BU women’s hockey swept by No. 2 Minnesota in Minneapolis

The Boston University women’s hockey team lost both games to the University of Minnesota in a two-game series at Ridder Arena in Minneapolis.

The Golden Gophers (4-0-0) were ranked second in the country coming into this series, and they may turn out to be the toughest opponent BU (1-2-0) faces all season. The Terriers got to rip the bandaid off in their first road trip.

Game 1

BU did not roll over to a star-studded roster in the first game.

The defense shined the brightest, but none brighter than senior goaltender Callie Shanahan. Shanahan looked like a star in her season debut, stopping 40 of the 41 shots she faced, the third-highest total of her career.

“Her time to shine,” head coach Tara Watchorn said postgame. “She’s put the work in, and there was no doubt that she was gonna perform on a big stage like this.”

The Terriers absorbed 23 shots in the defensive zone, too, taking away shooting lanes and clogging up the middle of the ice. They were under a lot of pressure coming from the Minnesota offense, but they were able to keep the puck from hitting the back of the net until the last two minutes.

Graduate defenseman Tamara Giaquinto led the team with five blocked shots, and graduate defenseman Julia Shaunessy had a potentially game-changing backcheck on a one-on-one chance toward the end of the first period, tracking Gopher redshirt senior and United States Olympian Abbey Murphy and poking the puck away before Murphy could get a shot off.

The Terriers had a few good looks on offense, including a 3-0n-1 chance that ended in a Skylar Vetter save for Minnesota. The other most promising opportunity was a penalty shot awarded to junior forward Lilli Welcke after she stormed the net right out of the penalty box and was hooked by Minnesota freshman defenseman Chloe Primerano.

The game ultimately came down to the final three minutes.

Junior forward Riley Walsh, in her first season as a Terrier after coming over from Union College, was called for direct contact with the head on a play right in front of the Minnesota bench with just two and a half minutes remaining in the third period. She was assessed for a five-minute major, sending the Gophers to the power play with under two minutes left in regulation.

Junior forward Josefin Bouveng tried to slam the puck home from the point, and the shot deflected off senior forward Peyton Hemp who was set up as a screen. Through the traffic, Murphy was able to tuck the rebound in just past the end of Shanahan’s right pad. 

The Terriers were unable to recover with just over a minute left in the game, and the final buzzer proved the one goal to be the difference in the first game, a 1-0 victory for Minnesota.

“We worked to prove that we can represent this program against the best in the country, and we’re definitely going to take all the stuff that we’ve learned and just keep building off of it,” Watchorn said.

Game 2

The second matchup was less even than the first.

Despite Shanahan’s performance on Friday, sophomore Mari Pietersen took her spot in net for game two.

Pietersen had a strong performance in her start against Merrimack College on Tuesday, but after Shanahan’s debut against the Gophers two days earlier, the net seemed like hers to lose.

It would have been unfair to ask Pietersen to try and replicate Shanahan’s success, and she didn’t.

Minnesota scored its first goal 16 minutes into the first period. Junior forward Lilli Welcke shot the puck off Gopher freshman goalie Hannah Clark, making her home debut, and the Gophers were able to flock to the rebound in the corner and start an offensive rush.

Hemp took the puck through the neutral zone and passed it to fifth-year forward Natalie Mlynkova, who dumped the puck to sophomore forward Ava Lindsey in traffic up the middle. Lindsey was able to get the puck out across and back to Hemp, who drove the shot home from a sharp angle on Pietersen’s blocker side.

The second period was riddled with penalties, including a two-man advantage for the Gophers when Walsh and sophomore forward Alex Law were sent to the box for elbowing and tripping respectively. The penalty kill held up, though, preventing Minnesota from converting.

Riding off the PK momentum, senior defenseman Maggie Hanzel slammed a one-timer at Clark, and the puck bounced off a defender’s stick through freshman forward Lola Reid back to Welcke, who netted the tying goal from the slot with a wide-open net.

The boost was short-lived as Shaunessy was called for slashing not even one minute later, awarding Minnesota a penalty shot. BU hadn’t faced a penalty shot since 2022, though they were unable to take advantage when they had their own opportunity earlier in the weekend.

Murphy took the puck past the blue line slowly before pulling off a Datsyuk flip over Pietersen’s glove and into the net to give the Gophers back the lead.

Senior forward Ella Huber tacked on a third Gopher goal before the second period ended, and junior defenseman Sydney Morrow gave Minnesota a three-goal lead shortly into the third.

The Terriers found an answer in a Walsh goal with 18 minutes left to go, but Minnesota answered right back with another goal to reinstate the three-goal lead and were able to take their foot off the gas for the last 16 minutes of the period.

The Terriers fell for the second time, 5-2, in a much different game from the first. Pietersen stopped 21 of the shots she faced, but the team was unable to keep up with their opponent.

“The score I don’t think replicated what we did on the ice,” Watchorn said. “We had way more shots; we generated offense; we generated some sustained zone time, and there was a lot of good takeaways from today.”

The road does not get much easier as the Terriers head back to Boston to face No. 13 Northeastern University in a home-and-home series, with the first game at Matthews Arena at 7 p.m. on Oct. 11 and the second matchup set for 3 p.m. on Oct. 12 at Agganis Arena.