LEWISTON – They are the eight young men most often forgotten in conversation about the Lewiston Maineiacs, yet the skaters that call the blue line home – the defensemen – may be the key to the team’s entire season.

“You always say that a goaltender is the key to a team,” said Maineiacs’ coach Clem Jodoin. “Sometimes he can steal games, maybe seven to 10 in one year, but the game as a whole is a team game, and a goalie will only be as good as the defense in front of him. I think we have that good core group in front of our net this season.”

With the bulk of the offseason news centered around Alexandre Picard’s selection in the NHL draft, and with much of the concern in training camp focused between the pipes, the defense has been somewhat overlooked.

“We’re just solid and experienced,” said returning 20-year-old defenseman Bobby Gates. “We have five guys back from last year that are all a year older and ready to play another season.”

Experience was the common theme among the defensemen themselves, with Gates, Brandon Roach, Travis Mealy and Jonathan Paiement all citing it as the number one factor for the unit’s success this season.

“Some of the guys have been raising the bar,” said Jodoin. “There has been a lot of improvement in some of the players from last year, and they are pushing harder and harder every practice.”

One of the biggest differences for some of the players – Gates and Roach specifically – is muscle mass.

Both of those players added more than 10 pounds of muscle in the off-season, which they say will help them be more of a physical presence on the ice.

Still, there are doubters, those that saw or heard about the plus-minus numbers from the Maineiacs’ game in Moncton, of that in Shawinigan, the team’s two lopsided preseason losses.

A cursory glance at the preseason numbers for the Maineiacs shows, however, that the defensive unit as a whole was a plus-14 over seven games (not counting the defensemen who are no longer with the team), and that not a single player still on the roster had a “minus” rating in that category.

On the upside, Matthew Lemire was the team’s leading defenseman in plus-minus with a plus-5.

“The younger guys, Lemire and Lafleur, they are rookies, and they are learning,” said Jodoin.

“They are doing well so far, and we are very happy and a little surprised about Korenko. He is doing very well for a young 17-year-old.”

The bottom line, according to the skaters, is still the experience.

“We have three solid lines right now, and even the younger guys are getting better,” said Roach.

“We lost a couple of solid defensemen in (Francis) Trudel and (Richard) Stehlik, but now with everyone on the team a year older and a year more used to the league, it gives us something to build on and grow into during the season.”