 37 second into the third period. The Black Bears answered with a pair of goals less than three minutes apart in the final 6:10 of the game. Maine trailed by two goals in the third period against Vermont earlier this season and came back to tie the game at 5-5. BISHOP SETS CAREER-HIGH IN SAVES: Ben Bishop recorded a career-high 49 saves on Saturday, Feb. 2 at UMass. It was three more than his previous high of 46 set earlier this season at Denver. Bishop stopped 21 shots in the first period alone against the Minutemen. MISSING TIME: Maine players have combined to miss 78 games due to injury this season. Chris Hahn missed 12 games, Billy Ryan has missed nine games, while Keenan Hopson and Andrew Sweetland have each missed six games. Ryan and Hopson were Maine's two leading returning scoring forwards from a year ago. Saturday, Feb. 23 against UMass was the first time that Maine had Hahn, Hopson, Ryan and Sweetland all in the lineup at the same time since November 25 against Vermont. RAMSEY WINS M CLUB DEAN SMITH AWARD: Maine senior Travis Ramsey was named the 2008 M Club Dean Smith Award winner on Sunday, Feb. 27, 2008. The award is presented to the male and female student-athlete with outstanding academic and athletic achievement along with citizenship and community service. Ramsey, captain of the hockey team, has seen action in 132 career games with five goals and 23 assists for 28 points. He has played in 126 consecutive games. He was named an official candidate for the Lowe's Senior CLASS Award, but was not selected as one of the 10 finalists. He is member of Lambda Pi Eta, the official communication studies honor society of the National Communication Association. Ramsey has been named to the Hockey East All-Academic Team and is also a three-time UMaine Scholar-Athlete Award winner. He is a communication major with a double minor in public relations and business administration. The M Club Dean Smith Award was first presented as the M Club Scholarship Award in 1980. The Award was renamed to honor Dean Smith in 1993. Dean Smith was a recipient of the Walter Byers Award presented by the NCAA. Smith combined the top grade-point average among senior electrical engineering majors with the NAC scoring title as the captain of the 1989-90 men's basketball team. Ramsey becomes the sixth men's ice hockey player to win the M Club Dean Smith Award joining Paul Kariya (1994), Jim Leger (2000), Martin Kariya (2002, 2003) Gray Shaneberger (2002) and Frank Doyle (2004). JUST ONE GOAL: Maine allowed just one goal in 120 minutes of regulation play against Boston University the weekend of Feb. 15 and 16. The Black Bears allowed two overtime goals against the Terriers. Ben Bishop finished the weekend with a 1.46 goals against average and a .958 save percentage. TYLER NAMED SEMIFINALIST FOR WALTER BROWN AWARD: Senior defenseman Bret Tyler has been named a semifinalist for the Walter Brown Award, presented annually to the top American-born hockey player in New England. He is one of 15 semifinalists. The semifinalists include 12 players from Hockey East schools and three from ECAC schools. Nine forwards were named along with four goaltenders and two defensemen. Tyler is second on the team in scoring with six goals and 12 assists for 18 points. DEFENSEMAN NEAR TEAM LEAD IN SCORING: Bret Tyler, a defenseman, is second on the team in scoring. The last time a Maine defenseman led the team in scoring was during the 1994-95 season when Jeff Tory led the team with 13 goals and 42 assists for 55 points. Tyler is tied for eighth this season in Hockey East in scoring among defensemen.
|
