Brutal Again: Boston Univ. 5, Boston College 3
By Joe Micik
The CBS Sports Network jinx continues.
At a packed Conte Forum on Friday night, the Boston College Eagles hockey team started their BC/BU rivalry weekend with a 5-3 loss to the Terriers. The #3 Eagles fall to 7-3 in Hockey East play, 10-5 overall, and can get swept in the season series by Boston University with a loss tomorrow night.
The game opened with incredible crowd energy, but the visitors would strike early. At 10:15 of the first period, the Terriers were able to pick up where they left off in the last game, scoring the first goal on a power play thanks to Charlie Coyle’s third of the season. (Nieto and Nicastro assisted.)
Boston University wasn’t done in the first, netting a 2-0 lead off the stick of Yasin Cisse at the 17:03 mark (Privitera and Coyle assisted). It was Cisse’s first goal as a Terrier.
In the second period, shots were outrageously lopsided towards the Eagles. Boston College outshot Boston University 23-1, but the scoring for the period was one a piece, which clearly means Parker Milner allowed the only shot on goal for the second to get through. That came at 13:21 thanks to Garrett Noonan, who was able to find some time out of the penalty box to score.
Meanwhile, of the Eagles’ 23 shots in the period, one found its way past Kieran Millan, thanks to Bill Arnold on the power play at 16:59 (Cross and Kreider assisted). This was Arnold’s eighth time in the goals column this season. Later in the second, Boston College appeared to have gotten a late goal which would have cut the deficit to 3-2, but it was waved off by the officials. On replay, the puck was in the net before the whistle blew, but apparently, the play was over before the whistle was blown, or, as the color commentator described it, when the official “intended” to blow the whistle. Arbitrary and nebulous, you bet.
In the third period, during a five-minute major after a game misconduct was called on Pat Mullane, the Terriers scored their fourth goal at the eight-minute mark from Cason Hohmann (Escobedo and Clendening assisted). Pat Mullane was not the last Eagle to take a major penalty; Steven Whitney got a total of 12 minutes later in the third on a hit from behind.
The Eagles would get one of those goals back on an Edwin Shea goal (Hayes assisted; this goal was originally credited to Kreider, but no longer); this started a small flurry of scoring.
The Terriers added a fifth and final goal on a shorthanded empty-netter by Corey Trivino at 16:57, and the Eagles hit right back on the power play at 17:16 on a Barry Almeida goal (Arnold assisted).
Simply put, in the two games these teams have played against one another so far this season, BU has made BC look bad. The Eagles have been stopped dead in their tracks by BU’s goaltending, while their own hasn’t looked too good. Despite the shots on goal being so heavily favorable to BC, the Eagles looked like they lacked offensive consistency all night.
Boston University, on the other hand, disrupted just about everything BC tried and played with enthusiasm. In many respects, this game closely resembled the last one, because the Eagles appeared to be frustrated and incapable of getting anything going. I’m not calling it a lack of effort, because it wasn’t, but they definitely played ugly. When you outshoot your opponent 45-15 for the game, you don’t expect to lose, much less by multiple goals.
Prior to the first meeting between these teams this season, it had been a long time since BU had beaten BC on the ice. Now, it’s BC that will look to try to stop this sudden down trend against the Terriers tomorrow down the road at BU.