Saturday night was an emotional night for Lynden Breen.
The University of Maine hockey team’s senior co-captain and center scored the game-winning goal with 1:17 left in a 4-3 victory over UMass at Alfond Arena that all but sewed up UMaine’s first NCAA Tournament berth since the 2011-12 season.
It completed a weekend sweep of UMass.
It was his 100th career point and two of the family members on hand for the celebration were his older sisters. His oldest sister, nine years his senior, hadn’t had a chance to see him play at Alfond Arena.
His freshman year was the COVID-19 season so fans weren’t allowed to attend games and then his sister gave birth to a son who has had health complications.
His nephew is now two years old.
“It’s the first time my sister and brother-in-law had been away from him together. It means a lot to me for them to come. It’s super special. It’s emotional,” said Breen, who also had his parents and several other family members on hand.
They were introduced in the post-game ceremony and he hugged them on the ice.
“They all mean so much to me. They all deserve to be shown there (on the ice) for how much they have supported me,” said Breen, whose Black Bears finished third in Hockey East with a 14-9-1 conference record, 22-10-2 overall.
Regardless of what happens in the playoffs, UMaine will finish with its best overall record since the 2005-06 team went 28-12-2.
It is the first time the team has finished in the top three in the conference since the 2009-10 team tied for third.
UMaine will entertain the highest seeded survivor of Wednesday’s preliminary round playoff games in Saturday’s 7 p.m. quarterfinal game at Alfond Arena.
Arch-rival New Hampshire is the most likely opponent. Sixth seed UNH on Wednesday will host a UMass Lowell team it swept over the weekend by identical 4-0 scores.
Breen has been the heart-and-soul of this team and it was fitting that he would score the game-winner.
He hasn’t missed a game in his four seasons even though he is undersized (5-foot-9, 175 pounds) and plays a physical game. He is relentless and fearless and is a player his teammates look up to.
He was the team’s leading scorer last season and the year before. He was tied for second his freshman year.
He is currently third behind the Nadeau brothers, Bradly and Josh.
When the coach who recruited him, Red Gendron, died unexpectedly on April 9, 2021, it would have been completely understandable if he decided to transfer. The same with current graduate student left winger Ben Poisson, senior right winger Donavan Houle and senior goalies Victor Ostman and Connor Androlewicz.
But they believed in new head coach Ben Barr. They knew he had recruited players for three national championship teams at Union, Providence and UMass.
And they were willing to put the work in necessary to change the culture of a program that had fallen on hard times after being one of the elite programs in the country during a heyday that included two NCAA championships, 11 Frozen Fours and 18 NCAA Tournament appearances during a 26-year period from 1986-87 to 2011-12.
They have had virtually every player show up for optional six-week workouts on campus the past two summers which has built a value between the players and created a positive culture.
Breen and the other upperclassmen have been welcoming and very supportive of the new players.
To say this team has overachieved would be an understatement.
It was picked ninth among 11 teams in the coaches’ preseason poll.
It is currently sitting in seventh place in the Pairwise Rankings that mimic the NCAA Tournament selection process.
The six conference tournament champions earn automatic berths to the NCAA Tournament along with 10 at-large teams.
The other nine teams in the current Pairwise Top 10 have an average of 10.7 National Hockey League draft picks on their roster. Seven have at least 11. Boston College and Boston University lead the way with 14 apiece.
UMaine has one: Bradly Nadeau (first round, Carolina Hurricanes, 30th overall pick).
“There is a lot of heart in our locker room,” said Barr. “What they have done so far, and hopefully it will continue, is not because they’re better than anybody. It’s because they work extremely hard.”
The next step for the Black Bears is to win Saturday’s quarterfinal and make its first appearance in a Hockey East semifinal at the TD Garden in Boston since 2011-12.
It won’t be easy because whoever they play will be desperate. Its opponent will have to win the Hockey East tournament to earn an NCAA berth.
The game will also give the Black Bears a chance to snap a string of 12 consecutive Hockey East playoff losses dating back to the 2014-15 season when it won the second game of a best-of-three series at Vermont, 4-2, on March 7, 2015.
It lost the third game, 3-2 in overtime.
Getting to the TD Garden would also give this team a taste of a tournament atmosphere that it would experience at an NCAA four-team regional and a Frozen Four.
