Boston College Men’s Hockey Defeats Yale 6-2

The Boston College men’s hockey kept rolling on Tuesday night, picking up a 6-2 win over Yale to bring their record to 8-4 on the season. It was a pretty clean night for BC, who got up early and never took their foot off the pedal en route to blowing out the visiting Bulldogs.

Ben Finkelstein got on the board first for the Eagles, scoring his second goal of the season at the end of a great rush by BC. Finkelstein took a great cross ice pass from David Cotton and fired a shot under the crossbar before Yale’s goalie Nicholas MacNab could get across his crease. BC got another goal from a defenseman less than two minutes later, when Marshall Warren netted his second of the season. Warren took a drop pass from Matt Boldy and fired a quick wrist shot that managed to sneak its way through MacNab and into the net. The two goal lead didn’t last long, however, as Yale cut their deficit in half in less than three minutes. Spencer Knight couldn’t quite corral a shot from the blue line, and a Yale forward jumped on the loose puck and buried the rebound. With just over a minute to play in the period, Aapeli Rasanen gave BC their two goal lead back, scoring his sixth goal of the season from the slot after a nice passing play with Alex Newhook. The Eagles had another great chance right at the buzzer, but had to settle for a 3-1 scoreline after the first 20 minutes.

MacNab exited the net after allowing three goals in the first, but the Eagles kept rolling early in the second. Mike Hardman scored to cap off a nice passing play between him, Rasanen, and Newhook to put the Eagles up three. The goal drew a challenge from Yale, who claimed BC had too many men on the ice just seconds before scoring, but the goal stood after review. Things did slow down a bit after Hardman’s goal, with the two teams trading power play opportunities, but failing to score for the remainder of the period, giving BC a 4-1 lead after two.

Yale made things interesting early in the third, scoring a power play goal less than a minute after play resumed. BC took a bad too many men penalty and Michael Karow lost his stick on the ensuing kill, giving the Bulldogs all the time and space they needed to get a clean look on Knight. The shot was a laser that beat him up high and cut the score to 4-2.

BC got a power play chance of their own just a few minutes later and Logan Hustko made it count. Nearing the end of his shift with the first power play unit, Hutsko picked up a loose puck near center ice and did everything by himself. The junior winger brought the puck all the way into the corner, muscled his way around a Yale defenseman, and fired a shot from in tight into the top corner of the net. It’s a no doubt candidate for BC’s goal of the year and a heck of a reminder of the unique kind of player Logan Hutsko is. Julius Mattila scored a power play goal of his with just about five minutes left in the game to stretch the lead to four goals. Mattila converted on a one timer from the right circle off of a nice pass from Hutsko. That was all the scoring for the night, as BC shut down a late 5-on-3 chance for Yale and took the game 6-2.

This was a good performance by the Eagles, who stretched their winning streak to six games. On paper, they are a far more talented team than Yale, and that’s just what we saw on the ice. The top line kept clicking, BC got some depth scoring, and the special teams looked good all night. It’s the ind of result that you’d expect from a good team, and one that hopefully has the Eagles ready for Friday night, when they will be on the road to take on an undefeated Harvard team.