GOAL BY GOAL: BC Hockey Can't Overcome Early Deficit To Vermont

There will be a game three.

With an opportunity to punch their tickets to the Garden, BC hockey stumbled early, falling behind to Vermont 2-0 in the first period. They never did fully recover, as the Catamounts held on to force a decisive game three at Conte Forum on Sunday night.

If you like special teams goals, you're going to love this recap.

That's all we had in this game. Unfortunately, BC's much improved power play has been accompanied by an increasingly horrible penalty kill. SCORCHING HOT TAKE, I know, but given that both of Vermont's non-ENG's came on the power play, it's probably fair to say that BC's penalties and poor penalty kill lost them the game.

BC didn't play that badly -- they put 40 shots on net and seemed to have a good number of chances -- but it just was not to be.

Vermont Goal #1 (PPG): 8:54 of the 1st period
Brady Shaw (Brendan Bradley, Alexxxxxxxxx Privitera)

UVM 1, BC 0

It's hard to pinpoint what went wrong for BC here. Should the BC defenseman have been playing tighter on Shaw? Maybe, but it's easy to say that knowing what the end result was going to be. What ends up happening is Shaw goes from the corner to the half wall, before saying 'screw it,' skating toward center and just firing off a wrist shot.

Nothing fancy; Demko can presumably see it and it's not a super terrifying chance, but it goes in. Frustrating.

Vermont Goal #2 (PPG, GWG): 16:36 of the 1st period
Brady Shaw (Mike Paliotta, Jake Fallon)

UVM 2, BC 0

Fast forward and you have almost the exact same play. This time, instead of skating in from the corner to the half way, Shaw skates down from the low point to the half wall before once again taking the space given to him by the BC defender, putting himself in a place where he can at least try his luck.

Once again, I don't think Demko was screened. Maybe he wasn't expecting such a bold shot. But I'm guessing he would probably like both of those goals back.

Vermont had some other chances, obviously, but BC carried play for the vast majority of 5 on 5 play. Once they got a power play of their own, they returned the favor.

Boston College Goal #1: 14:14 of the 2nd period
Ryan Fitzgerald (Michael Matheson)

UVM 2, BC 1

My God, what is with these goals? All three from just about the same spot on the ice (this one mirrored to the near circle), with the exact same seemingly harmless wrist shot.

You can't even really fault Vermont's defense on this goal. With BC on a 4 on 3, there's a ton of open ice, but the Vermont defender on Fitzgerald actually stays with him pretty well, cutting off his line to the net and forcing him out a bit. But Fitzgerald gets some good muscle on it and it beats Hoffman to cut the lead in half.

That's as close as BC would come, though. They challenged in the third period and probably should have scored a couple different times, but they couldn't get the equalizer. A late empty netter from the Catamounts put the game out of reach for good, for a final of 3-1.

BC will have to give it another shot on Sunday night, with a 6pm start on NESN to determine who punches their ticket to the TD Garden for the Hockey East semifinals.