some help

AMHERST - The University of Massachusetts hockey team needs points and help to still be playing when the Hockey East Tournament begins next weekend.

Those points won't be easy to come by as UMass closes its regular season tonight and Saturday with 7 p.m. games against Maine at Alfond Arena.

Eight teams make the conference tournament and at the Minutemen (16-16,11-14 Hockey East) are currently in ninth place with 22 points after losing six straight games in February.

They are one point back of Merrimack (11-13-1, 23 points), which has a home-and-home series this weekend against last-place Providence. Because the Warriors won the season series with UMass, if the teams finish tied Merrimack would have the tiebreaker and earn the tournament berth.

The Minutemen are two points behind Vermont (9-10-6, 24 points), which plays tonight and Saturday at UMass-Lowell. The Minutemen only need to finish tied with the Catamounts to get in the tournament because UMass won two of the three regular-season games between the teams.

UMass coach Don "Toot" Cahoon said he is frustrated with his team's lack of consistency and is not sure what to expect this weekend.

"It's put up or shut up. It's win or put your skates away until next year," he said. "In an ideal world they'll play at a very high level. We've shown that we can.

"In the real world up to now, we never know when that's coming and when that's not coming," Cahoon added. "That'll be up to them. We'll do everything we possibly can to lead them in that direction. But at the end of the day they're the ones with the skates on their feet.

"Each and every week the coaches have done their job trying to get these guys ready to play to be sure they're ready to bring it. But the question is where they are when the puck drops Friday night."

Maine (15-12-3, 13-10-2 Hockey East) is in third place trying to sew up a top-four finish in the conference and home-ice advantage in the first round of the playoffs. The 17th-ranked Black Bears, who are also competing for NCAA consideration, have lost four of their last six games.

Maine leads Hockey East in scoring, averaging 3.78 goals per game, but also has given up the most goals at 3.38 per game.

Sophomore forward Gustav Nyquist leads Hockey East in points (57) and assists (37), while sophomore Brian Flynn is tied for sixth in points with 39 (17 goals, 22 assists). It's been over four months since the teams last met on Oct. 23 at the Mullins Center when the Minutemen won 5-3 and James Marcou had a goal and three assists.

Matt Vautour can be reached at mvautour@gazettenet.com. Follow UMass coverage on Twitter at twitter.com/GazetteUMass. Get UMass coverage delivered in your Facebook news feed at http://www.facebook.com/GazetteUMassCoverage.