By Tim Healey/DFP Staff
This weekend, David Quinn said, was of the utmost importance.
The four Hockey East points were crucial. Building on recent successes was imperative. And, with a home date with Bentley University next week the last game of the semester, heading into a three-week layoff on a high note would have been significant.
But by the end of seven, the Boston University men’s hockey team came away with just one of those points — and very little momentum. The Terriers tied Merrimack College, 1-1, at Agganis Arena Saturday night, hardly salvaging a weekend home-and-home that featured them dropping Friday’s contest, 3-2.
The Warriors (4-9-2, 1-5-2 Hockey East) finished with a 39-24 shot advantage in a continuation of a season-long trend. BU allows an average of 37 shots on goal per game while garnering fewer than 27.
“I don’t know if I’ve seen us that flat and that emotionless as we were in the first 35, 36 minutes,” Quinn said. “We finally started spending some time in the offensive zone, we started skating, playing with a little bit of passion, little bit of enthusiasm. It’s hard in the middle of a hockey game to become enthusiastic and play with passion. I thought we did that.”
Merrimack mostly controlled in the first period, but fortunately for the Terriers, that trend didn’t start until a couple of minutes in.
BU took advantage of those opening moments when junior winger Evan Rodrigues scored a goal — his first since the season opener Oct. 11 — at the 1:47 mark. He took a pass from freshman center Robbie Baillargeon, skated into the slot and rang one off the pipe for the 1-0 lead.
Freshman wing Brendan Collier was awarded the secondary assist on the play, his first point in the scarlet and white.
“I’m really happy with where he is at,” Quinn said of Rodrigues. “It was good to see him get rewarded for all of the hard work he has put in over the last month. And again, we are going to need him to be effective. We are going to need him to be a point producer if we are going to have success.”
Shots were heavily in favor of the Warriors throughout the first two frames — at one point the scoreboard read 27-4 — and the visitors finally capitalized 5:53 into the second when freshman Chris LeBlanc tipped a soft wrister on goal from the top of the circle. The shot snuck through everyone cleanly before deflecting off LeBlanc’s stick to beat O’Connor stick-side.
The Terriers picked up the pace in the third but to no avail outside of 10 shots, more than they had in the first two periods combined.
Sophomore defenseman Matt Grzelcyk finished with a game-high eight shots.
“He was our best defenseman tonight,” said senior captain Garrett Noonan, himself a defenseman. “He took the game over and he played awesome.”
BU’s penalty kill was effective the four times it was called into action, including thrice in the third period.
That was not particularly surprising for Quinn, who was very high on the kill units after a strong week of practice.
“It was almost like when we got the penalty kill, it was almost like we relaxed a little bit and we started skating,” Quinn said. “I almost didn’t put another guy out there after [the penalized player] came out. I said, ‘Let’s just go with four for now and see how this works.’”
If this weekend was as important as DQ says, why did we only get 1 point against the worse team in HE? Was it because DQ couldn’t motivate the players or was it because DQ can’t coach?
I think it’s because of you.
Yea probably. Quinn is known nationally to be a sucky coach. Just look at his pitiful resume. The TEAM USA, AHL and,NHL must not have a clue either since he coached there. Definitely why he was the chosen one. Bu was looking for a guy who can’t motivate his players, can’t put the right players out there and can’t coach at all. Yup, you are exactly right.
I don’t agree with the premise of your question. Right now this is a very young and and not especially talented team. This season we’re suffering from the inconsistent recruiting efforts and numerous early departures of recent years. That being said, I believe freshmen like Roberto, Baillergeon and Somerby among others, have the ability to be good college players, and along with sophs such as Grzelcyk, O’Regan, Lane and O’Connor are setting the foundation for a bright future. Given time, I believe DQ and his staff will bring in the right guys, develop an effective team culture and return the program to its former level of prominence. Rebuilding a program takes time, and there is just no way around that. BC was not very good for the first few seasons after Jerry York took over. I believe we’ll get there. In the meantime, try to enjoy watching the development of the young guys..
Coach Parker took this same group of “losers” to the HO championship game last year. DQ takes these same guys along with one of the top HE recruiting classes and can’t get them to .500. This just proves that DQ is a complete failure as a coach.
Same bunch of players?? Just shows how ignorant you are….look up the term freshman.
The mindless name calling again from DQ family members to distract from DQ’s epic failure as a coach and leader of our hockey program. BC, Northeastern, and Michigan have more freshman than we do and they are doing just fine.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA you’re mad again!!! WOW, lots of spewage from you…..That’s AWESOME!!!
And another ignorant post by someone who knows nothing about the hockey process. And fyi…I’m not a family member or friend for that matter but your constant insulting references to the coach’s family, when all posts are basically anonymous, just proves what a lowly character you are. The poster above was probably calling you out on your yet again, inaccurate statement, that parker led this SAME group to the play offs. Bu has 9 freshmen so it is not the same group at all. So just curious, WHY do you post on here? The only thing you ever post about is your blatant hatred of Quinn…and quite honestly, your statements are laughable. You are making a complete fool of yourself.
Sincerely, a parent of a player that is technically challenged and can’t make a profile.