After taking a back-and-forth game into overtime, the No. 10 Boston University women’s hockey team fell to No. 7 Northeastern University 4-3 in the Beanpot championship Tuesday night at Walter Brown Arena.
“[It was] a fantastic hockey game, an exciting hockey game, a game that had a super crowd and all the elements you want to see in a game,” said BU coach Brian Durocher. “We played hard, we competed, we lost to a really good team that’s not a mirage.”
With the loss, the Terriers (16-13-1, 10-7 Hockey East) snapped a five-game winning streak and missed their opportunity to win their first Beanpot title as a varsity program.
“It’s a bitter night for us tonight, but not many of our kids will forget this evening for a long time,” Durocher said.
As the first period developed, the Terriers found themselves even with the Huskies (19-6-3, 12-3-2 Hockey East) despite outshooting Northeastern 13-4.
While neither team scored during the opening frame, the Terriers appeared to struggle keeping up with the speed of the Husky forwards.
Northeastern found the back of the net first when it scored two goals in less than two minutes during the second frame.
The scoring began when sophomore forward Marie-Philip Poulin was whistled for roughing 5:35 into the frame. Less than a minute later, Northeastern freshman phenom Kendall Coyne took a shot on BU sophomore netminder Kerrin Sperry.
Sperry blocked the first shot before Coyne, who leads Hockey East with 24 goals, picked up her own rebound and notched the puck under the cross bar and over Sperry before the goaltender could reposition herself.
The Huskies lit the lamp a second time 1:41 later when freshman Lucie Povova picked up her own rebound and, like Coyne, put it past Sperry to make it 2-0.
After staying off the board for half of the game, the Terriers cut into Northeastern’s lead with a tally from freshman defenseman Shannon Stoneburgh, her first collegiate goal.
Stoneburgh ripped a slap shot that initially looked as though junior forward Shannon Mahoney tipped it into the net. However, officials ultimately decided Stoneburgh scored the Terriers’ first goal, consequently cutting the Terriers’ deficit in half.
With just fewer than three minutes left in the frame, BU found itself with a 5-on-3 advantage. With the end of the power play coming near, freshman forward Kayla Tutino took a pass from junior forward Isabel Menard and put it past Northeastern goaltender Florence Schelling for the power-play goal.
“I think we’re learning,” Durocher said. “I love the poise when we get down 2-0, the composure on the power play to get a couple of goals . . . Those things were big.”
The score remained tied at two apiece until late in the third period when Tutino once again scored on the power play. The Lorraine, Quebec native picked up a rebound from senior captain Jenn Wakefield and laced it past Schelling to give BU it’s first lead of the game.
However, the Terriers could not hold onto that lead. Just 33 seconds later, Northeastern’s Sonia St. Martin blasted a slapshot through a screen by junior Katie MacSorley to tie the game.
“They came up with a huge goal there, 20 seconds or so after we scored,” Durocher said. “That gave them legs and the opportunity because I like to think that we’re pretty good at closing the deal there.”
After a 15-minute intermission, the teams returned to the ice with renewed intensity.
Halfway through the extra frame, Coyne and junior Casey Pickett took a 2-on-1 down the ice. Despite sophomore defenseman Kaleigh Fratkin’s effort, Pickett tapped in her 16th goal of the season on a pass from Coyne to win the sudden-death overtime – and the Beanpot title – 4-3.
“Obviously it wasn’t just a fluke or something that fell out of the sky in the back of the net,” Durocher said. “It was a real good hockey play by super hockey players.”
With the win, Northeastern, which has won the most Beanpots of any school with 15, won its first title since 1998.
While he had hoped a Beanpot-title win would help the Terriers maintain momentum going into the final stretch, Durocher said he “liked” his team the best after this game.
“I told them after the game,” Durocher said. “I like my team and I probably like my team better than any other time this year . . . The immediate thing for us is to pick up the pieces here, take a day off, get a couple skates in and go up to [the University of Vermont].”
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