BC 3, Providence 0 – Eagles take care of business

You wouldn’t necessarily know it from the final score, but the first 45 minutes of this game were scoreless. Plenty of penalties, yeah, but no scoring. I don’t think there was too much tension amongst Eagles fans, however, keeping in mind the caliber of their hockey team.

#1 Boston College defeated Providence by a score of 3-0 on the road on Friday night, gaining their 21st win of the season. John Muse put together his 11th career shutout in what would be BC’s eight-straight win over the Friars. The win would be Boston College’s sixth in a row overall, adding two more points to their Hockey East standings. This win pulled them even in the conference with New Hampshire, who were defeated at home by Merrimack while the Eagles played the Friars in Rhode Island.

The aforementioned Muse stopped all 24 Providence shots, while PC goalie Alex Beaudry stopped 30 of BC’s 32 and held together for quite some time before finally giving in to BC’s strong offensive attack.

Providence benefitted from seven BC penalties, while BC got five opportunities from Providence, but all three goals were scored on even-strength. The first came at exactly the five-minute mark of the third period when Cam Atkinson (assists: Gibbons and Kreider) notched his 21st goal of the year, putting the Eagles ahead for good. The second came over eleven minutes later off of the stick of Brian Gibbons (assists: J. Hayes and Dumoulin) for some added insurance, and the third came on an empty-netter with nearly a minute to go as Jimmy Hayes unselfishly passed to Bill Arnold (assists: J. Hayes and Almeida) for the score.

Providence played with some intensity, but as you might imagine given their record, their hard work was not rewarded with a win. For BC, it was a very ho-hum victory which seemed peculiar at first due to the 0-0 score which lasted for over two periods. Now they get to take the weekend to focus on Northeastern and the chance to win their third Beanpot in four years.