For the better part of the season, it’s taken a cable box or a few dozen tanks of gasoline to see how good this Boston University hockey team could be.
Before Saturday, the Terriers had struggled at Agganis Arena. Home fans witnessed two scoreless ties and a 5-2 loss to archrival Boston College. They saw the half-hearted skating efforts, passes go off the mark and only 22 goals in 13 home games.
Those who traveled or tuned in to road games, on the other hand, were treated to a sweep of the then-second-ranked University of Maine in Orono and big wins at BC and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. They saw 57 goals in 17 games outside Agganis. Impressive stuff in hostile digs.
This weekend, the gap between the Terriers on the road and the alter-egos at home narrowed. The No. 5/6 Terriers didn’t win Saturday against the University of New Hampshire, but they did come back from a 3-0 deficit at Agganis Arena, where they hadn’t scored more than two goals in five games at home, for a 3-3 tie. They didn’t win, but the way they tied and the fact that it came after a 4-2 win at UNH the night before should provide ample reward for the patience of the faithful.
The three-point weekend, the most successful one since the two games in Orono in January, made the Terriers (17-5-9, 12-4-8 Hockey East) only the second team this season to take four points from the Wildcats (22-6-2, 17-4-2), including a 4-4 tie in November.
“You’re never satisfied with a tie,” said BU goalie John Curry on Saturday. “But against the No. 1 team in the PairWise [Rankings], getting three points is pretty good. Looking down the stretch, we realize we’re in dire need of points, and seeing UNH on the schedule is a little daunting . . . Three out of four, I think we’re satisfied, though I would have liked to get the tie last night and the win tonight maybe.”
The Terriers beat the Wildcats to countless loose pucks on Friday and the second half of Saturday’s game, yet lagged a half-step behind for the first 30 minutes in the latter. Where their passes traveled smoothly from tape to tape on Friday, they bounded across the ice in the first half of Saturday’s contest.
What was most impressive about the Terriers on Friday was how good, very dangerous and sharp they could be against one of the nation’s top teams. What resounded Saturday was, even in a less-than-spectacular game, this team will fight. And there’s never been a better time this season for those traits to converge.
“I didn’t think we played nearly as well tonight as we played last night,” said BU coach Jack Parker after the tie. “Not just because we didn’t get the ‘W,’ but because we were more jumpy with the puck . . . It was a great effort on our part, but we weren’t as smooth as we have to be or as good with the puck as we had to be against this team. We turned the puck over too many times.
“But in general when you go down 3-0 and you come back and get a point out of it, especially against the No. 1 team in the nation and No. 1 team in the league, it’s a pretty good turnaround,” he continued. “We’ll gladly take the point.”
Friday’s game, which saw Brandon Yip score twice in his return to the lineup after a five-game absence due to injury, started the way it was expected to – with a UNH flurry. But the Terrier defense kept the surge from becoming a blizzard, moving the puck through and out of the defensive zone with pace and poise.
But UNH got on the board first, on the power play, when leading scorer Mike Radja took the puck in the middle then slid to the left of the slot, dragging the puck with him. He let a wrister fly and sent the puck past Curry stickside 8:47 into the first.
Up to that point, the Terrier penalty kill had fended off each Wildcat charge, clearing the puck four times. But Radja’s goal provided an indication of UNH’s explosiveness. BU gave UNH a crack, allowing the power play to set up in the offensive zone, and the Wildcats blew it open.
After that, those cracks closed.
“I don’t know if they’re more dangerous when you turn the puck over 10 feet inside your own blue line or you turn the puck over at their blue line,” Parker said. “But they’re dangerous on any type of transition, and we did a good job of taking care of the puck after the first period.”
As those cracks closed, Curry provided the spackle, just as he’s done all year. He made 31 saves Friday, then a career-high 43 Saturday.
New Hampshire goalie Kevin Regan robbed BU of a sure goal two minutes into the second, when Boomer Ewing ripped a slapper from the left circle off two touch-passes from Kenny Roche and Jason Lawrence. But Regan threw his left side into the air and snared the puck out of the air.
Then Yip got his first score since his first shift of the year. He took a pass from Pete MacArthur in the middle and scooped a backhand to the top left corner with 12:10 left in the middle frame. But before he could get his second tally, three minutes into the third period, freshman Luke Popko had to vacuum most of the energy from the Whittemore Center.
With the Terriers 15 seconds into a 5-on-3 penalty kill, Tom Morrow lobbed a clear along the left boards. It bounced right in front of the blue line, and the UNH defenseman bent over to grab the puck. It squirted past him – and so did Popko.
The forechecking and general harassment specialist sped toward the net on the left, with nobody between him and Regan. He fired from the top of the left circle and fit the puck in just under the top right corner to make it 2-1 with a shorthanded goal.
“I guess it was a pretty far shot I took,” Popko said with a smile. “But it went in, I can’t complain.”
Yip’s second goal provided some insurance against the nation’s fourth-rated offense. With traffic in front of the net after shots by Chris Higgins and Matt Gilroy, Yip slid to the right side of the crease and slipped the puck between his legs and in.
“It wasn’t a great play on our part on the third goal,” said UNH coach Dick Umile. “The game was what I was expected. It was gonna be back and forth. But giving them a 3-1 lead wasn’t in the plan.”
A goal by Trevor Smith (one of his three on the weekend) with 6:20 left brought the score to 3-2, but the defense made sure the game stayed there. Then, with 50 seconds left and Regan pulled, BU senior defenseman Sean Sullivan took a loose puck on the left boards, brought it to center ice and filled the empty net.
Last time UNH came to Agganis, it picked apart BU, winning 7-4 last February. Twenty-eight minutes into Saturday’s game, things looked like they were headed for an even more lopsided outcome.
Smith scored with 1:24 left in the first period on the power play (the only UNH goal on seven man-advantages on the night). The puck rattled around the crease, and the sophomore sent the puck toward net. It bounced off Curry’s stick and slid in.
The second and third goals, both equally unstoppable for Curry, came 1:46 apart. Smith scored the first, three minutes into the second, when Jerry Pollastrone flew along the left boards and passed to Smith in the middle. He then one-timed a perfect slapper to the top-right corner that dug into the top twine.
Less than two minutes later, Kevin Kapstad fired from the top left. The puck bounced off an errant stick and skipped over Curry’s shoulder.
Parker used the television timeout to set up a new forecheck, and three minutes later, Pete MacArthur corralled a loose puck in front of the net and sent it 5-hole on Regan.
“We quieted things down,” he said. “We changed our forecheck to go after them a little bit and we got a goal on MacArthur’s goal, and that got us jacked up, like maybe we won’t get blown out there.”
With five minutes left, Morrow fired a pass from the left point behind the net. It bounced perfectly out to Kenny Roche on the right side of the net, who squeezed another shot through Regan’s 5-hole.
MacArthur made sure momentum didn’t have the chance to die out. Four minutes into the third, he got the puck in front of the blue line on the left side off a faceoff. He wound up and ripped a slapper low that kicked off Regan’s skate before glancing off the post and falling in.
UNH won the overtime period, keeping BU without a shot in the extra frame, but Curry eventually prevailed, securing the tie.
“This one doesn’t feel like a tie, it feels more like a win,” Roche said.
The problems at home this year have been based in motivation and complacency. If Saturday meant anything, it was that those days might have ended.
“I told the team we may not want to get home ice the way we’re playing at home,” Parker said half-jokingly. “We have a couple more games to straighten that out, so we’re happy to have that. But we’ll be OK. I think in past games we got caught thinking it was gonna be easy.”
“It’s almost like a mindset,” MacArthur said. “We haven’t played well at home for so long, we just have it in our heads that ‘Oh, we’re gonna suck again at home.’ And we didn’t tonight, so hopefully that’s out of our system.”