Salem boys hockey coach Mark McGinn believes his Blue Devils are built to win their first Division I state title since 2004.

Of course, so are at least six other teams, McGinn said, which should make for an exciting – albeit difficult – trip back to the promised land for a loaded Salem squad.

“I still think that Bishop Guertin is a notch above (everyone) out of the gate,” said McGinn, whose team made it the state semifinals the past two seasons, losing last year to eventual champion Hanover, another frontrunner. “Then you have Concord, Pinkerton, you’ve got Memorial, Bishop Brady has gotten much better, you have Exeter.

There are six to eight teams there that can win the championship.

“But our team goal is to at least get to the semifinals,” he continued. “I think that’s a realistic goal, and if you get there, anything can happen.”

Rather than leave it to chance, Salem returns a deep group of forwards, as well as a defense and goalie in junior Scott Crowther that should put the Blue Devils back among the best in their own end.

Losing forwards Pat Halligan and Brendan Healey to graduation leaves a void on the score sheet, but what the Blue Devils lack in pure scoring and muscle, they’ll make up for with speed.

Leading the charge will be the first line of Ryan Desroches, who played the majority of last season with Halligan and Healey; Jay Paradis, a senior captain; and Derek Tomes, whose brother, Chuck, played four years at Northeastern University, and brother, Scott, is a senior goalie for the University of Connecticut.

McGinn’s second line, “which is just as good” as the first, the coach said, includes Tyler Vigue, Josh Frahm and Mike Harding, while Jon Demers, Nick Monteiro and varsity newcomer Joel Vastl are expected to round out the third.

Special teams, as usual, will be Salem’s strength. McGinn estimated that his power play has converted somewhere between 35 and 40 percent the last few years.

Meanwhile, senior defenseman Jim Canavan returns to the team after a year of junior hockey and joins an experienced group that includes seniors Pat Jaeger and Corey Garabedian and juniors Craig Cameron and Steve Barreira.

Crowther, who posted a goals against average around 1.80 last year, McGinn said, is the backbone and should be ready to carry the load again.

The biggest difference from past years, McGinn said, isn’t physical, though. This season, he said the team seems as close as ever, meaning “they want to play a little more for each other and their school.”

It especially helps that the players hang out together, work out together and generally enjoy being around each other, Paradis said.

“We have a lot of juniors so they’ve been playing with each other forever, and I know I’ve been playing with them since I was 5 or 6, so we really know each other,” Paradis said. “Our families are all family friends, too, so we’re all really tight.”

That helps, considering the race for a title should be even tighter.