The No. 15 Boston University men’s hockey team came into its home-and-home series, which was split over two weekends, with hopes of securing four valuable Hockey East conference points. However, the Terriers (4-6-1, 2-3-1 Hockey East) left Matthews Arena on Friday night with zero points.
After last weekend’s 4-1 loss to the No. 13 Northeastern University (6-2-1, 4-0 Hockey East), BU was only able to get one single goal into the back of the net once again for a final score of 6-1.
Northeastern’s student section, known as the Doghouse, was sold out and the Huskies’ head coach Jim Madigan said it contributed to the team’s quick start.
“I don’t think there’s a better building when it’s full the way it was there tonight and credit to our students for giving us that extra momentum and jolt that we needed to get off to a good start,” Madigan said.
Northeastern’s senior forward and captain Nolan Stevens continued his success after notching his first collegiate hat-trick during the previous weekend. Freshman forward Zach Solow took advantage of a loose puck after junior forward Ryan Cloonan missed a pass from freshman forward Ty Amonte and dished Stevens a pass in the right face-off circle three minutes into the opening period.
Three minutes and 17 seconds later, the Huskies’ junior forward Adam Gaudette collected a tally after capitalizing on a loose puck in front of the net.
Sophomore goaltender Jake Oettinger deflected Guadette’s initial shot from the left side of the net, but freshman forward Brandon Schultz kept it alive for his teammate to get it to the top shelf if the net.
However after Northeastern’s two goals, their aggressive offensive pressure died down and their pucks not connecting with players’ sticks gave BU an opportunity to get on the board.
The Terriers tested freshman goaltender Cayden Primeau, but the score remained at 2-0 with Northeastern leading in shots 9-6.
Forty-two seconds into the following frame, sophomore forward Patrick Harper notched BU’s lone strike of the game to cut the Huskies’ lead in half. This marked the first time Harper has scored since his two-goal night against Quinnipiac University on Oct. 8.
The Terriers pulled ahead in shots to end the period with a 21-16 advantage, but were unable to score afterward.
“We’re obviously having trouble scoring goals, no question,” BU head coach David Quinn said. “We just got to keep at it. One of the things I don’t think we do a great job at is off the initial rush, we don’t go to the net hard enough. I think we have guys looking for passes instead of going around the net and that’s something that we’re going to keep pounding on and pounding on.”
BU was unable to survive its third penalty kill as Gaudette poked the puck past Oettinger’s right side after Solow’s shot from near the blue line went wide of the net to put Northeastern up 3-1 at 16:30 in the period.
For the remainder of the game, the Terriers were unable to bounce back as forward Lincoln Griffin scored twice in the third period.
During Griffin’s second goal of the game, the junior raced down the ice with Amonte just a pace behind. Oettinger came out of the net only to let Griffin slip past and crash into Amonte as Griffin scored into the empty net.
This sequence of actions had redshirt sophomore goaltender Max Prawdzik going into the net for the first time all season. Prawdzik almost made it through the 6:05 minutes of the game, but freshman forward Bobby Hampton capitalized on the power play and got the puck past him with seven seconds on the clock.
The Huskies eventually went three-for-five on their power play while Harper’s goal was even strength.
Despite the loss, Quinn liked that his team didn’t quit until the end and remains optimistic for the team to host No. 9 University of New Hampshire.
“Good news is we get to play tomorrow night and we get to dust ourselves off and move forward,” Quinn said. “I know the score looks 6-1, people look at that, but it was just too easy for them to score.”
