2023–24 Maine Black Bears men's ice hockey season

The 2023–24 Maine Black Bears Men's ice hockey season was the 49th season of play for the program, the 47th season competing at the Division I level, and the 40th in Hockey East. The Black Bears represented the University of Maine, played their home games at the Alfond Arena and were coached by Ben Barr in his 3rd season.

Season
For the second year in a row, Maine had a significant amount of roster turnover but it was the addition of the Nadeau brothers, Bradly and Josh, that brought about the biggest change. The two swiftly established themselves as top offensive threat for the Black Bears and helped chance a middling team into one of the nation's top squads. They were not alone, however, as the defense, led by co-Captain David Breazeale, performed tremendously by routinely holding opposing teams under 30 shots per game. This relatively light workload enabled Victor Östman to get off to a good start and backstop the Bears to a 6–1–1 record by mid-November. With wins over defending champion Quinnipiac and #1 Boston College, Maine shot up the national rankings and found themselves in the top 10 before Thanksgiving.

A sweep at the hands of Boston University briefly halted the teams ascent but Maine proceeded to win the next seven games, including the Ledyard Bank Classic, and were positioned for an NCAA tournament berth by the start of January. Unfortunately, an injury to Östman forced the team to turn to Albin Boija as the starter for several games. The freshman played well at the start but as he assumed the majority of the workload his play began to suffer. Goaltending problems were compounded by a dip in scoring in February that saw the team lose five of six games and drop out of contention for a Hockey East championship. Maine recovered at the end of the season by sweeping Massachusetts to guarantee themselves a bye into the quarterfinal round and punch their ticket to the NCAA tournament.

They faced an old foe, New Hampshire, in the Hockey East tournament. With both teams experiencing a renaissance, the Nadeaus put their stamp on the rivalry by each scoring 4 points in the game. The unambiguous win sent Maine to the semifinals where another long-time rival, BU, used a solid performance on the power play to knock out the Black Bears.

Mine ended the year at #5 in the PairWise rankings, giving the team a #2 seed and setting them against Cornell in the Northeast Regional. Östman got his first start in over a month and the gamble seemed to pay off early when took a lead less than 6 minutes into the game. Shortly afterwards, the Big Red were handed a 5-minute major and the Black Bears had a tremendous opportunity to take over the match. Maine Pressured the Cornell cage for much of the power play but could not increase their lead. Instead, the performance by the Big Red goaltender turned the momentum against Maine and just minutes after the penalty ended, the score was tied. The Black Bears skated hard, searching to regain the lead, but nothing they threw on the net landed. Cornell, too, had its chances but Östman made several sparkling saves to keep the score knotted. Just past the midway point of the match, Cornell finally broke the tie with a straight shot from the right circle. Now with the lead, the Big Red began to play an oppressive brand of defense and limit Maine's chances. The Black Bears were unable to get many opportunities for the rest of the game and, as time slowly ticked away on their season, the team became desperate. Disaster struck when Cornell was able to get a goal off of the rush halfway through the third and all but ended Maine's chances. It wasn't until Östman was pulled that the Bears were able to get many shots on goal but nothing they tried worked and the team went down in defeat.

Roster
As of July 7, 2023.

Schedule and results
!colspan=12 style=";" | Exhibition

!colspan=12 style=";" | Regular Season

!colspan=12 style=";" | Ledyard Bank Classic

!colspan=12 style=";" | Hockey East Tournament

!colspan=12 style=";" | NCAA Tournament

Rankings
Note: USCHO did not release a poll in weeks 11 and 25. Note: USA Today did not release a poll in week 12.