With win No. 1 already pocketed, one more will give the Terriers another first: their first bonafide winning streak of 2007.
The monkey is off their backs, the 300-pound gorilla has left the room and now the Boston University women’s hockey team can stop pressing and just focus on playing.
Conventional wisdom will say that a few days removed from their first victory of the season — a 6-0 shellacking of Union College — the Terriers (1-5-2, 0-2-0 Hockey East) have a great opportunity to prolong their winning ways against Quinnipiac University (1-5-1, 0-4-1 ECAC) at home.
But history between the teams offers little insight into how they will match up tonight. In only the second game of the Terriers’ first season as a NCAA program in 2005, they tied the Bobcats, 2-2, and then beat them the next year, 4-3, behind junior goaltender Allyse Wilcox’s 40 saves and junior captain Gina Kearns’s game-winning goal. Still, BU coach Brian Durocher thinks the Terriers have been outplayed in the series so far.
“I think this should be a pretty interesting and even battle,” Durocher said. “They’ve played good competition pretty well. Based on their early season performance and the fact they had the edge in both games we’ve played against them, I think these are pretty evenly matched teams and will probably end up being a one-goal contest.”
Wilcox, who blanked the Dutchwomen this weekend, gets the nod between the pipes again tonight. Against Union, Wilcox was backed by a defense that smothered the blue line on the other end of the ice, and back checking from the forwards denied the Dutchwomen from mounting any sort of offensive attack.
“If we’ve got everyone committed to playing defense I have faith that we’ll score goals,” Durocher said. “We’ve been able to get goals this year but you can’t sacrifice what you’re doing on the other end of the ice. And it’s not just about the goaltenders or about the defense but about our forwards playing 200 feet. That’s an area of our team that has taken another step forward this year.”
Although Quinnipiac has a strong junior class, led by forwards Jennifer MacLean and defenseman Elyse Cole, the Bobcats have inexperience in net with freshman goaltender Catherine LoGrasso — and the Terriers will look to test her early. Against Union, the Terriers were able to win battles down low and cycle the puck to the point as they unloaded 50 shots on net. Bottling the same proficiency against a tougher and quicker Quinnipiac team is unlikely.
“They’ve also got a rookie goaltender so our job will be to try and get after her and get some shots on her,” Durocher said. “As a freshman there’s probably a little bit of nerves that you want to take advantage of and get after her as early as you can.”
After playing nationally ranked talent, the Terriers must capitalize on matchups against lower-tier teams like Union and Quinnipiac if they hope to salvage their season. Even though tonight’s matchup is another non-conference tilt, a victory would give the Terriers a two-game winning streak and confidence heading into the last three games of a seven-game home stretch.
“Confidence comes usually through success,” Durocher said. “For us to have some success tomorrow and get two wins in a row, it will start to give us some of that positive roll that could carry on because we are home the next couple games after that.”
