Just to clear up some points Lee brought up..
 
I've been informed that the following is Maine's max allowed
scholarships over the next three years:
 
1996-7:  16 of 18
1997-8:  14 of 18 (not 5 as I suggested earlier)
1998-9:  16 of 18
 
There is some confusion as to whether or not Maine loses 4 or 5 next
year, we will get clarification from the NCAA but the standard around
here is 4 so we need to go with that for now.
 
Maine has 8 seniors (Thompson and Marsh not returning already), and
assuming that Maine will lose some of them this year and some to
graduation the following year there will be plenty of room for Maine
to forfeit these scholarships.
 
With regards to recruiting.. I'm not convinced yet that Maine is
going to be a near last place team just because of these sanctions.
Certainly they won't challenge for a title in the upcoming seasons,
but when you consider that Maine still got quality players with all
this "hanging-overhead" and all this negative recruiting, then it's
fair to suggest they can still get quality players now, considering
that anyone recruited from here on in knows exactly what the future
is, unlike previous recruits.  Maine got Brett Clark last year, one
of the best young players in Hockey East, with all this overhead.
They've got some impressive recruits next year as well.  No not the
best recruiting class they've ever got, but still very competitive.
 
What I will agree on is a point that Greg Cronin made today, and that
is Maine will no longer have several comforts.  For instance they
need to make sure they offer their few scholarships to the right
players, they can't be "taking chances" on players because they don't
have the latitude to do this anymore.  Maine is still going to get
some good players, just not as many or as good as past Maine teams
perhaps.
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Deron Treadwell - [log in to unmask]
Orono, Maine
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