Friday, November 19, 2021

Game Day: Terriers host Huskies

                                               
Terriers will try to build off last weekend’s win and tie vs. UMass as they take on #18 Northeastern in a home-and-home series beginning tonight at Agganis Arena. Puck drop is at 7:30 p.m.

The teams didn’t play each other last season due to the COVID-shortened schedule. The last meetings were the final two games in March 2020—a 3-0 BU win at Matthews and a 2-1 Husky victory at Agganis.

Northeastern (8-4-0, 4-3-0) had won five in a row before a 2-1 overtime loss to Lowell. The Huskies’ attack is led by junior Aidan McDonough with team highs in goals (8) and points (10). Freshman Justin Hryckowian has nine points as does senior defenseman Jordan Harris.

In its last four games, Northeastern has yielded just five goals, winning three times, due largely to the play of sophomore goalie Devon Levi who sports a 1.58 GAA, tops in Hockey East. Last season, following a strong performance in the World Junior Championships, Levi was injured and missed the rest of the season. He is aided by a veteran defense led by Harris and Jayden Strubel.

Juniors Wilmer Skoog and Robert Mastrosimone are BU’s top point-getters with 11 and 10 respectively, followed by classmate Dom Fensore (9) and sophomore Dylan Peterson (8). Junior defenseman Case McCarthy has been wielding a hot stick with goals in four of the past five games, including the overtime game-winner last Saturday against UMass. Sophomore Drew Commesso stopped 43 of 48 shots in the UMass series.

Coach Albie O’Connell, who is looking for more consistency and stability in his forward lines pointed out the chemistry between Peterson, Nick Zabaneh and Jamie Armstrong, adding that Skoog and Mastrosimone were clicking with junior Jay O’Brien who returned to the line-up last week after missing eight games. He added, “We’ve got guys filtering back into the line-up and that will shuffle the deck a little bit.”

Addressing NU’s best-in-conference penalty kill, O’Connell said, “We’re going to try to keep it simple. It’s important to get pucks down and get some traffic on them. They do a good job structurally and they do a good job blocking shots. Our shooters are going to have to be really sharp to get it by those guys and get it to the net.”

Despite some recent struggles, O’Connell says he’s seeing progress. “I think we’ve improved on our breakouts and playing faster. There were times, even against UMass, that we were really tough to play against because we pushed the puck up ice. Our defensive zone has been a lot better. Our forecheck has been better.” He added that he wants to eliminate mistakes in puck management.

TONIGHT’S BU LINE-UP

Mastrosimone-Skoog-O'Brien

Cockerill-Ty Amonte-Phillips

Tuch-Zabaneh-Boucher

Kaufman-Stevens-Carrabes

Armstrong

Vlasic-McCarthy

Fensore-Gallagher

Webber-Campolieto

Commesso

Duplessis

 

● GoTerriers.com preview, Game Notes, Live Stats, Terrier Sports Radio Network, BU Men’s Hockey Twitter

● Coach Albie O’Connell’s media call

● Live Stream College Sports Live

● College Hockey News Tale of the Tape

● Boston Hockey Blog preview

● WTBU Sports preview



 

Looking ahead

2022 recruits Lane Hutson and Devin Kaplan have signed their national letters of intent (LOI). Hutson, a speedy left-shot defenseman has a 1-14-15 scoring line in 18 games, while Kaplan, a right-shot power forward, has a 4-10-14 line. 

In last Sunday’s NTDP U18 9-2 win against Finland, Kaplan scored a pair of goals while Hutson had two helpers. Both received B rankings in NHL Central Scouting’s preliminary players to watch for the 2022 draft.

Looking back

Jake Oettinger, making his first NHL start of the season, stopped 28 of 29 shots in the Stars’ 5-2 win against Detroit.


Terriers behind the mic

Former BU netminder and Providence College women’s coach Bob Deraney was the game analyst on a recent NESN broadcast of a Northeastern-Holy Cross women’s game and is expected to appear on additional games this season.

Deraney joins several other Terriers in the broadcast booth. Recently Dave Tomlinson was named to handle analyst duties on Seattle Kraken radio broadcasts.  Rick DiPietro, who had been a studio analyst for New York Islanders’ games, joined ESPN’s roster of analysts for NHL games. Colby Cohen, M.O.P. of the 2009 NCAA championships and a former analyst for ESPN, is now a content analyst for the Chicago Blackhawks, contributing to the team’s digital channels and game broadcasts on NBC Sports Chicago.

Women’s Team

Terriers are in Orono, for a 6 p.m. match-up with the Maine Black Bears at Alfond Arena. BU split a home-and-home with Holy Cross last weekend. Maine played a pair at UConn, earning a 1-0 win and a 4-4 tie.

● GoTerriers.com preview, Game Notes, Live Stats,

● Live Stream College Sports Live

● WTBU Sports preview

 

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Tuesday, November 16, 2021

3 Make Top Performers List; Night of the Charlies

A trio of Terriers earned spots on Hockey East’s Weekly Top Performers list following BU’s tie and overtime win against UMass:

Junior Case McCarthy scored in both games, including the OT GWG, and had four blocks on Friday. Here’s a few more looks at the game-winner.

Junior Jay O’Brien returned to the line-up and gave the Terriers a spark. He assisted on Friday’s game-tying tally and on Saturday, scored his first goal and added an assist on Wilmer Skoog’s redirection. O’Brien totaled 11 shots in the series.

Freshman Ty Gallagher’s second goal tied Saturday’s game at 3-3 to set up McCarthy’s overtime heroics. He also had two blocked shots in the series.

 


Looking back

Terriers accounted for four goals in the Bruins’ 5-2 defeat of Montreal with Charlie McAvoy scoring his third and fourth of the season and Charlie Coyle tallying his fourth and fifth. It was MacAvoy’s first two-goal game as an NHLer.

● Full NHL.com video highlights

● McAvoy on trying to have a shoot first mentality

Trevor Zegras fired a pair of power play goals, including the game-winner, and added a spin-o-rama assist in the Ducks’ 5-1 thumping of Vancouver.

● Full NHL.com highlights

Evan Rodrigues scored his 5th and 6th goals and assisted on another tally in Pittsrburgh’s 6-3 loss to Ottawa. Brady Tkachuk had an assist for Ottawa.

Jake Oettinger has been recalled from AHL Texas to the Dallas Stars. He made 29 appearances for Dallas last season. This year in 10 starts for Texas, Oettinger has a 2.62 GAA and a .913 save percentage. 

Women's Team

Another look at Mackenna Parker's power play goal in BU's 3-1 win against Holy Cross.


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Sunday, November 14, 2021

McCarthy’s OT game-winner completes 3-point weekend--UPDATED with highlights

Case McCarthy’s goal at 3:29 of overtime sent the Terriers home from Amherst with a hard-fought 4-3 victory and a 3-point weekend following Friday’s tie. For the junior blueliner and NJ Devils draft pick, it was his fourth tally in five games and his first game-winner as a Terrier. BU also received goals from Jay O’Brien—his first of the season—Wilmer Skoog and Ty Gallagher, while Domenick Fensore and Robert Mastrosimone each had a pair of assists.

The victory was BU’s third in Hockey East action. For defending national champion UMass, it was their first conference loss.

"BU owned the first period," according UMass coach Greg Carvel.Terriers put 12 shots on goal to seven for the Minuteman and after a few grade A chances were denied, BU opened the scoring at the 18-minute mark. Fensore gathered the puck in his own end, raced into the offensive zone, cut left and dropped a pass for O’Brien whose hard wrister from the top of the left circle sailed past Matt Murray.

BU would double its leads midway through the second period on a power play. The rebound of Mastrosimone’s shot was corralled in the left circle by O’Brien, who wheeled and fired a shot that Skoog redirected past Murray for his fifth tally of the season.

Just over a minute later, Matthew Kessel halved the lead with an even strength goal as his shot from the point found its way through traffic. In the final minute of the period Bobby Trivigno one-timed a pass in the slot to bring UMass even with the Terriers.

Early in the third period with the Terriers on a power play, Ryan Ufko scored shorthanded, beating Drew Commesso on a breakaway to give UMass its first and only lead of the game. On that scoring play, Fensore was called for holding so the teams skated 4-on-4. Mastrosimone set up Dylan Peterson for an off-target shot from the high slot, Gallagher retrieved the puck behind the net and sent it into the crease. The puck remained loose and the freshman defensemen banged it past Murray to knot the score at three apiece.

In the 3-on-3 overtime, the Minutemen had a 4-2 shot advantage, but Commesso turned aside their best chances.

With less than two minutes left in overtime, Fensore forced a turnover at the left boards in the offensive zone, skated behind the net, attracting all three defenders and set up McCarthy’s one-timer from the top of the right circle that beat Murray.

“All in all, it was a really good weekend for us,” BU head coach Albie O’Connell said. “I thought we were the better team tonight, and I thought we were the better team last night.  We didn’t give [UMass] a lot.

"I’m pretty happy with the way our team played defense, and obviously we’ve got some special players that can make big plays at the right time,” he added.

Both O’Brien and Ty Amonte produced strong efforts at the faceoff dot, combining to win 17 of 23 draws.

For the game, the Terriers outshot the Minutemen, 29-23.  

 

● GoTerriers.com recap and comprehensive box score

● Video Highlights

● Boston Hockey Blog recap

● WTBU Sports recap

 

Looking back

Charlie McAvoy assisted on three goals in the Bruins’ 5-2 win against the Devils.

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