Those were the words of Bob Johnson, the late Wisconsin hockey coach, and that statement was evident this afternoon when the University of Maine men's hockey team took the ice at Alfond Arena for its annual media day.

Clad in navy-blue road uniforms, this year's Black Bears posed for the obligatory team photo, then took a few laps and a few slapshots on the ice at the Alfond.

There were some light-hearted moments. While a camera was rolling, teammates came from behind and smothered the face of Gustav Nyquist with shaving cream. A few feet away, Will O'Neill put a microphone in the face of teammate Spencer Abbott, interviewing him for another television segment.

It seems the fun has begun.

But the big questions that face Maine are in goaltending and goal-scoring. Earlier this week at Hockey East Media Day in Boston, Black Bears Coach Tim Whitehead addressed not only his team's youth but also two areas where Maine suffered losses with the departures of goalie Ben Bishop and Andrew Sweetland, the team's fourth-leading scorer last season, to the pros.

Maine officially begins practice on Saturday at the Alfond with the Blue-White game at 7 p.m., then plays two exhibition games at the University of New Brunswick on Oct. 10 and 11 before opening the season Oct. 17 against Alaska-Anchorage at the Goal Rush Tournament in Fairbanks, Alaska.

Think about it. The Black Bears will go from one end of North America to the other and then back in less than 10 days' time.

"It's really exciting," Maine captain Jeff Marshall said. "They've come down here and we'll return the favor and go up there (to New Brunswick) for a couple. Then a couple days later we're off to the other side of the continent. I'm really looking forward to it. It's going to be a new experience here for everybody going up that far and hopefully we'll come back with two wins."

Get your passports ready.

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