If there is one yin to the Frank Spaziani yang, it's Jerry York and his Men's Ice Hockey team. While the football team was busy losing their 5th game out of six, the hockey team was busy winning their 5th game out of their first six.
On Friday night, BC welcomed the Minutemen from UMass to the Kelley Rink. BC started off strong with a quick goal from Bill Arnold, and followed that up with goals by Chris Kreider, Johnny Gaudreau, and Bill Arnold again. UMass never really was in this game, and Parker Milner had another solid game between the pipes, recording 18 saves. BC went on to win the opening game of the weekend 4-2. BC now holds a 50-10-3 series edge. Talk about domination.
UMass Hockey Bloggers Fear the Triangle, were not too happy with the execution of their Minutemen
Now if there was going to be one weakness going into the game it would be goaltending, right? After all, Jeff Teglia was making his first start of the year. No. In fact UMass got strong goaltending from Teglia. What they didn't get was offense. For all the hype about how this UMass team was performing much better offensively, they looked just as anemic as last year. They had only two shots during the entire second period. The power play went 0 for 7 with just four shots on net. And those that needed to score didn't, with one goal coming from a freshman playing only his second shift in his UMass career and the second coming from a defenseman late. Now some of the blame goes to the players who did not challenge BC goaltender Parker Milner. They can also take the blame for taking way too many penalties. Ten all in all, including 6 from the team's co-captains. That's unacceptable.
Sounds like the BCI guys after a Spaz ERA football game huh?
On Saturday night we traveled up the E line to face the Northeastern Huskies. One of the team's that matched up best against BC last year, the Huskies continued to give the Eagles all they could handle at the always hostile Matthews Arena. The Eagles who played the entire first two periods trailing, stormed back in the third period behind goals from captain Barry Almeida and defenseman Brian Dumoulin to force overtime. In the overtime period, BC successfully burned a penalty on Chris Kreider, and won the game on a slap shot from Bill Arnold.
Video courtesy of Hockey East:
First year Northeastern head coach Jim Madigan tried on his inner Spaz after the game:
"I thought we played well for two periods,’’ said NU coach Jim Madigan. "There are no moral victories in here. But I thought we played well as a team and did some of the things that we talked about after [Friday’s game]. But when you lose a two-goal lead in your own building, that’s not a good thing.’’
That's three wins in the Hockey East for the Eagles' who are in the midst of a tough stretch of conference games. As Coach Jerry York said, they can't take any game lightly:
"We're in a string of nine-straight Hockey East games. We've played three non-conference games already, and this puts us right in the heat of Hockey East. It's something we looked forward to. We look forward to the challenge ahead of us. Certainly, based on tonight's game, the opponents are going to come every night an play very very hard to be on the top of our game, too."
Bill Arnold now leads the Eagles' with 10 goals was named Hockey East Co-Player of the Week for his three goals against UMass and Northeastern. If you don't know much about Ah-nold yet, you better recognize.
Bill Arnold was the best player on the ice and will be the Eagles most consistent contributor throughout the year. There’s little doubting that forward Chris Kreider, Pat Mullane and Johnny Gaudreau are going to draw the crowd from their seats more frequently with their skating ability and pretty passing. But Arnold has already established himself as one of the best two-way centers in Hockey East after only the fifth game of his sophomore season. He currently leads BC forwards in goals (four), assists (five), points (nine) and plus/minus (plus-5). In BC’s first four games, Arnold played the pivot on a line with Kreider to his left and freshman Destry Straight to his right. Friday night, York moved Kevin Hayes to Arnold’s right and the results paid off 78 seconds to pay off, when Arnold banged a pass from Kreider past UMass goaltender Jeff Teglia after a beautiful breakout pass from Kevin Hayes sprang the pair. Whichever pair of wingers York surrounds Arnold with, though, is going to be successful.
The Eagles' road to the Hockey East championship continues this weekend with an away and home against UMass Lowell on Friday and Saturday night.