Orono, Maine -- The 1992-93 University of Maine hockey team, the first UMaine team to win a national championship in any sport and now the first team to be inducted into the Black Bears' Sports Hall of Fame, is widely acclaimed as the greatest team in collegiate hockey history.

Coached by the late Shawn Walsh, who was previously enshrined in the UMaine Sports Hall of Fame, the Black Bears lost only one game, finishing 42-1-2 with a 5-4 victory over Lake Superior State in the NCAA title game. The Black Bears went unbeaten through their first 32 games and closed the season with 12 straight victories, thoroughly dominating their opponents by scoring 6.5 goals a game and allowing but 2.4 per game.

Along with Walsh, five players from that '93 championship team — forwards Paul Kariya and Jim Montgomery, defenseman Chris Imes, and goaltenders Mike Dunham and Garth Snow — have previously been inducted into the Hall of Fame. Grant Standbrook, an assistant coach with the team, is being inducted this year.

"We have to have been among the top two or three teams ever," says Montgomery, who captained that team and has the added perspective of coaching this year's NCAA champion University of Denver team.

"That team was über talented," says Montgomery. "What made it great was how unselfish it was. Paul Kariya was incredibly unselfish.  The selflessness of that team was incredible."

Plus, says Montgomery, "We had the best coaching staff with Shawn Walsh, Grant Standbrook and Red Gendron."

They were "ahead of everyone else in the use of video" and in "making adjustments during the games," according to Montgomery. They knew how "to keep possession of the puck" to keep constant pressure on the opposition.

Yet, with all that talent and coaching, firm establishment of the 1992-93 Black Bears' mythic stature came down to the last 20 minutes of the championship game and a two-goal deficit.

Maine had jumped to a quick 2-0 lead on goals by Patrice Tardif (from Mike Latendresse) and Chris Ferraro (from Imes and Peter Ferraro) before Lake Superior closed the gap with a late first-period goal and then blitzed the Black Bears with three goals in the second period, taking a 4-2 lead into the final period.

That's when Kariya, the first freshman to win the Hobey Baker Award as college hockey's most outstanding player, and Montgomery, the Black Bears' all-time leading scorer, further embellished their places in Maine sports lore. (And, the coaching staff exhibited its ability to make in-game adjustments.)  Montgomery scored a hat trick within a stretch of four minutes and 35 seconds in the final period. Kariya assisted on all three goals. Imes also assisted on the middle goal.

Coincidentally, 2017 marks the 25th anniversary of Montgomery and Kariya's heroics and both are national stories once again.

Kariya will be inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto in November capping a 15-year career in the National Hockey League.  And, when Denver defeated Minnesota Duluth, 3-2, in this year's title game, the Pioneers' Jarid Lukosevicius had the first hat trick in a title game since Montgomery's 25 years earlier.

Honors abounded for the '92-93 Black Bears as Kariya, Imes and Dunham made the American Hockey Coaches Association All-American east first team, and Montgomery and Cal Ingraham were named to the second team. Maine dominated the All-Hockey East first team with four of six spots going to Kariya, Montgomery, Imes and Dunham. Snow made second team. Kariya led the nation in scoring and Maine had three of the top four scorers with Montgomery second and Ingraham fourth.

Also seeing ice time but not aforementioned, were Wayne Conlan, Eric Fenton, Greg Hirsch, Dave LaCouture, Dave MacIsaac, Matt Martin, Martin Mercier, Dan Murphy, Brad Purdie, Jacque Rodrigue, Kent Salfi, Lee Saunders, Andy Silverman, Chuck Texeira, Jamie Thompson, Justin Tomberlin and Jason Weinrich.

-UMaine-