#2 Boston College Hockey Strolls Past Vermont, 5-1

In keeping with my boycotting of polls for my rankings, I listed BC as #2 in the header because that's where we really are in what counts, the Pairwise Rankings. More on that later.

BC won this one in pretty much the exact way you'd expect them to, taking a quick lead and never really giving Vermont a chance. The Cats did pull within a goal in the first period, but they never threatened. BC won 5-1 on an empty netter. The Eagles are now 10-0-0 in our last 10 games.

The story of the game was Barry Almeida, who scored a contender for goal of the year in the 2nd period before scoring again midway through the third. The two goals brought Barry to 21 goals on the season, a monumental total and only one behind Maine's Joey Diamond for most goals in Hockey East (!).

Worth noting: BC scored a power play goal for the 12th straight game tonight. That is exceptional, and is a huge, huge part of our big winning streak.

A bit of a rooting guide for tomorrow:

1) Root for Northeastern. not only for "Eff BU" purposes, but a) as of the writing of this post, the Terriers were winning the comparison against us in the Pairwise and b) Northeastern needs at least a tie to remain a Team Under Consideration, keeping our healthy 4-0 record against them as four TUC wins.

2) Root for Merrimack. We need UMass to drop out of the Teams Under Consideration and the only way that will realistically happen is if they lose to Merrimack and get swept by Ours Truly next week in the Hockey East quarterfinals.

3) Root against Minnesota-Duluth. As of when I'm writing this, they are losing to SCSU, but they are currently #1 in the Pairwise.

4) Root for New Hampshire. We really need them and our 3-0 record against them to stay TUC-relevant.

5) Root for Boston College. They're kind of a big deal. They have many leather-bound books and their arena smells of rich mahogany.

The PairWise is an interesting animal right now. Usually at this point in the season you really see the Pairwise Rankings mirror the RPI. BC is far and way tops in RPI, but we are losing the comparison to BU (barf) and Duluth. It's all because of our relative TUC records. Hence why it's so important for New Hampshire and Northeastern to stay in, and for UMass to get knocked out. Of course, winning Hockey East will take care of BU. But to flip the comparison with Duluth, we'll need some help.

Tomorrow night is senior night! Tickets are still available and if you have the ability, go to Conte tomorrow at 7 PM for the rare opportunity to see our Eagles win some hardware on home ice. A win or tie -- or a Northeastern win or tie, but let's not hold our breath -- will give us the Hockey East regular season title.