It’s definitely “trophy season” now.

The #4 Boston College Eagles hockey team, having suffered through a bad January, is officially back on track. In the championship game of the 61st Beanpot at the TD Garden on Monday night, the Eagles defeated the Northeastern Huskies, 6-3. BC has now won its fourth-straight Beanpot title, meaning that the current senior class has never lost a game in this local tournament and never will. For Northeastern, their drought will reach at least 26 years as they still have not won since 1988.

The Eagles, now winners of three games in a row for the first time since November, are 17-7-2 on the season and are quickly recovering momentum they lost in the previous month.

To start the game, neither team scored though there were abundant opportunities, particularly those for Boston College. In spite of BC outshooting Northeastern, 10-5, the first period ended in a 0-0 tie.

As a matter of fact, much of the second was scoreless, though the Eagles made a habit of creating loud clanking sounds off of the crossbar. Those near-misses soon became goals for Boston College in the second period, and when BC started getting them, they came in bunches. Bill Arnold, the hero of the 2012 Beanpot in overtime, got the party started at 10:53 by making it a 1-0 BC lead (assists Hayes, Whitney). The floodgates opened just one minute, fifteen seconds later as Johnny Gaudreau tipped in an unassisted goal to double the lead to 2-0.

Northeastern did not want to be left out of the action. Kevin Roy, eventually the tournament MVP, halved BC’s lead to 2-1 at 15:04 (assists Saponari, Lauwers). They’d pay for that, however: Boston College hit back with two more goals in the second period thanks to Patrick Brown (18:37; MacLeod, Smith) and Steven Whitney (19:59; Arnold) right before time expired.

The Huskies put a scare into BC to start the third, notching two quick goals: Kevin Roy just 11 seconds into the period (assists Vermeersch, Saponari) and 3:45 later thanks to Braden Pimm on the power play (assists Vermeersch, Saponari). From then on, the game was tense for the Boston College faithful who wanted badly to see their team win for a fourth-consecutive year — that is, until Johnny Gaudreau made his presence felt once again. With 5:23 left in the game, Gaudreau’s second score of the night put the contest out of reach for the Huskies (assists Matheson, Whitney). To cap off the action, captain Pat Mullane scored a power-play empty-netter at 18:32 to make the margin a comfortable 6-3 (assists Gaudreau, Milner).

It’s a good night for Boston College when you’re winning trophies and your goalie, who was named best goaltender in tournament, is getting assists. The Eagles played a very good game overall and have finally started once again to establish consistency. This tournament victory will help them going forward, and even from the perspective of an outsider, one would have to marvel at how BC can always find another gear at this time of the season, no matter how forgettable the middle of the year was. There is much to be decided in the months to come and anything can happen, but this is a movie we’ve seen before, and it typically has a happy ending for BC.

The Boston College senior class is to be congratulated once more for being a perfect 4-for-4 in Beanpot tournaments, but team efforts have gotten them this far, and team efforts will eventually get BC to the promised land again.

The Eagles return to the ice on Friday night in North Andover, MA against Merrimack in a Hockey East conference game.

Twice in the previous two years, the Boston College Eagles men’s hockey team has been in the position of having to defend its Beanpot title. Now, for the third-straight season, the Eagles enter the Beanpot championship contest as the defending champions, and BC looks to run its streak to four. This time, as it was several years ago, their opponents are the Northeastern Huskies.

The BC hockey senior class is on an incredible run when it comes to these games at the TD Garden. As a matter of fact, when it comes to the Beanpot and the Hockey East Tournament, the current senior class hasn’t lost a single one of those games on Garden ice. In March, the Eagles will look to make it four consecutive Hockey East titles, but for now, their focus will be the Beanpot.

Boston College and Northeastern have recent history, both in the 2012-13 regular season and in earlier Beanpots. In the 59th Beanpot (2011), BC defeated Northeastern 7-6 in overtime after Jimmy Hayes knocked the game-winner into the net. During the regular season, the Eagles and Huskies have met three times, with BC dropping the season opener, winning the next one, and then winning a blowout in the third. The most recent meeting between them was on January 19 when BC won at Northeastern, 9-3.

When these two have met in the finals, BC is 2-1 — it goes without saying that their encountering one another in this title game is rare, mostly because Northeastern hardly ever finds itself in it. They did beat Boston University last week for the first time in 25 years in the Beanpot, with 25 years being precisely how long it’s been since the Huskies have won the whole thing. Northeastern beat BC in the semifinals to get to that 1988 title game, so they’re hoping they can repeat history in reverse in 2013.

As for Boston College, they have plenty of Hockey East history with the Huskies, some of which is quite recent. The last time they met, to say BC was on top of its game offensively would be an understatement. The Eagles know that Northeastern can beat them, since they did back in October, but that was a very long time ago and both squads have gone in different directions. BC has seemingly rebounded from another bad January slump to retain its top spot in Hockey East, while Northeastern has sunk into last place. Ironically enough, both of the Huskies’ last two wins were against BU; they’ve not beaten a team aside from the Terriers since December 29.

This is a game BC should expect to win. They’ve had some extra time off thanks to the blizzard, they should be fresh, and frankly, they are a better team. It’s nice to win this tournament as a status symbol, but it’s more important for the Eagles to build momentum heading into the trophy season. It has been months since BC strung three wins together, and if they can do it tonight, they’ll have everyone believing that the Eagles are moving in the right direction once again.

The puck is expected to drop at 7:30pm on NESN.

For as disappointing as last night’s Boston College hockey game was for the Eagles, not to mention the last couple weeks, eventually, they’re going to take it out on someone.

That unlucky team was the Northeastern Huskies as they were on the wrong end of an offensive outburst from the #2 team in the nation. On Saturday night at Northeastern, the Eagles defeated the Huskies, 9-3. The win brings BC’s record to 14-5-2 and gives them a four-point lead in the Hockey East standings.

Two curiosities from this game stand out immediately: there were nine Boston College goals scored and none of them were by Johnny Gaudreau, and none of the twelve on either side were on a man-advantage. Gaudreau did, however, have a four-point evening with all of them coming on assists. Captain Pat Mullane and Steven Whitney, who put a hat trick on the scoreboard, also had four points each. Freshman Travis Jeke was an outstanding +6 despite not scoring any points.

The first period was probably of quite a bit of concern to BC fans watching the game, as they allowed the Huskies to score three times in the first and were tied despite having scored three themselves. What saved the Eagles is that Parker Milner got better for BC and nobody in-goal for Northeastern could stop the onslaught. Starting goalie Chris Rawlings got tagged six times in the first 29 minutes of the game, but backup Bryan Mountain still gave up three more goals himself. Milner notched 21 saves in the victory.

In total, ten Eagles managed at least one point, with five players totaling at least three. The eighth of those BC goals came off of the stick of Quinn Smith midway through the third, for whom it was his first goal of the season.

Freshman defenseman Mike Matheson left in the middle of the contest with an unspecific upper body injury and did not return. His condition is as yet unknown.

Some caution is perhaps in order for Boston College hockey fans and observers. It might be somewhat relieving to see the Eagles blast Northeastern, perhaps allowing one to think that the typical January slump is ending, but kindly recall that BC played an unimpressive game against an equally-bad UMass team just 24 hours earlier. Rarely is it discouraging to see a team post nine goals and see seven different players get in the goal column, but there is still a long way to go, and there might be more inconsistency in the near future.

The Eagles return to action on Friday and Saturday nights to play a two-game home series against Maine.

Boston College hockey knows how to throw a party.

On Saturday night at Conte Forum’s Kelley Rink, the #3 Boston College Eagles defeated the Northeastern Huskies, 3-0. It was goalie Parker Milner’s fifth career shutout victory on a night where Boston College welcomed back some old friends to help raise the 2012 national championship banner to the rafters.

A capacity crowd at Conte Forum saw the gold-clad Eagles strike first, middle, and last. Just 6:16 into the game, Kevin Hayes got into the goals-scored column by notching his first of the season on a power play to give BC a 1-0 lead (assisted by Doherty and Wey). Only seconds remained on Colton Saucerman’s cross-checking penalty at the time of Hayes’s score. The assist for freshman Teddy Doherty was his first career point.

One of the heroes from last night and the tournament run that made the banner ceremony possible, Johnny Gaudreau, wanted to ensure that he got in on the action. At 10:06 in the first period, Gaudreau scored his second goal of the season to double the Eagles’ lead (assisted by Mullane). In Friday’s comeback win over UMass, Gaudreau assisted on Pat Mullane’s game-tying goal, then Mullane assisted on Gaudreau’s game-winner, and now Mullane assisted on this one tonight.

The Eagles were quiet for most of the second period, despite the fact that both BC and Northeastern took a high number of shots on goal. Boston College took 14 and Northeastern shot 13, but the difference is that one of BC’s got in the net. That was at 18:32 of the second period, coming off of the stick of Steven Whitney during a 5-on-3. His second goal of the season put the icing on the proverbial cake, giving Boston College a 3-0 lead (assisted by Gaudreau). The point for Gaudreau is his fifth in the first three games of the year.

Neither team did any scoring in the final frame, with the only item of note being a Vinny Saponari ten-minute misconduct penalty for Northeastern.

Following their opening night loss to these same Huskies, Boston College has gotten better. Their win on Saturday night was a tidy, businesslike victory in which all phases of the game were working and BC did what they had to do. Boston College took a few too many penalties at eight, but their penalty kill remained outstanding in not allowing any goals. Offensively, the Eagles went 2-for-6 when they had the power play.

Shots on goal were virtually even at 27 to 26 in favor of Boston College. but Parker Milner stopped all that came his way. At Amherst on Friday night, Milner’s night was a little rough as he allowed four goals in their come-from-behind victory, but on Saturday, he bounced back to pitch a shutout. Chris Rawlings took the loss in-net for Northeastern.

The Eagles return to action on Friday night as they face UMass-Lowell in Lowell.

Every hockey team will have bumps in the road. Perhaps Boston College is following their typical path and getting to them early.

On Saturday night at Northeastern, #1 Boston College was defeated by the Northeastern Huskies, 3-1. The defending national champions are now 0-1 and have had a 19-game winning streak snapped.

Northeastern came out of the gates hot and Boston College never seemed to get themselves into the momentum of the game. The Huskies struck a little over five minutes into the contest, getting a goal from Ryan Belonger (assists Darcy and Manno) at 5:03 to go ahead, 1-0. Belonger’s goal was complemented just minutes later, as Kevin Roy sent his second goal of the season past Eagles goalie Parker Milner to give Northeastern an early 2-0 lead at 8:06 (assists Ferriero and Pimm).

The Eagles attempted to make it a contest later in the first period, as Boston College’s first goal was scored by Steven Whitney. Dan Cornell of Northeastern went to the box for charging, and just nine seconds later, Whitney netted a power play goal. His first of the season came at 14:55 and made it a 2-1 game (assists Gaudreau and Mullane).

Both teams were quiet for much of the rest of the game, despite having their chances. It was not until the third period that one of the squads broke through, and it was Northeastern again. Colton Saucerman scored his first of the year at 3:42 to give the Huskies a two-goal lead (assisted by Darcy). No other scoring took place, but notably, the game ended with Eagles captain Pat Mullane getting rung up for a blow to the head, getting a major penalty and a game misconduct.

This was a shaky effort by Boston College, the type of which Eagles fans are not used to seeing. There were flashes of good play, but otherwise, BC seemed off-kilter for virtually the entire game and looked a little sloppy. Boston College took eight penalties, including Mullane’s game misconduct, but were fortunate to have gone 7-for-7 on the penalty kill.

Four of the BC freshmen got into the game — Colin Sullivan, Brendan Silk, Mike Matheson, and Teddy Doherty (started on defense) — but none made an impact. For a few of them, one could tell it was their first college hockey game.

BC outshot Northeastern 32 to 29, but Chris Rawlings outdueled Parker Milner for the win. Rawlings picked up 31 saves, while Milner had 26.

It was not a good game for the Eagles, but the national champions have little about which to worry at this stage. BC’s next game is on Friday night at UMass.