Maine head coach Shawn Walsh returns to the bench Friday, December 27, as Maine takes on Denver in a first-round matchup of the Denver Cup tournament.
Walsh was suspended in December, 1995 by Maine after many NCAA violations were uncovered in which Walsh was either directly or indirectly involved. Walsh’s suspension ended December 24.
“I’m making a commitment for coming back in the long-term and rebuilding the program in the long-term,” said Walsh.
Walsh ran his first practice of the season on Christmas evening, and since his suspension did not allow contact with the team at all, including attending games, Walsh has a lot of work to do.
“I haven’t seen [Maine] play,” said Walsh. “I’ve listened to a few of the games on the radio [and read the newspapers], but I’m going in blind. I’m looking forward to using the Denver tournament to get an idea about our personnel. It’ll be my training camp.
“Denver is a quality team. They were a top preseason pick in many polls, ranked as highly as fifth in the country. They seem to have righted their own ship when they swept Minnesota-Duluth two weekends ago. They’ll be a very, very good team on their own ice surface.”
Walsh has a 289-171-26 record in 12 years at Maine.
