ORONO, Maine — The associate head coach at the University of Massachusetts hockey program is jumping from a national championship to a head coaching gig in Maine.
University of Maine announced Wednesday that Ben Barr is the new men’s ice hockey coach for the Black Bears. The Bears and Minutemen are rivals in Hockey East, one of the most competitive conferences in college hockey.
UMass won its first men’s ice hockey national championship in April with a win over St. Cloud State. UMaine’s last championship was in 1999.
Barr has been signed to a four-year contract that will pay him more than $235,000 per year at the start, the Bangor Daily News reported. Barr is 39 and played college hockey at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. He first joined the UMass staff in 2016.
Barr takes over the program from Red Gendron, who died in April.
