Boston College Women's Hockey Carves Up #3 Boston University, 7-1

Alex Carpenter highlight reel

Maybe BU had too much Halloween candy before the game.

Maybe the Terriers decided to be the UMaine men's team for Halloween.

Maybe the Eagles were really ticked off about the way things went down at Conte Forum four weeks ago when BU came to Chestnut Hill and took BC down in the season opener.

Whatever the reason, the end result was a blowout. You would never have guessed this was a game between, ostensibly, two of the best teams in the country; you would have guessed instead that it was a game between one top team and one very unfortunate sparring partner.

What does this all mean for the women's hockey team's quest to right the ship after a bumpy start? Not too much, yet - the win tonight brought them back up to .500 at 3-3, and another crucial matchup with BU beckons on Saturday afternoon at 2. Lose that one, and the momentum is gone. But for one night, the Eagles looked like a menacing machine, one that could stack up with the rampaging championship contenders we've seen at Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Minnesota-Duluth.

The Eagles came out with a vengeance tonight at Walter Brown Arena and completely bludgeoned the #3 in the country. The scoreboard read 7-1, but that honestly didn't tell the story of how much of a rout this game was. I'd like to have some of whatever the official scorer was having, as he/she had the shot tally at 36-33 BC; as someone who was at the game, I can report that it was one-way traffic constantly for at least the last 40 minutes after a somewhat even first period that saw BC go into the locker room up 1-0.

As noteworthy as the beatdown was how gleeful the Eagles seemed to be to be delivering such a whoopin'; their celebrations intensified with each goal, as if for one night they were possessed by @Salzano14's twitter feed. Their end-of-game celebrations also were jubilant.

The star performer on the night, as if on cue, was Alex Carpenter, whom I'd kindly requested a breakout performance from in this afternoon's Hockey Banter. She potted three goals for her first career collegiate hat trick, including a jaw-dropping breakaway shorthanded goal in the second period that had shades of Gaudreaubey Baker. Carpenter also added two assists, adding up to a 5 point game.

Taylor Wasylk also had a stout game for BC, scoring the opening goal on a brilliant play, streaking behind the BU defense, fielding a tremendous bomb of a pass from the defensive zone by Blake Bolden, and heading in on a breakaway; her first effort was stuffed but she knocked home the rebound to open the scoring (and the floodgates) for BC. In addition to her goal, she made some stellar defensive plays and was an all-around presence for BC.

Captain Blake Bolden had four assists and was a stout presence on the blue line for BC, anchoring a very effective power play which went 2-for-5 and threatened multiple times on each opportunity. Freshman phenom Haley Skarupa also added two assists for BC.

It was BC's second straight win since juggling the lines a bit from what they were in the first two weeks of the season; there seems to be some chemistry developing on the top two lines of Grieves-Carpenter-Skarupa and Field-Trivigno-Motherwell.

Additionally, we appear to have a bit of a goaltending rotation brewing as Megan Miller performed well between the pipes, scoring her first win of the season (1-2). She wasn't called upon to do too much, but she got the job done and made all the saves she had to make. She didn't do anything to take herself out of the running for future starts, though Corinne Boyles probably still has the edge as #1 goalie.

The 3-3 Eagles look to get above .500 for the first time all year in the rubber match of the season series with BU on Saturday at 2; the Terriers (7-2) will surely come in with similar motivation to what BC brought to Walter Brown tonight. It should certainly be an intriguing game, and a huge one for pairwise purposes.

[UPDATE] Video highlights!