BOSTON – After taking a 1-0 victory on the road against Massachusetts, the Huskies fell at home in a 6-3 routing at the hands of the Minutemen.

Kevin Roy struck on the first power play chance for the Huskies, beating UMass goaltender Kevin Boyle just 10 seconds into the two-minute advantage. The rest of the first period was all UMass when it came to scoring, with Rocco Carzo and K.J. Tiefenwerth each notching a goal to extinguish the Northeastern lead and make it a 2-1 Minutemen advantage heading into the second period.

Roy would strike again when he took a cross-ice pass from Mike McMurtry for his seventh goal of the season and the equalizer. The 2-2 score was short-lived as the Minutemen’s first scorer Carzo beat Chris Rawlings on a pass from Steven Guzzo to make it 3-2 and give UMass back the upper hand.

Two third period UMass goals changed the tempo of the game and proved to be too much for Northeastern to recover from. First, Drew Ellement was boarded in the corner, but it resulted in no call and in the process Adam Phillips was able to steal the puck and beat Rawlings with a high shot to the top of the net. Joel Hanley put UMass on the scoreboard again within 90 seconds later to make it 5-2.

Vrolyk had a solo effort to cut the Northeastern deficit to 5-3, coming from the corner to sneak the puck under Boyle. But a late empty netter from Michael Pereira was all UMass needed to seal it and take one win from the home-and-home weekend against the Huskies.

With the win, UMass moves to 4-6-2 overall and 3-6-1 in Hockey East. Northeastern falls to 5-7-1 overall and 3-6-1 in conference play.

What I Saw

• UMass controlled play throughout the first period, despite Northeastern getting the early jump from Roy’s power play goal. The Minutemen outplayed the Huskies in almost every aspect of play early on, with some heavy handed defense keeping a high energy Northeastern top two lines under control. But Northeastern broke out of their usually sluggish second period play with some dominating play in front of Boyle. About halfway through the second, they had a period of about 90 seconds of sustained pressure in the Minutemen’s zone. Their play was composed and intelligent, and a few minutes later it paid off with some perfect positioning from Roy to take a cross-ice feed from McMurtry. There might have been a big game going on in Boston over in Chestnut Hill, but these two teams certainly match up well for a fast paced, physical game. These are both teams that have potential if they could rack up some conference points. (more…)

PROVIDENCE, R.I. – Josh Myers’ third-period goal proved to be the difference as Merrimack College snapped a five-game winless skid with a 2-1 win on the road at Providence College.

The Warriors picked up their first victory since beating Vermont on Oct. 26. It was the Warriors’ longest winless skid in three years.

Brian Christie also scored for the Warriors, who got 34 saves from first-year goaltender Rasmus Tirronen. Tim Schaller scored for the Friars and Jon Gillies stopped 22 shots.

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BOSTON — Jerry York was looking to tie the all-time wins record on his archrival’s ice, but Boston University had different ideas. Led by a 35-save effort from Matt O’Connor, the Terriers beat Boston College 4-2 at Agganis Arena on Friday night. An exciting first period didn’t produce any goals, but the Terriers finally broke the ice 9:04 into the second. Matt Nieto hit the post on a rebound chance, but Garrett Noonan was able to bat the puck out of mid-air and past Parker Milner (30 saves).

BU (8-4-0, 6-3-0 Hockey East) added to its lead seven minutes later when Evan Rodrigues took a pass from Danny O’Regan and fired a laser past Milner’s glove. The Eagles (10-2-0, 8-2-0 HE) answered just 38 seconds later when Johnny Gaudreau kicked a pass to Pat Mullane, who proceeded to beat O’Connor stick-side. Matt Grzelcyk scored what proved to be the game-winner 1:46 into the third when he led a rush down the left wing and beat Milner on a wraparound.

What I saw
-Some great goaltending. The only reason the game was scoreless after 29 minutes was because O’Connor and Milner both made a handful of great saves on quality chances. The Terriers had a couple turnovers in their own zone that could’ve given BC an early lead, but O’Connor was there to bail out his defense and keep it scoreless. Milner’s biggest challenge came against Sahir Gill on a breakaway, but the senior netminder was able to shut the five-hole in time. O’Connor also made several big saves in the third as the Eagles tried to claw their way back.

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AMHERST, Mass. – Adam Reid scored the lone goal of the night for Northeastern, but it was just enough to hang on as Chris Rawlings made 31 saves to lift the Huskies to a 1-0 win over Massachusetts Friday night at the Mullins Center.

Rawlings pitched his second shutout of the season, while his counterpart Kevin Boyle was solid as well, making 16 saves on 17 shots faced.

What I Saw

• While UMass had a majority of the chances throughout the first two periods and seemed to dominate play, it was the Huskies that found the back of the net in the most unusual of circumstances. The goal by Reid came shorthanded 17 minutes, 13 seconds into the second period in a moment of indecisiveness by NU coach Jim Madigan. The Huskies had only three men on the ice in the defensive zone for the first few seconds of the shift as Madigan and his staff were deciding to put Reid out on the ice. As NU was was left with those three players on the ice, Reid hopped over the boards and found himself wide open in the neutral zone. Dustin Darou obtained possession of the puck and skipped it to the sophomore forward right away, who proceeded to skate into the Minutemen zone untouched and slipped the puck past Boyle after faking right and going left to beat the sophomore goaltender’s outstretched pad. It was Reid’s first goal of the season and third point total.  (more…)

UNH took an early lead at nine minutes, 43 seconds  on a breakaway, shorthanded goal off the stick of Grayson Downing and would proceed to score the next three goals in the game to race out to the 4-0 lead on the River Hawks. The goal was Downing’s sixth of the season. He would later score his second of the game, while Kevin Goumas and John Henrion also scored for UNH. The 4-0 lead was more than enough for UNH and they would hold on for the 5-2 victory over Lowell.

UNH improves to 10-1-2 on the year with the victory and 7-1-1 in Hockey East, while UML falls to 4-6-1, 2-4-1. Coupled with a BC loss to BU on Friday night, the win moved the Wildcats to within one point of the Eagles in the Hockey East standings, with a game in hand. The loss was the first for UML in three games and UNH is unbeaten in seven tilts. (more…)

Hockey East teams return to conference action in a major way as a total of ten games will be played between the league teams. The biggest two game series this weekend is without question Boston University and Boston College who will take the regional and national stage by storm with two nationally televised tilts. The home and home series becomes a popular concept this weekend as four out of five series’ are of the such. This weekend could be the one that teams could make a big splash in the league standings as many of the games are between teams in all four tiers, which Hockey East has turned into. Without further ado, here is my weekly take on the games: (more…)

The way I see it, Hockey East has four tiers right now — the top two, BU, the middle four, and the bottom three. This weekend helped highlight the line between the latter two tiers, but it didn’t result in a whole lot of movement in this week’s rankings. Two teams swapped places, but everyone else stayed where they were last week.

1. Boston College (10-1-0, 8-1-0 HE) — Last week: 1
The Eagles extended their winning streak to 10 with a 6-3 triumph over Dartmouth on Saturday. With the victory, Jerry York is now just one away from tying Ron Mason’s all-time wins record. BC’s top line of Johnny Gaudreau, Pat Mullane and Steven Whitney combined for an incredible five goals and seven assists in the game. Gaudreau has at least one point in every game this season and is second in the league in points. Mullane and Whitney both rank in the top five as well.

2. New Hampshire (9-1-2, 6-1-1 HE) — Last week: 2
The Wildcats blew a 4-0 lead and ended up tying Colorado College 4-4 on Friday, then they overcame a 3-0 deficit to beat Denver 6-4 on Saturday. Grayson Downing and Kevin Goumas each registered a hat trick on Saturday, while Casey Thrush scored twice on Friday. Goumas ended up with seven points on the weekend and now leads the league with 20 on the season. The eight goals allowed on the weekend were more than UNH had allowed in its previous eight games combined. (more…)

Boston University outshot the Saints 17-8 in the first period and escaped the first period up 1-0, on a wicked wrister by Wade Megan at eleven minutes, 15 seconds that found the back of the net. The second period turned into the Matt Weninger show as he kept his Saints in the game by making 21 of 22 saves the Terriers sent his way in the period. BU would score two third period goals to put the game away and win it 4-0. The Terriers sent 47 shots at the St. Lawrence net and controlled the game from start to finish.

What I Saw

• Matt Weninger was the star of the show on this night despite giving up a goal apiece in the first two periods and two more in the third. The Terriers dominated the second period and until late in the period were unable to solve the Saints goaltender. For 19 minutes BU threw shot after shot at Weninger but he was able to come up big.   On the 22nd BU shot of the second period (more…)

BOSTON – An early lead for Northeastern turned out to be just that after St. Lawrence capitalized on a a sluggish second period from the Huskies and took the game, 5-2. With the win, the Saints moved to 6-3-2 on the season while Northeastern fell to 2-6-1.

The Huskies opened up the scoring when Ludwig Karlsson took a feed from Dan Cornell out by the blue line and shot high with a wrister that went above goaltender Matt Weninger to make it 1-0 at 12:25 in the first period. As the final seconds of that first period ticked off, St. Lawrence’s offense broke up the Northeastern defense which made it possible for Greg Carey to get right in front of Bryan Mountain, deke, and beat him with a backhand shot to tie it up going into the second.

The Saints carried that momentum with them, capitalizing on a power play chance caused by a hooking call on Dustin Darou. The power play combination of leading scorers Kyle Flanagan and Greg Carey set up the opportunity for Gunnar Hughes 16 seconds into the power play to make it a 2-1 Saints lead, one they wouldn’t give up throughout the latter half of the game.

Flanagan notched one of his own at 13:05 in the second, taking a feed from Patrick Doherty while positioned perfectly between the circles to beat Mountain. That closed out the second period scoring, but Chris Martin and Pat Raley would each score one in the third to give St. Lawrence a 5-1 lead.

Northeastern added a late goal to cut the deficit when Dax Lauwers scored his first goal as a Husky for a 5-2 final.

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BURLINGTON, Vt. — Spurred by a three-goal second period, Minnesota beat Vermont 5-1 in its first game ever at Gutterson Fieldhouse and its first regular-season game out east since 2005. Seth Ambroz gave Minnesota a 1-0 lead 7:52 into the game when he cut to the middle from the right side and slid a backhander past Brody Hoffman (30 saves). The Catamounts (2-6-2) tied it with 4:34 left in the first when Matt White found Brett Bruneteau alone at the top of the crease, but the Gophers retook the lead three minutes later when Kyle Rau capitalized on a Vermont turnover at the side of the net.

Minnesota (8-2-2) put the game out of reach with three straight goals in the second. Zach Budish scored on the power play 2:26 in when he pulled the puck out of a scrum in front and fired past a down-and-out Hoffman. Ten minutes later, Nick Bjugstad scored on a breakaway just after exiting the penalty box. Mike Reilly made it 5-1 when he beat Hoffman with a shot through traffic for his first career goal. Adam Wilcox stopped 22 of 23 Vermont shots to improve to 7-1-2 on the season.

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