By Kevin Dillon/DFP Staff
Boston College men’s hockey captain Pat Mullane argued with the referees twice as he glided to the penalty box in the first period of No. 1 BC’s. 4–2 win over No. 11/12 Boston University Sunday. He earned two of the three penalties the Eagles took in the first frame, which gave BU several chances to tie the game after it fell behind in the first minute.
The early power-play opportunities did not help the Terriers though, as they did not capitalize on any of their three chances in the first period or any of their first six chances in the game.
“We did not play well on our power play and we made it kind of easy for them to kill it,” said BU coach Jack Parker. “We really struggled and halfway through the game we got it straightened out a little, but we really struggled the first couple.”
On BU’s first power play, sophomore forward Matt Nieto had a shot on goal, but the team did not generate any more good scoring chances as BC cleared the puck five times. BU struggled to get the puck across the blue line and the power play set up inside the offensive zone.
Santana had it right: it was the speed of the game that led to BU’s struggles on the powerplay.
Dump & chase on the powerplay does not work against BC, or other teams with fast-skating defensemen, who only have to beat the forwards and clear it out.
As Santana said, once they had the opportunity to move the puck around the powerplay was fine. Well they only got to move it around when they carried the puck into the offensive zone.
BTW, Oksanen is as good at passing the puck out of the zone as anyone that BU has had in awhile. Great hands and vision. Just needs to work on his speed afoot.