The Boston University women’s hockey team has had almost two weeks to recover from a demanding February, in which it played eight games in 16 days between Feb. 3-19. The Terriers will get back on the ice for the Hockey East semifinals against Northeastern University on Saturday at 12 p.m.
After tearing through the middle third of the season without a loss between Nov. 20 and Feb. 3, BU (25-5-4, 15-3-3 HE) stumbled in the Beanpot tournament, losing 2-1 to Boston College in the first round and tying Northeastern (15-12-8, 6-10-5 HE), 3-3, in the consolation match. They wrapped up the regular-season Hockey East title with a win over University of Maine on Feb. 18, and then lost their last game of the season to Maine the next day. The win allowed Maine to clinch the sixth and final playoff seed, although they fell to Providence College in the quarterfinal on Feb. 26, 5-2.
“I think that was natural in the Beanpot and to some extent [in Maine], you could say, because they clinched the regular season championship,” BU coach Brian Durocher said of the occasional lack of urgency in the team’s play. “I wasn’t too disappointed with their intensity up there, and Maine was fighting for their collective lives.”
The Huskies and Terriers are certainly familiar with each other by this point – three of their four matchups this season came between Feb. 11 and Feb. 15. In the first match, BU gave up a 3-0 lead on home ice and needed a late shorthanded goal from senior forward Lauren Cherewyk to win, 4-3. The Terriers won handily the next day, 5-1, at Matthews Arena, but once again gave up a three-goal lead to end up with a 3-3 tie on Feb. 15.
The Terrier team that takes the ice on Saturday will be different from the one the Huskies saw in their last three meetings in a few important ways: freshman forward Marie-Philip Poulin and sophomore forward Taylor Holze are expected to return to the lineup after missing six and eight games, respectively, with injuries. Poulin suffered a broken hand against University of New Hampshire on Feb. 5, while Holze broke her ankle when she slipped on ice outside of Walter Brown Arena two days earlier.
“It looks like both of them will be ready to play, maybe at slightly different levels,” Durocher said. “Taylor’s is a slightly different situation being that it’s an ankle instead of a hand, but they’re both progressing in pretty good order.”
Durocher said that Poulin – who was leading BU in scoring before the injury – has been skating for the last two weeks and stickhandling for the last five days or so, while Holze has not quite gotten her full skating strength back and her status could be decided closer to game time.
The Huskies beat fourth-seeded University of Connecticut 4-0 in the quarterfinals to advance to play BU. Sophomore forward Casey Pickett had two goals in the win and junior goalie Florence Schelling earned her fourth shutout of the year with 25 saves. Schelling has a 1.98 goals-against average in 26 games this year, and although that only ranks her sixth in Hockey East, she has logged more time in the net than any other goalie except BC’s Molly Schaus and Providence’s Genevieve Lacasse.
With Schelling in the net and an offense that averages 32.6 shots per game, the Terriers have learned from experience that they can’t expect to sit on a lead against the Huskies, no matter how late in the game they find themselves ahead.
“You found out twice this year in four games [against Northeastern] that we’re gonna have to button down the hatches if we get any kind of lead there, whether it’s one goal or two goals or whatever happens,” Durocher said.
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