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BURLINGTON, Vt. - Some of Vermont’s tightest road games in Hockey East have come at Merrimack’s Lawler Arena. The last five meetings between the Catamounts and Warriors in North Andover, Mass., have been decided by one goal or ended in a tie.

“Merrimack is always a really tough team to play against,” Vermont co-captain Brian Roloff said. “They are pesky and they always seem to give us a problem with trying to score.”

The seventh-ranked Catamounts (2-1-0, 1-0-0 HEA) return to Lawler Arena on Friday at 7 p.m. (Radio – WVMT) for the first of three meetings with the Warriors this season. Scoring hasn’t been a problem for the Catamounts in 2009-10 as they have recorded a total of 14 goals through the first three contests.

Meanwhile, Merrimack (2-2-0, 0-0-0 HEA) began the season with a pair of losses at No. 2 North Dakota but returned home to pick up wins against Holy Cross and Army last weekend. Freshman Stephane Da Costa was named the Hockey Player of the Week on Monday after scoring five goals in last Saturday’s 6-3 win against Army.

“The have some more skill and some more scoring than they’ve had in the past,” Vermont head coach Kevin Sneddon said. “I think if you look at their season last year, Merrimack lost a ton of games by one goal. They could’ve gone either way and I think if they start to flip those games around, they’re a contender in Hockey East.”

Merrimack finished the 2008-09 season with 15 one-goal losses. The Warriors played in a total of 26 contests last season that were decided by one goal or went to overtime. Two of those games were against Vermont at Lawler Arena in February. The Warriors defeated the Catamounts 3-2 on Feb. 13 before dropping a 4-3 decision the next night for a weekend split.

The defensive improvement Vermont showed in Sunday’s 4-1 win against Boston College will be needed on Friday at Merrimack. The Catamounts went 8-for-8 on the penalty kill and blocked 18 shots against the Eagles. However, taking better care of the puck was a focus this week.

“I think that there were too many times in all our games so far where we were a little too lax with the puck,” Vermont defenseman Dan Lawson said. “We’ve been a little too lazy in making sure we have the puck deep or making sure we’d catch that pass in the neutral zone in any number of situations. I think we all need to value the puck a little bit more.”

With single-game weekends this week and next, Coach Sneddon said the team will use its valuable practice time to continue its early season development. Paying attention to details was also a focal point but on Friday the attention will be shifted to a tough road opponent.

“We certainly won’t be taking anybody lightly in this league,” Sneddon said. “That’s the advantage of having a more mature team as our guys know for sure not to look past anybody, and especially playing on the road. Points are tough on the road and we’ve got to have our best game to come away with points at Merrimack.”

NOTES: Vermont is 10-5-4 all-time against Merrimack … The Catamounts are 2-1-2 in the last five games at Lawler Arena. UVM has outscored MC 10-9 in those games … Stephane Da Costa set two NCAA records against Army by becoming the first freshman to post a natural hat trick and score five goals in a game … Vermont will be looking to go 2-0 in Hockey East play for the first time since it joined the league.