Dimitrakos Doom As Icedogs Fall

Sometimes things work out quite differently than one would think they should.

After the Boston University hockey team (25-9-3, 15-6-3 Hockey East) fell to the University of Maine (23-10-7, 14-5-5 Hockey East), 4-3, at the FleetCenter on Friday night, it appeared the Terriers had said, “Bye-bye, bye,” and were destined for two games in the Eastern Regional in Worcester next weekend.

But fate — and the Pairwise Rankings — apparently thought the Icedogs deserved one, and they are seeded second in the East to the University of New Hampshire, who defeated Maine, 3-1, on Saturday to win the Hockey East Championship.

The Terriers started off strong on Friday, controlling play early, which was rewarded seven-and-a-half minutes into the period when junior center Brian Collins knocked in his 11th goal of the season.

Senior forward Mike Pandolfo centered a puck that hit Collins, who wheeled around and sent a low shot past Maine goaltender Matt Yeats. Sophomore Mark Mullen started the play and earned the second assist.

Collins struck again less than two minutes later, holding his ground with a Maine defenseman all over him and deflecting freshman defenseman Ryan Whitney’s shot past Yeats. Senior defenseman Chris Dyment had the play’s second assist. With the two goals, Collins has now totaled five goals and five assists in his seven career games at the FleetCenter.

Maine struck back with about seven minutes left in the first frame, as Colin Shields beat BU sophomore goaltender Sean Fields five-hole as Whitney screened his goaltender. The freshman looked shaky on the play, originally coughing up the puck to Maine forward Tom Reimann, which led to a Maine rush to the BU net.

The second frame continued that theme, as BU quickly surrendered its lead under intense Maine pressure.

A minute into the period, Gray Shaneberger tied the game for the Black Bears, taking advantage of a rare misplay by Fields with his glove to knock in the rebound of Francis Nault’s shot.

“I don’t think Sean was as sharp as he has been down the stretch,” said BU coach Jack Parker. “We haven’t seen those types of rebounds very much so we looked kind of shocked that they were jumping around. He made some great saves, but he wasn’t quite himself as far as calmness and positioning.”

However, the goal that gave Maine a 3-2 lead could hardly be blamed on Fields. Prestin Ryan’s shot went through heavy traffic, eventually caroming off of BU freshman center Brian McConnell and landing right at Reimann’s stick. The Black Bear tucked an easy shot past Fields, who had no chance.

“We split the second period when they got a couple of goals and we got discombobulated in our D-zone coverage,” Parker said.

From there, BU recovered momentum, once again controlling play for the majority of the period. That control paid off, with Dyment putting a low shot from the point past a screened Yeats on the power play for his seventh goal of the season. The lone assist went to sophomore center Gregg Johnson.

At that point, Fields seemed to be rid of his earlier jitters, making several spectacular saves. Fields’ best moment was clearly when he stoned Maine forward Niko Dimitrakos — the Black Bears leading scorer — on a third-period breakaway.

With seven minutes left in the third period, however, Dimitrakos got his revenge. After a questionable penalty for too many men on the ice, Dimitrakos took a beautiful touch pass from Michael Schutte and roofed it past Fields.

“I was kind of rattled, I’m not going to lie,” said Dimitrakos of getting stoned on the breakaway. “I should have buried that, but I just tried to focus on my next shift and I did that, and I was fortunate enough to get that pass in front.”

While the goal was an unquestionable thing of beauty, the penalty left Parker fuming about an otherwise well-officiated game.

“You should have the linesman take a look at the game film,” Parker said. “Nothing happened there. It was an unbelievable call. If the linesman looked at the game film, he’d be pretty embarrassed by what he saw.”

However, according to Parker’s estimation, that linesman is the only person who should be ashamed about his performance. Despite losing the game, and — at least then — what looked like the chance for a bye in the NCAA Tournament, Parker was happy with his team’s performance.

“Great college hockey game, typical of three-out-of-four games this year,” Parker said. “I thought our guys played great, we played the way we want to play, we just didn’t get the ‘W’ tonight. From a tactical point, we were playing real well, and from an emotional point, we were playing real well.”

His colleague on the other bench agreed.

“Great hockey game, well played; I thought it was exciting,” said Maine interim head coach Tim Whitehead. “I’m sure a great game for the fans. It was hard fought, and we were fortunate to come out with one more than they did.”