Photo credit Matt Woolverton
The Battle of Commonwealth Avenue will have its first skirmish of 2023 when the #4/5 Terriers take on Boston College at Agganis Arena at 7 p.m., as the ancient rivals begin a home-and-home series. Tonight’s game, which will be broadcast on NESN and live-streamed on ESPN+, is the fifth and final game of BU's current homestand.
The contest will be the 289th meeting between the teams with BU holding a 137-130-21 edge in the series that began 105 years ago.
The Eagles took the first meeting of the season in early December, a wild 9-6 game with the Terriers holding the lead at two junctures of the second period before a pair of power-play goals put BC on top to stay.
BU (17-6-0, 11-4-0 HE) has won its last four conference games and sits in a second-place tie, two points behind Northeastern. The Eagles are seventh but have two games in hand vs. BU and three vs. the Huskies.
Looking back at the loss last month, Head Coach Jay Pandolfo asserted, “We certainly didn’t get the type of game or outcome we wanted the last time we played them so hopefully we are ready and a little bit more prepared.”
Pandolfo will expect much better execution than last time. He added, “We left the middle of the ice way too wide open against them last time. They have some difference makers on their team and we gave them way too much time and space.”
This rivalry frequently finds emotions running high and Pandolfo want the right balance between intensity and discipline from his team.
“The big thing is you don’t want our guys being too excited,” Pandolfo said. “We’ve got to make sure we’re disciplined and staying out of the penalty box.”
With a 9-7-5 mark overall, BC is 4-2-3 since the beginning of December. Freshman Cutter Gauthier, a Flyers’ first-round draft pick who attended Philadelphia’s development camp with BU’s Devin Kaplan, paces the Eagles’ attack with 12 goals and 20 points. More offense comes from juniors Nikita Nesterenko (18 points) Trevor Kuntar (17) and Colby Ambrosio (15), Senior captain Marshall Warren and junior Eamon Powell anchor the defense. Grad transfer (from Colgate) goalie Mitch Benson has played all 21 games and brings a 2.64 GAA and a .905 save percentage.
Coming off a six-point weekend and on a five-game point streak, Matt Brown (11-23-34) leads Hockey East in scoring and is tied for fourth in Division 1. Lane Hutson is the top-scoring defenseman in D1 with a 9-18-27 and is second in the nation with four game-winning goals. They’re followed by Wilmer Skoog and Ryan Greene, each with 20 points, Jay O’Brien with 19 and captain Dom Fensore and Quinn Hutson, who have 18.
BU has been receiving strong production from the top line of Skoog, Brown and Kaplan, while the freshman line of Greene, Quinn Hutson and Jeremy Wilmer is coming off its second eight-point game of the season.
Drew Commesso, pulled midway through Saturday’s win, will be back in the BU cage. “I think it was the right move to get him out of that game” Pandolfo explained, “He didn’t seem like himself, didn’t seem like he was tracking the puck well so that was the decision there,”
Senior Jamie Armstrong, injured in the Air Force game, and Fensore, who missed Saturday’s game against Maine, have been skating and their availability will be determined Friday morning.
UPDATE: Armstrong returns. Fensore will sit out.
BU is 17-4-2 in its last 23 games at Agganis Arena, with three of the four losses coming in OT.
TONIGHT’S BU LINE-UP
Brown- Skoog- -Kaplan
Tuch-O’Brien-Peterson
Wilmer- Greene-Hutson
Armstrong- Stevens - Zabaneh
Webber-Gallagher
Hutson-McCarthy
Page-Copeland
Getz
Commesso
Duplessis
Schena
● GoTerriers.com preview, Game Notes, Live Stats, BU All-Access (audio), BU Men’s Hockey Twitter
● Live Streams: ESPN+
● Boston Hockey Blog preview
● College Hockey News Tale of the Tape
● BC Interruption preview
BHB’s Caroline Fernandez and James Harrison are joined by sophomore defenseman Ty Gallagher for a new Terrier Hockey Talk podcast. They also recapped the games played during semester break.
● Boston Hockey Blog Terrier Hockey Talk podcast with Ty Gallagher
Which of the 14 goals BU scored against Maine made Hockey East’s Plays of the Week? Skoog’s snipe at 0:36 of the first period Saturday Night.
► The hockey LINKS in our sidebar have been updated. New items: 2022-23 BU Hockey Almanac & Record Book; BU Hockey Stats Twitter
Looking ahead
tw-align-centersFutures Update ‼️ @willzellers9 is making an impact on the star-studded @ssm_hockey. The 16 year old has acquired 13 points in only 14 games. This is the @TerrierHockey commit’s second year playing with Shattuck, last season he ended up with 79 points in 61 games #GoGamblers pic.twitter.com/8L5kFiStRy
— Green Bay Gamblers (@GamblersHockey) January 25, 2023
Will Zellers, a 2024 recruit, is one of three ‘06s to earn a spot on Shattuck’s Prep roster. After playing for the US Select U17 team in the Five Nations this summer, he missed several months due to an injury and recently returned to the line-up. Zellers was drafted #18 overall in the 2022 USHL Futures Draft by Green Bay.
Looking back
It never gets old recounting the career accomplishments of BU Athletics Hall of Famer Chris Drury, now president and general manager of the New York Rangers. He is the only player to win the Hobey Baker Memorial Trophy and the NHL’s Calder Trophy for Rookie of the Year, as well as winning an NCAA Championship and the Stanley Cup.
● Daily Free Press Off the Post--Chris Drury, the humble hero
● U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame bio
● Video: Drury goal sends BU to the 1997 Frozen Four
Matt Nieto is headed back to Colorado where he'd spent 3+ seasons, following a San Jose-Colorado trade. This year he had an 8-7-15 line in 48 games with the Sharks. A BU fan favorite (“Glory, Glory, Matty Nieto”), he scored 55 goals and had 102 points in three seasons. In his last two years at BU, he was a teammate of Evan Rodrigues, a free-agent signee by the Avalanche just before this season began.
Nieto, a Long Beach, Calif., native, was drafted by San Jose in the second round of the 2011 NHL draft, becoming the Sharks’ first California-born draft pick. He spent four seasons in San Jose before being claimed on waivers by the Avalanche. He set career-highs in goals (15) and points (26) in 2017-18 and then returned to San Jose as a free agent at the beginning of the 2020-21 season.
Another Terrier teammate of Nieto’s, Danny O’Regan changed uniforms and organizations last month (somehow it slipped past us), when a three-way trade sent him from Anaheim’s AHL team in San Diego to the Red Wings’ affiliate in Grand Rapids.
► On the 2012-13 Terriers—Jack Parker’s final season—the top three scorers were O’Regan (38), Nieto (37) and Rodrigues (35). On March 1, Nieto’s hat trick accounted for all BU’s scoring in a 3-1 win against Vermont—assisted by O’Regan on the first, Rodrigues and O’Regan on the second, and Rodrigues on the third.
Women’s Team
Terriers will try to keep the winning going when they host Merrimack tonight at Walter Brown Arena. Puck drop is at 7 p.m. for the contest that will be live streamed on ESPN+
● GoTerriers.com preview, Live Stats, BU All-Access (audio), BU Women’s Hockey Twitter
● Live Streams: ESPN+, International Stream
Abby Cook, a standout defenseman who played in three Beanpot finals will be inducted into the Women’s Beanpot Hall of Fame. She had a line of 2-5--7 in the three tournaments but came up big by setting up both the game-tying and game-winning goals in the 2019 Beanpot final.
No comments:
Post a Comment