The work will be swift and down to the wire for crews putting the finishing touches on the Central Maine Civic Center.

The front and rear of the building have been painted, although a color scheme has not yet been added. That, according to building owner Roger Theriault, will coincide with whomever purchases naming rights to the building.

On the inside, the bleacher seats were being installed even as they were being sold in the ticket office. The blue and metallic bleachers will encircle the top level of the civic center. A temporary kiosk designed to handle merchandise sales will be completed on the left side of the main level concourse, near the old trophy cases, and the concessions stands have been completed.

The much-anticipated scoreboard and clock have arrived. On Thursday, crews will work to raise the mammoth fixture to the ceiling to put it in place for Friday. One snag occurred when the fixture arrived without goal lights. Goal judges will use push-button lights for now while compatible goal lights are acquired from the company, a process Theriault says may take a few weeks.

Where’s the heart?

The biggest issue the coaches and general manager had with the Maineiacs after going 0-2 over the weekend wasn’t their lack of talent. According to head coach Mario Durocher, the team is as good as every other team in the league, if they work hard every game. That was the big “if” last weekend.

“It’s not necessarily if they win or lose all the time,” said GM Normand Gosselin. “If they lose a few games, that’s all right, but it’s how they lose. The coaches are not happy after last weekend, and neither am I.”

Both the coaching staff and Gosselin agree that what they saw in training camp is good, but what they saw last weekend was far from what they expected.

“If we want to have success of any kind, we can’t go on long losing streaks and expect to recover easily,” said head coach Mario Durocher. “We stopped skating hard and moving the puck well, something we had done well all during training camp.”

This week’s practices have reflected the coaches’ displeasure with the team’s play.

“We did a lot of skating and puck movement in practice this week,” said Durocher. “It’s really too early to make major changes. The biggest thing for us is that we have speed, and we need to use it properly.”

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