BC Women’s Hockey vs. Northeastern & Holy Cross: Final Thoughts & Predictions

Don’t look now, but Boston College Women’s Hockey is the proud owner of one of the longest winning streaks in the country. The Eagles have now won seven straight dating back to mid-November, and have quietly climbed their way into the top 15 of the Pairwise Rankings. The Eagles are just barely outside of the USCHO poll as well, so folks out there are starting to take notice.

Up next for the Eagles? The toughest test remaining on their regular season schedule. No. 7 Northeastern is on tap for Friday evening, before BC faces last-place Holy Cross to wrap up the weekend on Saturday. If the Eagles can find a way to get their biggest win of the year (and not get caught napping the next night against Holy Cross), it would set BC up nicely for some momentum heading into Trophy Season, and likely see them climb back into the polls for the first time since September.

WHO

Friday
Boston College Eagles (13-7-1, 11-5-0 WHEA)
at No. 7 Northeastern Huskies (19-2-1, 15-2-1 WHEA)

Saturday
Boston College Eagles (13-7-1, 11-5-0 WHEA)
at Holy Cross Crusaders (3-18-1, 2-14-0 WHEA)

WHAT

A tough, exciting rivalry matchup... and Holy Cross.

WHERE

Friday
Matthews Arena
Boston, MA

Saturday
Hart Center Rink
Worcester, MA

WHEN

Friday, January 13th, 2023
6:00pm EST

Saturday, January 14th, 2023
6:00pm EST

HOW TO WATCH

Both games this weekend, like all Hockey East games this season, will be streamed live on ESPN+. Here is a direct link to Friday’s game, and here is a direct link to Saturday’s game.

LAST TIME OUT

Boston College put together one of their nicest weekends of the season against Maine a week ago at Conte Forum, coming away with a pair of 4-1 victories. Those six points opened up a gap, and earned the tiebreaker, on the Black Bears for 4th place in the conference.

Northeastern brings their own seven game winning streak into the matchup against the Eagles, with four of those victories coming against ranked opponents. The Huskies dominated Boston University — something we can all support — to the tune of a 6-0 drubbing last Sunday.

Holy Cross also won against Boston University last weekend (lol) taking a 3-2 decision at Frozen Fenway last Friday. That’s only the Crusaders’ third win of the year, but it was one of the biggest in program history given the locale.

PROJECTIONS

KRACH (used for odds) has Northeastern in 8th, Boston College in 15th, and Holy Cross in 36th. Running the numbers gives us two one-sided matchups for the Eagles this weekend, with BC looking at a 19.94% chance of winning against Northeastern and a 93.94% chance of getting the W against Holy Cross. That also works out to a 18.73% chance of a BC sweep on the weekend.

The GRaNT rankings (used for point spread) sees things slightly differently, with NU 5th, BC 16th, and Holy Cross in 34th. Those rankings work out to a projected score of 3.53 to 1.17 for the NU/BC matchup (something like 3-1 or 4-1 in favor of the Huskies), and a score of 3.45 to 0.89 for BC/Holy Cross (or a similar 3-1 or 4-1 result, this time in favor of the Eagles).

THIS WEEK’S STORYLINE

Get that big win. Boston College has had a pretty okay season so far, and their winning streak has them moving in the right direction. But unfortunately, their best win in 13 victories this year is probably their 4-3 squeaker against No. 11 Vermont. The Eagles really don’t have that “wow” result this season, and unless BC gets to face Northeastern in the Beanpot Championship, this will be their last opportunity of the regular season to do so. Yeah, Holy Cross is waiting in the wings on Saturday. But the focus right now is solely on Northeastern until 8pm tonight.

PREDICTIONS

Northeastern is 2-0-0 against BC this year with 4-0 and 2-0 shutout wins over the Eagles back in November. Those were the last two losses BC had prior to their seven game winning streak. For some reason, Boston College has really struggled to find the back of the net against the Huskies for the last few years now, even with Patty Kazmaier-winning goaltender Aerin Frankel off the roster and out in the real world.

The offense is starting to hum along a lot better now, so I don’t think BC will get shutout, but with the Huskies one of the few teams hotter than the Eagles right now, we’ll give Northeastern the 4-2 win in game one.

In game two against lowly Holy Cross, BC needs to make sure they don’t get caught on a letdown after the big night the day before against the Huskies — whether it’s because they’re down after a loss or they had a little too much celebration after a big win. Still, this is one of the worst teams in the country; even on a bad night the Eagles should get the win. We’ll call it BC in a 4-1 decision against the Crusaders on Saturday.