Playoff hockey is so good, right? Last week Boston College Women’s Hockey dropped the puck on the postseason with a couple wins over UConn, and game two was an all-timer. It was a roller coaster 5-4 affair that the Eagles won in overtime, and the game was full of emotion.
Now, somehow, BC is going to have to find a way up the intensity to a level beyond that for far and away their biggest game of the season, and their biggest non-NCAA tournament game in, really, years. This game — even more so than a potential Hockey East final! — could be the difference between getting into a winnable NCAA quarterfinal game (and getting mathematically locked into the tournament, with the right results elsewhere) and being out of the tournament entirely.
Oh, and it’s BC-BU. There is that little nugget. This exact game in this exact matchup in this exact situation has been hotly anticipated since the Beanpot, when BC’s loss the Terriers threw a wrench into BC’s Pairwise positioning. It’s a massive game. It really doesn’t get much better than this.
WHO
No. 8 Boston University Terriers (21-7-8, 15-6-6 WHEA)
vs. No. 6 Boston College Eagles (25-10-1, 19-7-1 WHEA)
WHAT
BC vs. BU: The Hockey East Semifinals
WHERE
Schneider Arena
Providence, RI
WHEN
Saturday, March 9th, 2019
4:30pm EST
HOW TO WATCH
The good news this week is that the semifinals and finals of the Hockey East tournament will be on honest-to-goodness HDTV this weekend, with NESNplus picking up the feed. The bad news is that if you aren’t in the New England area or don’t otherwise have NESN as part of your cable package, you’re going to be out $30 for a monthly subscription to FloHockey.tv to watch the games. So stupid.
PROJECTIONS
KRACH has the Eagles just slightly favored, with BC at a 54.71% chance of winning. That is close! Rivalry game indeed.
GRaNT has it even closer, as the two teams are neck and neck at 5th and 6th. The model has a score projection of 2.63 to 2.48, which you’d normally call as a 2-2 or 3-3 tie... but they’ll play until we have a winner, so it won’t be either of those!
LAST TIME OUT
Boston College had a good (if a little too exciting) weekend against UConn in their Hockey East quarterfinal, winning game one in your run-of-the-mill 4-1 victory before winning an absolute thriller 5-4 in OT in game two. The Eagles are playing their best hockey of the season and are on a 12-1-1 run dating back to mid-January.
Boston University had themselves a much more boring weekend, sweeping New Hampshire 5-1 and 3-1 in their quarterfinal to advance. The Terriers are red-hot as well, going 13-1-3 in their last 17 games.
This game is going to be nuts.
THIS WEEK’S STORYLINE
Oh my God, what aren’t the storylines this week? It’s BC vs. BU. It’s two red-hot teams. It’s two teams looking to advance to Sunday and play for a trophy. And perhaps even more importantly, it’s two teams playing for the NCAA tournament lives. I mean, look at this mess. BU needs to win to even have a chance to make the tournament. BC can still get in if they lose, but is getting shipped west to Minnesota or Wisconsin really all that different from not making the tournament at all?
BIG QUESTIONS
Will Daryl Watts suit up this weekend after leaving game two against UConn in the second period and not returning? Is BC’s freshman goaltender ready for the pressure of real, big-time playoff hockey? Will the Eagles play this neutral site game like they’re on the road or will they not be awful? If this game goes to overtime, will I survive it? Can’t we get, like, ECAC refs for this deal or what?
RANDOM, POSSIBLY INCORRECT FACT FROM BOSTON UNIVERSITY’S WIKIPEDIA PAGE
Boston University traces its roots to the establishment of the Newbury Biblical Institute in Newbury, Vermont in 1839
[Heartily clears throat]
NOT FROM BOSTONNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN
ICE CREAM OF THE WEEK
Turkey Hill All Natural Vanilla Bean & Chocolate
My local non-chain grocery store here in Madison, CT doesn’t have a huge selection of ice cream, and it seems like they rotate through just a few relatively simple flavors. So when my wife and I were on a big “WE NEED ICE CREAM” kick this week, we figured we’d just grab the old chocolate & vanilla standard and roll with it.
Turns out, this stuff is pretty great! Look at that ingredient list. This is some old-school legit ice cream. You don’t need anything fancy, you don’t need the added drama of walnuts or fudge or whatever... nothing manufactured about this here ice cream. And no manufactured drama of today’s game against BU. Just a simple ingredient list of Rivalry, Playoffs, Tournament Implications, and Hot Streaks. Awesome.
GAME TIME SONG OF THE WEEK
Panic! At The Disco — The Greatest Show
Don’t fight it, it’s comin’ for you, runnin’ at ya
It’s only this moment, don’t care what comes after
It’s blindin’, outshinin’ anything that you know
Just surrender ‘cause you’re callin’ and you wanna goWhere it’s covered in all the colored lights
Where the runaways are runnin’ the night
Impossible comes true, intoxicatin’ you
Oh, this is the greatest show
Is there any explanation needed? On paper this game should be a blockbuster. Get hype.
PREDICTION
This game is going to be extremely uncomfortable. At no point will either team pull out to a multi-goal lead, unless there’s an empty net involved. I was guilty of predicting BU was going to be hot garbage this year after losing almost all of their scoring to graduation, and they’ve been, in my opinion, far and away the biggest surprise in women’s hockey this season.
The Terriers are good and their sophomore phenom Jesse Compher is scary. She has 60 points (!), more than anyone in the country that doesn’t hang out with someone named Loren Gabel. And BC doesn’t need a reminder of how talented BU is, because the Terriers have taken two of three from the Eagles this year.
Give me a 3-2 BC win, probably in overtime. This game is going to be a heart attack on ice and I cannot wait to be there for it.