Well, that seems about right.
After a season marred by inconsistent play and disappointing results, the No. 20 Boston University men’s hockey team saw that season end Friday night by the No. 19 University of Maine in a 5-2 final.
The loss ousted the Terriers and sent Maine to the Hockey East Championship game Saturday night, where it lost to No. 4 Boston College, 7-6, in an overtime thriller.
“We had a team that was very much so at the top of their game tonight, and we had a team that was not nearly what they had to be tonight,” BU coach Jack Parker said Friday. “I was very impressed at how hard and how quick and how smart Maine played. I was very disappointed in our efforts.
“I thought it would be a real fast game because both teams would come flying, and one of them didn’t.”
The loss to the Black Bears (19-17-3, 13-12-2 HE) was, in many ways, a microcosm of the Terriers’ (18-17-3, 13-12-2) year &-&- starting off in a slow, uninspired fashion before picking up with sparks of brilliance and hope before coming to a crashing, disappointing and premature end.
Maine opened with the game’s first three goals on tallies by freshman Joey Diamond, sophomore Brian Flynn and junior Robby Dee.
The Black Bears carried the 3-0 lead into the third, but it took BU less than two minutes to get on the board in the final period. Working in the right corner of the zone, sophomore forward Vinny Saponari dropped a pass to junior center Nick Bonino, who drove the net and put a shot off Maine goalie Dave Wilson.
The rebound kicked at the right post to Saponari, who spun a backhand pass to junior captain Kevin Shattenkirk atop the crease on the left side. Shattenkirk had plenty of net to look at as he one-timed the puck by Wilson to tighten the score to 3-1.
Then, with 3:47 left, a scrum broke out in front of the Maine net after Saponari put a puck at Wilson. The play was initially blown dead, with a penalty called on Maine’s Spencer Abbott.
However, the play went to review, and after a lengthy set of looks, referees Tim Benedetto and John Gravallese ruled that Wilson had reached behind himself and knocked the puck into the crease after it had already crossed the goal line. The penalty on Abbott was waived off, and BU closed the gap to 3-2 on a short-handed tally from Saponari.
Any thoughts of a comeback were short lived. After BU killed off the rest of a two-minute minor on freshman forward Alex Chiasson, Maine’s David deKastrozza sent a shot off sophomore netminder Kieran Millan’s right leg pad that tipped into the top corner of the net to put Maine back up by two.
Seconds later, Parker pulled Millan, and Tanner House scored from the neutral zone to ice the game and send the Black Bears to the Hockey East finals.
“I think tonight, we showed both teams that we were this year,” Shattenkirk said. “The first two periods, we just didn’t bring it. We weren’t ready for how well Maine was playing and we didn’t match their intensity.
“Finally, when the third period came around and we knew we didn’t have that much time left and we started to kick it into gear, but in any playoff game, you can’t do that. Maine played well defensively to hold onto their lead, and they get their goal at the end and it was only a matter of time, because we set ourselves up for it.”
The loss marks the end of the road for BU seniors Eric Gryba, Luke Popko and Zach Cohen, as well as junior Nick Bonino, who left Saturday for Anaheim, Calif., where he will sign an NHL contract with the Anaheim Ducks and forego his senior year of eligibility.
“It was a shame they had to leave the Garden ice in that mess we made tonight, because they deserve better,” Parker said in reference to the three-man senior class.
Notes:
The Terriers failed to convert on a 54-second 5-on-3 chance in the second period just before Dee’s goal made it 3-0 Maine. The Terriers finished the season having converted just 2-of-24 5-on-3 chances, which averaged 50.1 seconds per chance . . . BU was outshot 18-5 in the first period Friday . . . Millan turned away 28 shots against Maine, bringing his season stat line to 3.147 goals-against per game and a .891 save percentage in 32 starts (16-16-0).
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