BOSTON — As Jay Pandolfo walked back to his side of the ice after shaking hands with Boston College coach Greg Brown, the Beanpot banner at TD Garden dropping from the sky behind him, two figures in dark suits and black beanies emerged from the tunnel.
Pandolfo, finally a champion of this tournament as a head coach, extended an arm to the figure on his right for an aggressive high five, then reeled him in and shook him vigorously.
It was Macklin Celebrini.
Celebrini, lighting it up as a rookie with the San Jose Sharks after winning the Hobey Baker Award at BU last season, was back in town for a game that couldn’t get much bigger. Lane Hutson, his former partner in crime, was back too. They had spoken to the coaches before the game, read the starters to the team in the locker room, scurried up to BU’s student section on separate occasions and, now, they watched along as the Terriers celebrated a title that, somehow, neither of them won.
“Beforehand, they were both so nervous,” Pandolfo said later. “It was really funny to see.”
This year’s Terriers have not been the team Celebrini and Hutson’s were. When BU wasn’t the No. 1 team in the country last season, it was usually No. 2 or No. 3; this BU team started No. 3 and almost immediately began to free fall down to as low as No. 15. These Terriers (16-10-1) have already lost as many games as those Terriers. And before this Beanpot final, Pandolfo’s third BU team didn’t look all that capable of reaching the Frozen Four, like his first two did.
Then Monday night happened, and it wasn’t just that the No. 9 Terriers finally won another Beanpot, it was how they did it and who they did it against.
“They were better than us,” said Brown, coach of the No. 1 Eagles and national title favorites.
And think about what that means. Before Monday, BU was 1-4-1 against top-ten opponents. There have been myriad problems for the Terriers this season, but their results against the opponents they’re supposed to be competing for a national title with was perhaps the most alarming. Getting swept by the Eagles in late January — without scoring an even-strength goal over 120 minutes — felt like an indictment, even if BU actually thought it played quite well in the second game.
In the Beanpot final, though, BU peppered 44 shots on the net of a team that came in allowing only 26.2 per game, 10th best in the country and 2nd in Hockey East. BC — giving up a staggering 1.8 goals a night — allowed four for only the fifth time this season.
BU’s three non-empty net goals were all from a freshmen class with a ton of responsibility on its shoulders, and all three were no accidents, either. Fourth-liner Brandon Svoboda equalized off a BC turnover, firing a wrister into the top of the net from the circle. Less than two minutes later, defenseman Cole Hutson sniped the top corner from the opposite circle. And in the third period, Eiserman forced another BC giveaway then slid a backhanded shot through the five hole of Jacob Fowler and his .936 save percentage.
That’s just BU’s best players making plays on the biggest stage, something Hutson and Celebrini made a habit of doing during their time on Comm. Ave.
“They were able to capitalize off our mistakes,” Brown said. “They’re a good hockey team.”
Of course, it helped that when the Terriers made their mistakes — and there were plenty in the first period — goalie Mikhail Yegorov (43 saves) was there to bail them out. It is unbelievable what the Eberly Award winner, awarded to the netminder with the tournament’s best save percentage, is doing. It almost feels wrong to call him a freshman, given he was in the Bahamas acquiring a student visa a month before being mobbed by his teammates at the final horn at TD Garden.
BU couldn’t have won without him. The Terriers were “under siege,” during a first period in which BC was outshooting BU 15-2 at one point, and if not for Yegorov, BU’s intermission deficit would’ve been far worse than a goal.
If the Terriers are to reach the heights they want to this season, they’ll need a goalie capable of bringing them there, and senior Mathieu Caron had suffered through too many low moments through the first half of the season. So Pandolfo threw Yegorov into the fire at Conte Forum two weeks ago, and in the four games since, BU has allowed just three even-strength goals.
“Yeah — he’s unreal,” Beanpot MVP Cole Hutson said of Yegorov. “He’s been the backbone of our team since he got here.”
In the 2024 Beanpot final, BU didn’t have that. Celebrini and Lane Hutson both scored but Caron allowed four goals on 17 shots. BU lost in overtime.
“He does not get caught up in the moment,” Pandolfo said of Yegorov. “He enjoys the moment. He thrives in the moment.”
Big moments were when Pandolfo’s two BU teams before this one — so freakin’ good otherwise — struggled to deliver. His third team hasn’t been as good as the first two game in and game out. But with a trophy on the line? These Terriers are now two for two.
BU was 1-2 in the Hockey East final, 0-2 in the Beanpot and 0-2 at the Frozen Four under Pandolfo entering this season. In September, Pandolfo pointed to the “little things,” as the reason for his program’s struggles in big games.
But on Monday night:
“They were doing all the little things right,” Brown said.
It’s been a constant struggle for BU this season. Three days before the Beanpot, the Terriers sleepwalked through an overtime loss at Merrimack and Pandolfo was fuming. Celebrini and Lane Hutson’s BU simply didn’t lay that type of egg; the team after them has laid plenty.
But on Monday night, these Terriers proved they can still go all the way.
“Our group knows,” Pandolfo said, “we can play with the best in college hockey.”
More reading on BU men’s hockey:
- BU wins 32nd Beanpot title with 4-1 win over BC
- BU falls flat, loses to Merrimack 2-1 in OT
- BU dominates Harvard in Beanpot semifinal
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