The excitement for a new season is always lurking underneath for the New England Black Wolves indoor lacrosse team, who will play their first game in franchise history at 7 tonight at Mohegan Sun Arena.

But, as Black Wolves coach Blane Harrison has referred to several times in the preseason, the National Lacrosse League is a performance-driven endeavor, too. He'd like to find a way to use the Black Wolves' relatively inexperienced roster to beat the Buffalo Bandits in tonight's opener.

"The light-of-day reality is we've got some work to do," said Harrison, in his second season as head coach for the team which relocated to Mohegan Sun from Philadelphia late this summer. "We're still trying to find ourselves, but I think we'd like overall performance to go up. We felt really good about ourselves for most of training camp. The last two scrimmages we had ... it was sobering and it was a cold bucket of water."

The Wolves, who return just nine players from last year's team, were 0-3 in the preseason, with two losses to Buffalo. New England lost the first exhibition game 10-9 to the Bandits, but fell 17-10 in the second one. The Wolves then fell 18-10 to the Toronto Rock.

Tonight's game serves as the season opener for the nine-team NLL. New England, formerly the Philadelphia Wings, was 6-12 last season and missed the playoffs. Buffalo, which plays in the East Division along with the Black Wolves, was 8-10 in the regular season and 2-2 in the playoffs.

Two things Harrison said he's looking for this season:

One. The Wolves need 6-foot-4 forward Kevin Crowley to have another big year on the heels of last season's 33-goal, 42-assist performance.

"He's our No. 1 guy," Harrison said. "He's got to be a guy that plays like a No. 1 guy. He's a perennial 30-plus goal scorer and there's not that many 30-goal scorers in the league. There might be 10. And we think Kevin can be a 40-goal scorer. He has upside ... he's 6-foot-4, he's got some speed, he's got some agility, he knows how to get somebody else open, he requires the other team to figure out how to stop him.

"The target's on Kevin's back ... that will open up other guys on the offense."

Two. If the Wolves had five one-goal losses last year, costing them a playoff bid, and Harrison would like to see them get over that hurdle. He believes the roster the staff put together, acquiring a great deal of talent through this year's draft, will jell before too long.

"If two of those games go the other way, we're in the playoffs," Harrison said. "And if you make the playoffs, you don't know what kind of wind you're going to catch at your back. I didn't hand-wring. We were pretty close. If you plug the right holes and go 2-3 or 3-2 in those games, we're in the playoffs.

"We've gotten younger, but I think we have a better base to work with. We're certainly looking to make a run."

Also returning for the Black Wolves are forwards Kyle Buchanan (23 goals, 45 assists) and Pat Saunders (25 goals, 14 assists); Mike Manley, who was the 2014 Defensive Player of the Year in the outdoor Major League Lacrosse season; and transition player Joel White, who had a career-high 17 forced turnovers last season.

The Bandits are led by top returning scorers Ryan Benesch (25 goals, 53 assists), Mark Steenhuis (31-32) and Dhane Smith (20-39).

Buffalo assistant coach Dan Teat, however, zeroed in on the excitement surrounding the Black Wolves' new venue as one of the keys to the game.

Said Teat, in a conference call this week: "When you're opening up a new building and you're starting off fresh ... the key for us it to stay as close to their intensity as we can because they're going to come out guns ablazing."

v.fulkerson@theday.com

Twitter: @vickieattheday