THE UNIVERSITY of New Hampshire men's hockey team looks for its first road win of the year and will try again to jumpstart its season against Tim Schaller and Providence College on Wednesday night at Schneider Arena.

Schaller, a junior out of Merrimack, is helping the resurgent Friars with his own breakout season.

In 17 games so far this season, Schaller has 10 goals to lead the team and also has four assists for 14 points. He scored seven goals and had 17 assists for 24 points in 67 games in his first two seasons.

No other Friar has more than six goals.

Schaller, 6-foot-2 and 210 pounds, has been particularly dangerous on special teams. Six of his goals have come on the Providence power play and another two while the Friars were short-handed.

He scored seven of his goals and added an assist in November and earned Hockey East Player of the Month honors for his efforts.

Under first-year coach Nate Leaman, who replaced Tim Army, Providence has been one of the surprise teams in the league.

The Friars are 8-8-2 overall and at 6-4-1 in Hockey East hold down sixth place in the league standings. They already have more league wins in a season since going 11-11-5 in 2007-08.

UNH is in ninth place in the standings, four points behind Providence and one behind Massachusetts and Northeastern, who are tied for seventh.

The Wildcats, who are 0-7-2 away from home, lost their fifth straight game on Saturday night at Fenway Park. The 3-2 overtime loss to Maine dropped UNH to 6-11-2 overall and 4-8-1 in Hockey East.

Casey DeSmith, a freshman from Rochester, took the goaltending loss against Maine.

“I thought he did a good job,” said UNH coach Dick Umile. “He gave us an opportunity to win, that's all you can ask your goaltender to do. He stayed in there when we were down 4-2.”

DeSmith made 28 saves for the game.

Three of the Black Bear goals came on their five power-play opportunities and one was a five-on-three. Maine has scored 23 power play goals in its last 11 games.

On the flip side, UNH had only two power-play chances and did not score on them. The Wildcats have now gone 0-for-16 on the power play over their last five games.

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THE WOMEN'S BASKETBALL TEAM will try to pick up where it left off when it faces Albany at home on Wednesday night at 7.

The Wildcats had lost to perennial league power Hartford 18 straight times before knocking off the Hawks, 64-45, at Lundholm last Thursday.

Albany is 9-7 overall and 3-0 in America East after Sunday's 57-32 win at Stony Brook.

UNH is 8-6 and 1-1. The Wildcats led UMBC by eight at halftime three nights before the Hartford game. They were up by eight at the half against Hartford, too.

“I told them at the half I'm going to keep bringing up UMBC until you find a way to win tonight,” coach Maureen Magarity said after the game. “And they did.”

Magarity told her team about the 18-game losing streak just before the game.

“It was for them to really think about that,” Magarity said. “That's kind of been our theme this year. Why not us? Why can't we beat Hartford? There's no reason we can't. They bought into it tonight. We'll see for the rest of the year.”

UNH went 9-20 overall and 6-10 in America East last year, Magarity's first.

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THE MEN'S BASKETBALL TEAM hoped for a nice start to conference play, but instead is 0-2 after dropping games to UMBC and Hartford, two teams that had one win between them in non-conference play.

The Wildcats, 5-8 overall, will try to bounce back starting on Wednesday night at Albany. Albany is 10-7 overall and 2-1 in the league.

UNH follows that with a home game against Vermont, 8-9 and 2-1, on Saturday at 3.

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THE UNH GYMNASTS, picked fifth in the pre-season EAGL poll, won their season-opening meet at Rutgers on Saturday.

The Wildcats are home for their next two meets, against Penn State on Sunday at 1 and against Pittsburgh on Jan. 21 at 4 p.m.

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THE WOMEN'S HOCKEY TEAM, 6-12-3 overall and 0-6-2 in Hockey East, is at Boston College, 14-6-1 and 7-2-1, tonight for its first game in a month.

The Wildcats play UConn at home on Friday at 7 and Saturday at 4.

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THE UNH FOOTBALL TEAM finished No. 11 in the final Sports Network/Fathead.com poll released on Monday.

North Dakota State, which captured its first Football Championship Subdivision title with a 17-6 win over Sam Houston in Frisco, Texas, on Saturday, was chosen No. 1. Sam Houston was No. 2.

UNH junior linebacker Matt Evans was recognized at the championship game. At a banquet on Friday, Evans was named the Buck Buchanan Award winner as the best defensive player in the country.

Colonial Athletic Association teams held down the No. 8 through No. 11 spots with Maine, Towson, Old Dominion and New Hampshire.

Allen Lessels covers UNH athletics for the New Hampshire Union Leader and Sunday News. He may be reached at alessels@unionleader.com.