NCAA conference championship Friday: Maine, Minnesota State win titles

BOSTON, Massachusetts — The University of Maine Black Bears had just seven wins in the 2021-22 season, the first under coach Ben Barr.

He quickly rebuilt what had become a moribund program back into the perennial NCAA tournament qualifier it once was, and tonight won the school's first Hockey East championship since 2004, 5-2, over sixth-ranked UConn, before a near-sellout crowd of 17,605 — the large majority of whom seemed to have made the trip down from Maine.

The Black Bears, who entered the night as the No. 3 seed in the country and are among the NCAA leaders in shot suppression, were on top of the Huskies early, and rarely relented in keeping a prolific offense mostly to the perimeter.

"It's hard to describe what I didn't know coming into this job," Barr said. "Like, the effect that our