UPDATED: No. 14/15 BU downs Vermont 4-2 on the road despite lackluster effort

By Sam Dykstra/DFP Staff

BURLINGTON, Vt. — Both on paper and on the ice, the No. 14/15 Boston University men’s hockey team probably shouldn’t have won Sunday.

It set a season-low for shots en route to being routed in that category to the tune of 31-16. Seven penalties against meant that the Terriers’ opponents had ample chances with the man advantage compared to just three of their own. Throw that together for a team that had won just twice since Halloween, and it’d seem that BU should have been doomed for its fourth straight game without a win.

But then again, the game came against lowly University of Vermont, a team that found itself ninth in Hockey East entering Sunday’s game against the third-place Terriers.

And thus, the Terriers (9-5-6, 6-3-4 HE) found a way to do just enough to edge the cellar-dwelling Catamounts (3-11-4, 1-6-3 HE) by a score of 4-2 in Gutterson Fieldhouse thanks to two timely goals by sophomore Alex Chiasson, including BU’s first power-play goal since Dec. 8 against Northeastern University, and high-quality netminding from junior Kieran Millan (29 saves).

“In general, I was very unimpressed with my team tonight,” said BU coach Jack Parker. “I thought our goaltender played great. We got a power-play goal, which turned out to be the game-winning goal, on a real nice play. We moved the puck around at other times on the power play so that’s a step in the right direction. Other than that, I didn’t see much I liked.

“They deserved the better fate because they played so hard. It’s hard to win in this league because you’ve got to play hard all the time, and Vermont played hard for 60 minutes. I don’t think we played real hard. You could count on one hand the amount of minutes we played real hard.”

Chiasson, who was coming off a left knee contusion that kept him out of BU’s 3-3 tie with No. 11/12 University of Notre Dame was arguably the best player on the ice for either side. His two goals, which put him in a tie with senior Joe Pereira for the team lead with eight, put the Terriers ahead both times, and his power-play goal off a near-perfect centering pass from freshman linemate Charlie Coyle to put BU up for good ended the Terriers’ long stretch without a power-play goal.

Despite his play, Chiasson echoed his coach’s comments about the team’s lackluster play in the win.

“Guys think everything’s going to come easy,” he said. “We came here, and Kieran saved up the game. They outshot us by 15 shots. That’s not right at all. We’ve got to play harder and come to play every night. It’s after Christmas now. Every game’s a playoff game. We’ve got to figure it out.”

At the outset, BU’s struggles were very evident.

The Terriers started the first period losing both the shots and faceoff battles 7-1. Earlier on a two-on-one break for Vermont, freshman defenseman Garrett Noonan attempted to deflect a centering pass from UVM’s Chris McCarthy away from the crease but instead ended up sending the puck into the back of the net.

BU found a way to rebound before the period was out. Sophomore defenseman Max Nicastro slammed home the equalizer on a one-timer seven minutes later thanks to a nicely designed faceoff setup. Moments later, Chiasson scored his seventh goal of the season to give the Terriers their first lead of the contest.

The struggles though returned in the second as BU managed just three shots on net the entire period, with two of those coming on a two-minute power-play opportunity six minutes in. Luckily for the Terrier offense, Millan, who improved his record to 6-3-6, held his ground to stop all 10 Vermont shots to keep both offenses as cold as the temperature inside Gutterson Fieldhouse.

The scoring picked up again in the third. Vermont scored its own equalizer 3:31 into the period when Josh Burrows was able to poke the puck through the scrum and into the net for his first goal of the season.

However, it was Chiasson again that put BU ahead with a one-timer on the power play at the 7:01 mark. The right-winger took a pass from Coyle – another BU returner who was coming back from a bronze-medal finish with the Team USA at the World Junior Championship – and placed it high above Vermont goalie Rob Madore’s blocker to make 3-2 in favor of the Terriers.

The goal came as a result of a week loaded with studying NHL teams, particularly the Detroit Red Wings and Pittsburgh Penguins, to see how special teams are played at the professional level. BU ended the game 1-for-3 with the man advantage.

Junior center Corey Trivino easily slid in an empty-netter in the game’s final minute to give BU the two-goal win.

As nice as it was to take two points in a conference road game, the Terriers know that they need to right the ship quickly from all of its players if they have any hope of maintaining a top-four seed as the season continues.

“In general, we had two or three guys who played hard, but as a team, we have nowhere near the intensity or the determination you need to win in this league,” Parker said. “We just stole two points tonight.”