BC Women’s Hockey vs. Boston University: Final Thoughts & Prediction

This is going to sound pretty unbelievable, but there’s just one week left in the regular season. After Boston College Women’s Hockey takes on Boston University this evening, there are just three games left on the docket: Tuesday’s Beanpot championship, and a home-and-home next weekend against Providence.

Normally it might be easy to start looking ahead... but with the Battle of Comm Ave tonight, the hated Boston University Terriers will certainly have BC’s full attention.

WHO

Boston College Eagles (17-12-1, 14-10-0 WHEA)
at Boston University Terriers (10-16-3, 9-12-3 WHEA)

WHAT

The Battle of Comm Ave

WHERE

Walter Brown Arena
Allston, MA

WHEN

Saturday, February 11th, 2023
6:00pm EST

HOW TO WATCH

Tonight’s game, like all Hockey East conference games, will be streamed live on ESPN+. Here is a direct link to the game.

THE TRENDS

Boston University has quietly put together a respectable stretch of games. They’ve gone 3-1-3 in their last seven against some solid league competition (winning the shootout in all three of those “tied” games, for what it’s worth), including a win over #11 Vermont and a tie with #13 Providence. That’s really not bad for a team that started out looking like they were as bad as anyone in the league early on. In their last contest, they hung in there for a while against #5 Northeastern before ultimately falling 4-1 — probably a worse final score than they deserved.

Boston College has started to find its footing as well. The Eagles have won three straight, all via shutout, outscoring Merrimack, #11 Providence, and Harvard by a combined score of 10-0. The Eagles looked great against BU earlier in the season, but with the Terriers playing a lot better right now, this should be a competitive contest.

PROJECTIONS

KRACH (used for odds) has BC ranked 17th and BU in 23rd. Running the numbers gives us the Eagles with an 71.01% chance of winning, or BC -245 with your local bookie.

The GRaNT rankings (used for point spread) likes both teams a bit better, with the Eagles in 15th and the Terriers 21st. Our calculator gives us a projected score of 2.80 to 1.61 in favor of the Eagles, or something like a 3-2 BC win.

THIS WEEK’S STORYLINE

Watching The Standings. Normally I’d be worried about the Eagles focusing on this game instead of looking ahead to the Beanpot on Tuesday, but it’s pretty hard to overlook your rivals. With only three league games remaining, banking points in this game is going to have some important implications.

The way the standings are shaking out, BC needs to get 7 out of 9 available points in their final three games to climb to 3rd in the Hockey East standings. Anything fewer than that and they’re probably looking at 5th, with 5th place UConn finishing with three games against Holy Cross and 3rd place Providence the opponent the Eagles will face next weekend.

PREDICTION

BC’s home/road splits are not great. The Eagles are just 6-7-0 away from Conte Forum this year and 11-5-1 at home. Indeed, home-and-home against BU earlier this season followed that trend, with BC dominating at home for a 3-0 win and just barely squeaking by at Walter Brown the next day by a score of 5-4.

The way both teams are playing, this is going to be a pretty close game. BC really needs to take this one in regulation, and I think they’ll just barely do so with a 3-2 win.