#8 BC Women's Hockey Sweeps Vermont

With the regular season rapidly approaching its conclusion, the Eagles have very little margin for error if they want to make the NCAA tournament. Friday and Saturday afternoons, the Eagles took 5-2 and 2-0 victories against the Catamounts to leapfrog Boston University into 8th in the Pairwise rankings.

The story of the weekend was that the Eagles would have to play both games without leading scorer Haley Skarupa, reportedly day-to-day with an undisclosed injury. Already on the outside looking in with two games against the third place team in Hockey East in front of them, they couldn't afford another letdown like last week's tie against Northeastern.

The weekend didn't start out well at all as the Eagles game out sluggish and Vermont took an early 1-0 lead. But it only took BC seven seconds to pull level with the Catamounts. It was the only seven seconds of the weekend that they would trail.

With the game tied at 1 midway through the game, Dana Trivigno took the lead for good to put the Eagles up 2-1 on a filthy snipe on the power play.

It was a lead they wouldn't relinquish, as they poured on three more goals in the third period. The Cats scored one of their own on the power play in garbage time, but the Eagles finished up with a quality 5-2 final.

The Eagles wouldn't trail at all on Saturday, as they never did surrender a goal. BC started out stronger than Friday and was rewarded with a goal -- the eventual game-winner -- thirteen minutes into the first. Somehow Emily Pfalzer managed an even more impressive snipe than Trivigno's from the previous afternoon.

A third period goal from freshman Andie Anastos sealed the deal after a very slow second period. BC's third period was very strong, however, and the Vermont goaltender (who made save after save throughout the game) wasn't even able to vacate her net for the extra attacker until there were just 10 seconds left in the game.

Saturday's game was interesting in that while Vermont did manage 34 shots on goal, the Eagles did carry possession for the majority of the game. But interestingly, the Catamounts were able to put together a half dozen 2-on-1 rushes. Fortunately, goaltender Corinne Boyles was equal to the task.

BC's march through middling competition continues next weekend in a home-and-home against the UNH Wildcats, who handed the Eagles their first loss of the season back in October. If the Eagles want to sustain their recent climb into tournament contention, they'll need to take care of business in both games. Hopefully they'll have their star forward back in the lineup.