Rarely does a 55-year-old man want a bunch of college kids to play their music louder.

But that’s one of the things head coach Rick Comley still is trying to get his 10th-ranked hockey team (1-1-0) to do in his first year at the helm.

Comley wants noise. He wants players to talk to each other and to him. He wants them to yell and scream before games. And he wants them, by God, to pump up the volume.

“In the locker room, they don’t say boo,” Comley said. “We knew going in that we had some very quiet leaders, but we don’t have many players right now who will walk around and not be concerned that you have to be the best player to say something. We need three to four guys in here who are chatterboxes.

“There’s a buzz you’ve got to take to the ice with you, and I don’t see that. You’ve gotta have spirit and you’ve gotta have emotion.”

Noise is just a piece of Comley’s scheme to get the Spartans to play with more energy. Every day, he implores his players to skate faster, move the puck faster and shoot harder. He estimates that the phrase he has to shout more than any other during a practice is, “Go!”

He doesn’t want the Spartans to be the chasers in a game, he wants them to be the chased.

But the transformation to his up-tempo philosophy from former coach Ron Mason’s methodical style hasn’t been a quick one for MSU.

In their 5-0 loss to Denver on Friday, the Spartans looked like they were skating on a Slurpee. They seemed only slightly quicker the next night against Colgate, a team with far less talent than the Pioneers.

So once again, Comley harped on speed and movement to prepare MSU for No. 14 Northern Michigan this weekend at the Berry Events Center in Marquette.

The Wildcats, whose roster was built to play on wider, Olympic-size ice, are usually one of the fastest teams in the CCHA. And new Wildcat head coach Walt Kyle said the same holds true this season.

“Things won’t be too different from the way Northern Michigan played last year,” said Kyle, who was a player and an assistant under Comley at Northern from 1980-92. “There are a few minor tactical differences in the way we do things, but a lot of my philosophy I picked up from Rick years ago.”

MSU senior defenseman Brad Fast said he’s “interested” in seeing what Northern tries to do this weekend.

“I’m not sure how much the new coach is going to change the style or anything,” Fast said.

“But I do know about a lot of the players on their team and sort of know their individual tendencies, so maybe we can play off that.”

Comley, for one, knows the Wildcats’ tendencies. After all, he coached at Northern for 26 years before coming to East Lansing in March. He knows all about talented Wildcat players such as forward Chris Gobert and goaltender Craig Kowalski, and just how annoying the Berry Events Center can be for opposing teams.

That’s why he’s happy the series is this weekend, even if the Spartans haven’t generated their “buzz” yet.

“It’ll be a good test for us,” Comley said. “We still have a lot of question marks and we’re going to be facing a good team.

“But it’s (October), not February, so the loser of this series isn’t destined to miss out on something.”