ORONO, Maine- The University of Maine men’s ice hockey team used five different goal scorers on Friday night and opened up their regular season home schedule with a 7-1 non-conference pounding of Alaska-Anchorage at Alfond Arena before 2,975 fans.
After a very disappointing 7-0 loss at Providence last Saturday and a 5-0 exhibition loss at home Sunday to New Brunswick, Maine (1-1) came out flying early. Wisconsin transfer JD Greenway got the scoring started at 1:14 of the first. Greenway took a pass at the left point and faked a shot skating into the high slot and firing a backhander that beat Alaska-Anchorage goalie Kristian Stead stick side to make it 1-0. Tim Doherty doubled the lead at 4:35 when he walked out of the right corner and into the faceoff circles to the left of Stead and fired a shot with traffic in front that found the back of the net. “Saw their winger cheating up to the D I knew I had some space, then I saw two of our guys in front of the net so I just threw it to the net was either gonna be a deflection or would go in and luckily it went in”, Doherty said. UAA (0-1) would cut the lead in half when Alex Frye fired one from the right point that beat Maine goalie Jeremy Swayman at 10:40.
Eduards Tralmaks got back the two goal lead for the hosts at 7:34 of the second, deflecting a point shot in front from Cam Spicer. Simon Butala scored his first collegiate goal at 11:57 on a behind the back pass from Ryan Smith who had streaked down the right wing finding Butala on the left side who buried it. Tralmaks second of the night at 18:33 made it 5-1 off a centering pass from Mitch Fossier that went in off Tralmaks right skate. A pair of third period powerplay goals for the Black Bears ended the scoring with Adam Dawe picking up his first of the season at 4:53, and then Doherty added his second of the night at 6:54.
Maine head coach Red Gendron said, “We got pucks and bodies to the net. We played much better defensively as a team. I thought puck management was better. We scored all kinds of different goals especially those first two periods, and these are the kind of things those guys need. We played to our identity, and that is something we didn’t do last week except for in a few spurts. But tonight we did and now we need to build on it and play that way all the time no matter who the opponent is and where the game is played”. Maine outshot UAA 38-21. Swayman ended with 20 saves, while Stead made 31 in the loss. Doherty and Tralmaks both had two goals and an assist for three point nights, while Emil Westerlund added three assists. Fossier added two helpers as well in the win. Maine was 2-5 on the powerplay, while UAA was 0-2. This was the opening game of the season for the Seawolves from Alaska-Anchorage who play out of the WCHA and only won three games last season (3-28-3) and have not reached at least the 10 win plateau since the 2015-16 season.
The two teams conclude the two game weekend series on Saturday night with faceoff scheduled for 7 p.m.
Maine and Alaska-Anchorage line up for the national anthem prior to their men’s ice hockey non-conference game at the Alfond Arena on Friday, October 11, 2019. Maine won 7-1. Photo by Chris Lessner
