Looking to regain momentum after the Beanpot Championship overtime loss on Tuesday, the Boston University women’s hockey team (11-12-3, 9-9-1 Hockey East) hoped to start the home-and-home weekend series against Holy Cross (6-16-2, 3-13-2 HE) on a high note.
The Terriers ultimately fell 2-1 in a tightly contested matchup, giving the Crusaders their first win since Nov. 28 and their first regulation Hockey East win of the season.
“We’ve found a really productive way to debrief as a group and they’ve really had ownership over defining our success,” BU head coach Tara Watchorn said postgame.
“I’m really learning, how do we keep growing through wins and losses through big games, not so big games, and so we debrief like we do any other game and we had a lot of good thoughts coming from the Beanpot to the good with us.”
Holy Cross started out collecting the majority of any loose pucks early in the game, getting six shots off in the first five minutes while BU had none. The Crusaders’ momentum fell flat though, when junior forward Ani FitzGerald’s absurd shot from center ice got through sophomore goaltender Brooke Loranger to put the Terriers up 1-0 five minutes into the game. This one marked FitzGerald’s third goal in the Terrier’s last four games.
The remainder of the period played out pretty evenly, with both teams exchanging penalties. The Terriers continued to generate plenty of dangerous opportunities but were unable to capitalize on any of them — a tale that continued throughout the game and into the final moments when, what would’ve been a game-tying shot for the Terriers, hit the post.
“There are a lot of those opportunities where we’re near the end of the shift and you just can’t connect there, bury them and put it home and I think, we have shorter shifts that we’ll be able to kind of execute on those vital moments when the opportunities are there,” Watchorn said.
In the second, the momentum again started with Holy Cross, aided by the remaining 1:38 of an Alex Law penalty, but the score stayed 1-0 in favor of BU.
Moments after leaving the penalty box for a body-checking call on Alexia Moreau, the sophomore forward found herself on an odd-man rush and got a backdoor shot past freshman goaltender Mari Pietersen.
After some more back-and-forth between the Terriers and the Crusaders, as the game got chippier, senior forward Catherine Foulem went to the box for roughing. Despite a league-high 90.7 percent penalty kill stat line, the Terriers could not hold off the Crusader pressure any longer. Sophomore forward Lewis Lane whiffed and the puck got over to senior forward Bryn Saarela, who buried it to put the Crusaders ahead 2-1.
The Terriers never found a way to come back from the one-goal deficit, even though they came out in the third period with quite a few dangerous chances and finished the game with the extra attacker.
“I feel good that we’re gonna bounce back tomorrow,” Watchorn said. “Just realizing that it takes a little things and we can’t think about the outcome. You can’t think about the end. We got to be in the moment with each other and play for each other and do all the little things right.”
The Terriers will next travel to Holy Cross on Saturday night. Puck drop is scheduled for 7 p.m., and the Boston Hockey Blog will have full coverage of the matchup, so be sure to follow along on Twitter (X) @BOShockeyblog and Instagram @boston.hockey.blog.
Recent Comments