Wild third period leaves Terriers and Huskies all tied up

Junior Danny O’Regan scored a pair of goals—early in the first and late in the third—but the second was followed by a late UConn power play goal, and the Huskies left Agganis Arena with a 4-4 overtime tie. 

A fifth round San Jose draft pick in 2012, O’Regan got the Terriers on the board before many fans had found their seats, beating a UConn defender and firing a backhander home at the 35-second mark off a slick cross-ice pass by Jack Eichel. The visitors answered three minutes later when Shaun Pauly converted a Spencer Nass rebound, beating BU’s Connor LaCouvee, who made his second regular-season start in goal. 

BU had the advantage in shots in both the first and second periods, but UConn netted the only goal in the middle stanza. Trevor Gerling scored a power play goal after a five-minute major to freshman Nikolas Olsson, who also received a game misconduct, forcing BU to play with a short bench for the final 30 minutes.

Pucks would find twine five times in the third period. Thirty-nine seconds in, rookie Brien Diffley, delivering another strong effort on the blueline, fired home his first career goal from the right circle, assisted by Eichel (photo) and O’Regan, knotting the score at two. But Gerling restored UConn’s lead at the nine-minute mark. Just 30 seconds later, junior Mike Moran deflected home a Diffley slapper, with sophomore Nick Roberto also getting a helper. BU took its first—and only—lead with 4:17 remaining when Eichel sent O’Regan in on a breakaway and the Needham native beat goalie Rob Nichols with a backhander. But the Huskies almost immediately went on a power play and, with 3:14 left in regulation, a sharp-angle shot caromed to Pauly who fired into an open net. 

Terriers had several scoring chances in the five-minute overtime period, while LaCouvee was forced to make one big save, and the game went into the books as a 4-4 tie. O’Regan finished with three points (2G, 1A), Eichel had three assists and Moran, Diffley, and Evan Rodrigues each had two points. LaCouvee stopped 22 shots, while Nichols turned away 30 BU shots. 

►Eichel, O'Regan and Rodrigues are 1-2-3 in points-per-game for all games among Hockey East skaters.With five goals and 10 points, O'Regan already has half his season total of goals from last season (10) and nearly half the points (22).

►Terriers yielded just one even-strength shot in the second period.

►Ahti Oksanen, injured in Friday’s win at BC, did not dress. He is “day-to-day” and the Terrier coaches are hopeful he’ll be ready for next weekend’s game at Maine.

Terrier Take-Away: We’re introducing a new feature with blog readers offering observations on the most recent game. Today’s entry comes from defkit:

- Overall a disappointing end to an entertaining game. It looked like O'Regan had the perfect "bookends" game (first goal and last goal), but UConn caught our defense out of position, forcing the last penalty, which led to the tying goal.

- UConn gave no indication that they were a "weaker" team just happy to be at the party. They have good speed, skill, and their coach clearly has them playing a solid team game.

- Having Rodrigues on the point on the PP burned the Terriers, as he was beaten by the scorer on UConn's third goal. While it was nice that Moran tied it back up and we still took the lead, I would prefer to see Rodrigues down low on the PP.

- Diffley's game continued its positive trend. He had an effective weekend for sure.

- Props to Moran for a second straight game with a big goal. However, BU needs more scoring from the 2^nd, 3^rd and 4^th  lines.

- Between some of the goals last night and the first BC goal Friday night, lots of rebounds are ending up in the net. Something for the coaching staff to address.

●GoTerriers.com recap and comprehensive box score

●Video highlights

●Post-game comments: Coach David Quinn, Diffley

Daily Free Press recap and feature on Diffley

Boston Hockey Blog: Pluses and Minuses

●Hartford Courant recap

● USCHO recap

Among the former Terriers in attendance were Jack Parker, Mike Eruzione, Tom O'Regan, Dan Ronan, Matt Ronan, Brian Durocher, Mike Sylvia, Frank D'Orio, Dennis O'Connell, Mike O'Connell, Brad Zancanaro, John Bethel, Bill Whelton, Chris Mays, Dan Cavanaugh, and Brian Collins.

Looking ahead

2015 recruit Jakob Forsbacka-Karlsson scored the clinching shoot-out goal in Omaha’s 2-1 win against Sioux Falls.

2015 recruit Sean MacTavish assisted on Waterloo’s only goal as the Blackhawks fell to Green Bay, 3-1. He also earned second-star honors.

Team USA lost to Russia, 2-1, in the gold-medal game of the World U17 Challenge in Ontario. 2016 recruit Clayton Keller was the tournament’s top scorer with 13 points (6G, 7A), and was one of three Americans named to the all-tournament team, along with Chad Krys and Max Jones.

Women’s Team 

The script for the women’s team was eerily similar to the men’s game: a 4-4 overtime tie against a team from Connecticut, Yale; and having overcome a 3-2 deficit in the third period to take a 4-3 lead, only to yield a late tying goal. 

At Yale’s Ingalls Arena, Rebecca Russo gave BU a first-period lead with a short-hander for her sixth goal of the season, but the second period was dominated by the Elis who scored three times, twice on the power play. Junior Kayla Tutino (photo), who missed most of last year with an injury, kept BU close with a short-hander for her first of the season.

Early in the third period, freshman Victoria Bach tipped home a Shannon Doyle shot for the equalizer.  At the 16-minute mark junior Sarah Lefort converted the long rebound of another Doyle shot for a power play goal and gave BU its first lead since the first period. However, the Elis’ Eden Murray scored an extra-attacker goal in the waning minutes to send the game to overtime with neither team being able to provide a game-winner.

Freshman Erin O’Neil, who made spectacular saves in the third period and overtime, stopped 24 shots.

● GoTerriers.com recap and comprehensive box score

● Yale University recap

Former Terrier captain Jenn Wakefield (photo) scored twice as Team Canada edged Team USA 3-2 in a shootout at the Four Nations Cup in Kamloops, B.C. Tara Watchorn, who assisted on Wakefield’s first goal, and Jenelle Kohanchuk, also skated for Canada.