In the first and only exhibition matchup ahead of the 2018-19 regular season, the Massachusetts hockey team defeated Royal Military College of Canada, 6-1, Saturday at the Mullins Center.

As it prepares for the official start of its third season under head coach Greg Carvel, the affair was an experimental one for UMass, which saw four freshmen headline it’s defensive unit.

On the offensive side however, it was a trail of familiar faces that filled out the scoring sheet for the Minutemen, as all three captains recorded points in their first live-action contest of the year.

First period goals from Marc Del Gaizo and Jacob Pritchard gave UMass an early edge, while Cale Makar picked up an assist on John Leonard’s goal in the second period. Later in the frame, Mario Ferraro set up Niko Hildenbrand to make it 4-0.

Leonard netted a pair of goals and recorded four points of his own, most among Minutemen skaters Saturday.

In a game that saw UMass play without two of their top goal-scorers, Mitchell Chaffee and Oliver Chau, the trio of captains on the ice led the way and provided an important spark.

“We thought (the competition) was going to be stronger tonight, but credit to our guys,” Carvel said. “They came out right from the drop of the puck and gave a very dominate effort tonight.”

With 56 total shots for UMass on the night, 20 of which came from its trio of captains, Carvel said he was pleased with the involvement of the offense and how it was able to play creatively.

“I want everybody to have seven shots and a couple points,” he added. “We’re now at a point in my third year here where we have a team that has really good depth up and down the lineup. It’s not like it was one line doing the damage. The guys showed good creativity and I like to see it.”

Del Gaizo scored the first goal of the contest, and his first for UMass, just 4:05 into the opening round of exhibition play, when he took a pass from Philip Lagunov and sent home a hard wrister.

“It was pretty cool,” the high-profile freshman said. “(Lagunov) made a nice play to fit in in there. It’s what everyone wants, their first shot and their first goal. So it was pretty awesome.”

Up 3-0 late in the second period, Hildenbrand joined the scoring party and shoved home one of his own on a feed from Ferraro to solidify all three UMass captains with points in the exhibition contest.

“I think everyone’s just getting into the swing of things and I think that this was a big game for us, just in terms of seeing what we could put around the ice,” Makar said. “Just seeing what we can do with our systems and being able to see our special teams on the ice was (a good thing).”

The Minutemen officially kick off their regular season on Friday, when Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute travels to the Mullins Center.

Puck drop for the season opener is set for 7:00 p.m.

Liam Flaherty can be reached at [email protected] and on Twitter @_LiamFlaherty.