Despite coaching change, Maine hockey program welcomes eight freshmen to campus

With coaching changes in college sports come the inevitable recruiting de-commitments. For the Maine Black Bears, it appears the old staff and the new staff kept much of the 2013 recruiting class intact.

The importance of the job that former assistants Dan Kerluke and Bob Corkum did for a month-and-a-half to keep eight recruits on board for this fall cannot be overstated.

Ultimately the new staff, including head coach Red Gendron and assistant coaches Ben Guite and Jay Leach, had to win the recruits over. Gendron decided he would continue the practice of bringing in freshmen for a summer session to get them acclimated to college life.

The eight University of Maine hockey freshmen are on campus for the three-week summer session that started today (Monday). The summer session allows players to get some on and off ice workouts in before the full team arrives back in Orono in September.

A new batch of Maine freshmen hockey players will be on campus starting this week, including forwards Cam Brown, Blaine Byron, Brady Campbell, Zack Glienke, Josh Henke and Brian Morgan, and defensemen Daniel Renouf and Eric Schurhamer.

Byron, who was drafted by Pittsburgh in the sixth round of this summer's NHL Draft, attended the Penguins development camp. Former recruit Tyler Gjurich has decided not to attend Maine, according to Larry Mahoney of the Bangor Daily News. He had been invited to Buffalo Sabres Development Camp as a non-roster invitee.

Maine has lost two recruits who were expected to arrive for the 2014 season when Nick Roberto decommitted and ultimately committed to BU while more recently Ryan Cloonan parted ways with the Black Bears.

Jeff Cox is a hockey reporter for SBNation. Follow Jeff on twitter @JeffCoxSBNation.