Boston College Men’s Hockey Blows Lead, Ties Northeastern, Huskies Earn Hockey East Shootout Point

Boston College men’s hockey continued to struggle tonight, blowing a 4-1 lead at Matthews Arena to end up with an official 4-4 tie and a shootout loss that gives Northeastern an extra Hockey East point.

The Huskies took an early 1-0 lead, tipping the puck into the net right off a face-off just 4 minutes into the game. The Huskies dominated until BC got a power play midway through the period, and great positioning from the Eagles led to a Cutter Gauthier goal to tie it up at 1. Despite some great chances for BC late in the period, the tie held and the teams went into intermission knotted at 1.

The teams traded penalties and shots on goal throughout the second period, but a 5 minute major on Northeastern flipped things in BC’s favor. Trevor Kuntar got a penalty of his own midway through, but scored shortly after exiting the box to put BC up 2-1 as the period wound down.

Cam Burke took a great shot just under 5 minutes into the third period for a great chance to put BC up another goal, and Liam Izyk followed through with the rebound to give BC that 3-1 lead. Gauthier followed up with an absolute highlight reel of a goal with just under 10 minutes to go, with a deke past the defenseman and a rocket of a shot to put BC up 4-1.

The Huskies almost immediately followed Gauthier’s second goal of the game with a goal of their own to cut BC’s lead to 4-2. With 2:07 to go in regulation, the Huskies scored again to make it just 4-3 Eagles. The Huskies then scored exactly before regulation ended on a wide open net to send this one to overtime.

The overtime period ended still tied at 4, with Northeastern largely dominating play. That sent the game into a shootout. The Eagles missed all 3 shots, and Northeastern scored on the third to take the shootout and earn the extra Hockey East point. All in all, a very disappointing result for BC - their losses to Merrimack were messier throughout, but blowing a 3 goal lead is an extra level of concerning.