#4 Women's Hockey Takes Down #8 Northeastern At Matthews Arena

In the first game of a home-and-home against Northeastern, #4 BC Women's Hockey (7-3-1) imposed their will against the #8 Northeastern Huskies on the road to win 3-1.

After an awful 7-24-3 season in 2008-2009, Northeastern hired head coach Dave Flint who has slowly but surely built a contending team, culminating in a loss in the Hockey East Championship last year to BC. This year, Northeastern came into a game with an impressive 10-1-0 record, but BC handled them and their Swiss national team goalie, Florence Schelling (who for some reason uses a bizarre lacrosse helmet).

BC opened the scoring at 6:29 of the first period as Melissa Bizzari (contender for Best Name In All Of BC Athletics) potted her first of the season. Northeastern answered with a power play goal just a minute and a half later. And there the score would stay for quite a while.

Both teams had numerous chances, but in a game featuring possibly the two best goaltenders in the conference, goals were hard to come by. At one point, BC defenseman Blake Bolden shined with some incredible two-way hockey. After some nifty stick work to walk in alone on Schelling only to be denied, she hustled back to rejoin the play as Northeastern broke out on a quick two-on-one. After catching up to the lead NU forward, Bolden made a spectacular diving play to clear the puck away and break up the chance.

And it's a good thing she did. With just over a minute to play in the second period, a scrum broke out in front of the Northeastern net, where Alison Szlosek managed to chip one just over Schelling's shoulder for the go-ahead goal.

BC scored the insurance goal early in the 3rd as Danielle Welch helped BC earn a great blue-collar goal. After being denied the first time and denied the second time in close, she collected the puck just outside the crease and patiently shot around the stick of Schelling... only to be denied a third time. Fortunately, Emily Field was positioned perfectly to put the proverbial biscuit into the proverbial oven on a juicy rebound with an open net. It was the kind of effort that would have made Jerry York proud. 3-1 BC, and that's how the game would end.

BC takes on Northeastern at home tomorrow at 7pm in the second leg of the home-and-home.