NCAA Hockey: Boston College survives late scare to advance
WORCESTER, Mass. — Hockey East is the conference that just last year had two teams in the national final, and this year sent six of its 12 clubs to the NCAA tournament.
By the time the first period of Saturday night's Northeast Regional final started, Boston College was one of only two remaining. Four others had been bounced in opening-round games, losing 18-7 on aggregate. A few hours down the road in Albany, UMass Lowell was in the midst of a tied third period against Yale, an ECAC club. They went on to win, meaning Hockey East still has a hope of putting two teams in Tampa, but that road runs through No. 1 Quinnipiac and, well, it's a perilous one as a result.
But at this time of year, and particularly with a regional in Worcester (they'd won each of the last five regionals here, and are 14-1 overall in this building), one is never wise to bet against BC, who held on for a 3-2 win over the upstart Minnesota-Duluth Bulldogs. Always good to represent the conference.
“We are so excited,” said legendary Eagles coach Jerry York. “The Frozen Four is an objective for us, every year when I have been at BC I have always thought, let’s get to that Frozen Four. And the more you get there, the more opportunities you have to collect some hardware and it’s hard to go once and win it once.
Captain Teddy Doherty, an undrafted defenseman who plays the wing nearly as often as the blue line, had two goals for the Eagles. Bruins prospect Ryan Fitzgerald scored a third-period power play goal that stood up as the game-winner thanks to a late Duluth push.
At the other end, Canucks second-round pick Thatcher Demko made 28 saves to pick up the win, including a few that would make Sportscenter on most nights. There was, for example, this one:
There was also this defensive play from forward Austin Cangelosi, inside of five seconds left, in the third period, with Duluth pressing and the net empty and on the power play. That literally saved a game BC nearly seemed poised to fritter away. But it turned out to be just another big-time performance in a season full of them for the Eagles defense and Demko, who entered leading the nation with 10 shutouts, just two short of the national record.
“It was probably inches, centimeters from making it over the line,” Demko said. “But all the guys came back and made sure that it didn't, so that was a big play for us.”
As with the night before, and perhaps to UMD's liking, this game had a long and protracted feeling-out process. Teams traded power plays and a few high-quality scoring chances, but nothing was really going on in terms of game action. At one point late in the period, shots were just 8-5 UMD, but BC led on a soft goal conceded to BC captain Teddy Doherty late in the first.
Bulldogs coach Scott Sandelin has his players buying into the whole “Stick to your systems and results will come” mantra that proves successful time and again, but one imagines that it has not often played a team so talented as the Eagles. Clubs with that kind of obvious skill level present matchup problems for just about anybody. So while Duluth was more than adept at limiting BC's attacking-zone time and opportunities around the net, anything even resembling one has a greater likelihood of going in than similar chances conceded to teams less-stocked with top-end talent; BC has 12 NHL draft picks, many of them selected in the first few rounds. Duluth has just four.
“You know against any good team you can’t turn pucks over or make too many mistakes because they are going to get opportunities,” said UMD coach Scott Sandelin. “They've got some guys on their team who certainly have found the back of the net quite a bit and tonight they found it one more than we did.”
But what separates this BC team from those in the past that have proven a little less successful (not that you can find too many of those lying around in the last decade) is an almost joyous physicality to go with the high skill threshold, and a team that is vocally delighted by the more pedestrian aspects of the game. Big shot-blocks are met by encouraging cheers and stick-banging from the BC bench, which seems to be a feature unique to this particular Eagles club in comparison with its predecessors. Before there was a kind of stoic determination about doing the simple things, but now there's more open encouragement.
“You know, it hurts,” York said. “The puck is hard and I think you need encouragement when you block the shot. The whole bench gets excited like a good hard back check. So things that might not be noticed as much by stat sheets, like you know it’s not a goal, it’s not an assist, it’s not a highlight reel goal. ... And we did block an awful lot of shots tonight and that is important to us. And no broken ankles, which is even more important to us.”
Is this the best BC in even recent memory? Almost certainly not.
They were bounced out of the league tournament in the semifinals, and that's actually an improvement over the previous two postseason campaigns. But still, any on the team would volunteer that the month of hockey prior to this weekend was hardly its best, and that there was more up its sleeve than a convincing first-round win against a shallow and meek Harvard team.
There isn't really a lot to note about the bulk game itself, other than to say Duluth played about as well as could have reasonably been expected. The double-overtime affair against Providence College, which split the Hockey East regular-season title with these Eagles, couldn't have helped their legs. But even if that had been a regulation win, one can't imagine that drawing two teams of that quality in back-to-back nights, with no familiarity from having played each other earlier in the year, helped their chances to advance to Tampa.
Another difference: BC was physical in a way it had typically not been this year. Big hits, heavy board play, it was all there. That's been a hallmark. But rarely did that cross into the realm of illegality and extracurriculars. There's no way to be sure, but BC has to lead the league in penalties taken after a whistle this year. They do it all the damn time.
But tonight the Eagles were whistled for just eight penalty minutes in the game in comparison with their season average of 14.6 per game coming in. Meanwhile, the Bulldogs were more than happy to oblige BC's physical play, but took too many penalties (five) in doing so.
Those calls, the resultant time spent defending, plus BC's extra-stout transition defense and ability to create an odd-man rush that leads to established zone time, would make it difficult for anyone to come back against a team of almost any quality. They just strangled the life out of the game and didn't need to go wild in attack to make the point and book a trip to Tampa.
“The NCHC is a very physical league and we expected that coming into the game,” Doherty said. “That being said, we weren’t going to back down from anything. If it got chippy, we were going to get chippy back. I think we did a good job not retaliating tonight, maybe a penalty or two. But we did a good job matching their physicality and that was big for us.”
The Eagles gave up two late goals in the space of less than three minutes to make the game more interesting on paper than it had been in actual practice. But one must consider that Duluth is a premier possession team, and can lean on anyone in that regard when they really press. With their season on the line, they were pressing hard.
The Eagles have now won the regional in Worcester each of the last six times it was played there, and has won the national title in three of the previous five trips. It's the kind of thing to which you can set your watch at this point.
Depending upon the result of Lowell/Quinnipiac, they probably represent Hockey East's best hope, if not its last. That's a wild turn of events for the best conference in the country.
“We will play where we play but we have a lot of pride in Hockey East,” York said. “So far we have one team from Hockey East in the Frozen Four now, so it would certainly be a great boost in our league if we can get one more in the Frozen Four. But Lowell has got a very difficult opponent in Quinnipiac.”
The Eagles played a tough opponent tonight, and for the first time in a while, had everything go well enough that it didn't matter.
Ferris State 5, St. Cloud 4 (OT)
Ferris entered the third period with a two-goal lead and saw it evaporate due to a parade to the penalty box, but then Jared VanWormer scored his second of the game just 18 seconds into OT to eliminate the second-seeded Huskies.
This wasn't exactly what you'd call a well-played game by either team, with plenty of shall we say “teachable moments” for the defenses on both sides. Overcommitment to puck carriers on odd-man rushes was an issue throughout.
Mike Richter Award finalist Charlie Lindgren probably wants a do-over on the big ol' 'L' he took today, giving up five on just 31. When you get outdueled by a goalie who allowed four on 33, that's not great.
Quinnipiac 4, RIT 0
This is about as close to an inevitability as scores get in college hockey.
Sam Anas played despite a shoulder so bad he wasn't even shooting much in warmups, and he still had a primary assist in the first period. The real star, though, was Devon Toews, who finished with three assists for the winners. Soren Jonzzon had two goals, Tim Clifton had two assists, etc. etc. etc.
Quinnipiac is a possession juggernaut regardless of score effects, so shots on goal being only 30-27 in their favor is a bit surprising. But hey, Michael Garteig stopped all 27 of 'em, so that'll do it.
North Dakota 5, Michigan 2
In a matchup of the two best lines in college hockey — North Dakota's CBS line versus Michigan's CCM line — the better line won the battle but the better team won the war.
North Dakota scored two somewhat controversial goals 1:14 apart in the third period to separate themselves at the end. Both were upheld by review, but really close. And frankly, Michigan never did enough to win the game anyway. If you trail for most of the night and still give up almost 50 shots, you frankly don't deserve to advance.
Five different goalscorers struck for the Fighting Hawks, including Drake Caggiula of the aforementioned CBS line. Meanwhile JT Compher of the CCM line had both Michigan goals, and Tyler Motte had two assists.
But again, 49 shots allowed.
And just for fun, here's Caggiula scoring the opener and then immediately getting smoked by the ref. Indisputably the best hit of the tournament.
Denver 7, Boston University 2
There's no good way to make this sound like anything less than the brutal beatdown the scoreline indicates. BU changed goalies after it was 4-0, none of it mattered even a little. Denver scored the first six goals of the game in the space of 40 minutes.
BU only mustered 21 shots on goal, and only scored when it was already 6-0. Then they conceded again 1:22 later.
Maybe we should have seen this coming, though. Terriers No. 1 goalie Sean Maguire dropped to .821 in his last four starts, conceding 13 goals on the last 73 shots he faced. Across the ice, Tanner Jaillet stopped 19 of 21.
Five Pioneers had multiple-point games. Danny O'Regan and Mike Moran scored in the loss.
UMass Lowell 3, Yale 2 (OT)
Joe Gambardella scored Lowell's second and third goals in this one, and both were quite big.
Obviously you get an overtime game-winner in the NCAA tournament, and that's always going to qualify as a big goal, but the River Hawks entered the third period with a deficit — just the seventh time they'd done so all year — and were winless when playing from behind even at the end of the first. So to get one back and force overtime was huge. He then won it just 1:37 into OT.
But perhaps the most intriguing part of this game coming in was the goaltending matchup. Mike Richter finalists Kevin Boyle and Alex Lyon were in the crease for Lowell and Yale, respectively. And while Lyon had the better season (.938 coming in versus Boyle's .935), Boyle certainly had the better night. Lyon allowed three on 31 in the loss.
Three stars
1. Jared VanWormer
Two crucial goals, including the overtime game-winner, and an assist in Ferris's major upset of St. Cloud. VanWormer came in with just five goals in his previous 37 games this year. That matched a career high set on Feb. 14 of last year, when he went 2-1-3 against Bowling Green. This one is a little more important, but one supposes the romance of the tournament is guys like this putting up the games of their lives.
2. Kevin Boyle, UMass Lowell
Yale pushed possession throughout, and its defense made things difficult at the other end, but Boyle continued to deliver top-flight goaltending for the River Hawks. He stopped 35 of 37 and beat arguably the best goalie in the country. Given how this season has gone, he's staking his own claim to that title.
3. Thatcher Demko, Boston College
Demko ended up being the regional MVP, which is no real surprise given that he stopped 50 of 53 (.943). That'll play.
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Ryan Lambert is a Puck Daddy columnist and also covers the NCAA for College Hockey News. His email is here and his Twitter is here.
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