Kelly Browne OT Goal Lifts BC Women’s Hockey To Split With #14 Vermont

Boston College Women’s Hockey came into its road weekend at Vermont neck-and-neck with the Catamounts in the polls, and came out of the weekend with the result you would expect given the two teams’ close ranking — a split. After letting a two goal lead slip away on Friday afternoon for a 3-2 loss, the Eagles came back on Saturday with a clutch overtime goal from Kelly Browne to take the 4-3 win and share the points on the weekend.

...That’s the good news. The bad news is that Boston College was thoroughly dominated in possession and shots — again — throughout the weekend. Friday’s game was certainly the worse of the two, and not just due to the fact that the Eagles took the L after holding an early 2-0 lead. BC was completely overwhelmed by the Catamounts for just about the entire game, but particularly in the second period when Vermont outshot Boston College by a whopping 22-5 on their way to a mortifying 44-13 overall and a 3-2 final score.

Game two played out similarly with a 43-24 shot count, but fortunately the Eagles were able to get some clutch scores to pull out the win. Cayla Barnes and Kate Ham put home a pair of power play goals to give BC another quick 2-0 advantage, but Vermont battled back with a goal in the waning seconds of the first period to make it 2-1 before the two teams traded goals in the second to go into the final intermission at 3-2 BC.

A third period goal from Vermont tied the score at 3-3 and sent the games to overtime, but a great individual effort from captain Kelly Browne gave the Eagles a happy bus ride home:

Given that Vermont came into the year pretty solidly regarded (they were 2nd in the Hockey East preseason poll) and that these games were on the road, BC can’t be too upset to come away with 2 out of the 6 available points. What they can, should, and undoubtedly will be upset about is the fact that they were once again utterly rag-dolled by their opponent in possession over the course of 60 minutes — something that’s unfortunately become BC’s hallmark the last two seasons when facing any team with a pulse.

Next up for BC is, oh, for God’s sake...

...the UConn Huskies. The Eagles head to Storrs on Friday evening before the two teams head back up I-84 for the home end of the series on Saturday.