By Jake Seiner/DFP Staff
The No. 5/7 Boston University men’s hockey team was dominant in nearly every fashion Friday night against Northeastern University.
The Terriers outshot the Huskies, 43-20, and controlled the pace of play for nearly the entire game. BU ripped 19 shots on net in over 15 minutes of power-play time, and blocked more than a third of Northeastern’s shot attempts.
In the end, about the only thing the Terriers did not have was NU freshman Chris Rawlings in net. The rookie made all the difference as Northeastern blanked BU, 1-0, at Matthews Arena. It was the first time BU was shutout on the road since March 15, 2004.
Rawlings turned away 43 BU (2-4-0, 1-3-0 Hockey East) shots, including 19 with NU (3-3-0, 1-2-0), on the penalty kill.
“He’s starting to get into a rhythm psychologically,” NU coach Greg Cronin said of Rawlings. “This position is such a mental position.
“There was a boatload of [shots] on the power play –– point blank shots, and hey, he was terrific.”
Rather than fold under the pressure of facing a “boatload” of shots, Rawlings said the constant barrage of pucks helped him maintain focus.
“I can’t stand when I don’t get a lot of shots,” Rawlings said. “I need a lot of shots so I can stay in the game.”
The teams played scoreless into the third period until the Huskies capitalized on a penalty by BU freshman Alex Chiasson 11:37 into the final frame. Exactly one minute into the power play, NU junior Mike Hewkin fired a shot from the center-point position. Junior Wade McLeod screened the shot, and the puck bounced off the pads of BU sophomore netminder Kieran Millan.
The puck slid to the top-right corner of the crease, where McLeod located and pushed the puck past Millan and over the goal line. It was McLeod’s third tally of the young season, and put Northeastern up, 1-0.
Just over three minutes later, Hewkin gave an already buzzing Terrier squad a golden opportunity to knot the game and potentially take the lead. The junior leveled Chiasson from behind into the NU half wall, and was handed a five-minute major and a game misconduct with 4:09 left in regulation.
The Terriers, who had dictated the pace of play since the second period, unleashed a flurry of scoring chances on the final man advantage.
Twice, junior Colby Cohen flicked passes from the point to sophomore Chris Connolly, who redirected the puck on net. Both times, Rawlings turned the sophomore away and left BU with no rebound opportunities.
Connolly, who led all players with eight shots on goal, sparked BU’s best scoring chance of the night. The sophomore flew around the back of the cage tried wrapping the puck around on Rawlings. Connolly beat Rawlings five-hole, but Rawlings got enough of the puck with the inside of one of his legs to slow it significantly. The puck trickled through the crease parallel to the goal line, inducing a massive scurry in front of the NU cage and frenzied an already raucous Matthews Arena.
The puck crept through the crease for three or four seconds before a Husky player located it with his stick and flipped it out of the zone.
In the game’s waning seconds, the Terriers wound up for two final shots, but NU defenders blocked both attempts. The horn sounded to end the game and capped off a 0-for-7 showing for the Terriers on the power play.
Despite the story on the stat sheet, the BU power play had one of its best performances of the season.
Coming into Friday, the Terriers were scoring on just 17.2 percent of their extra-man chances, and had been plagued by often horrendous puck possession and composure in the attacking zone.
Friday night, the Terriers in-zone passing game took a major step forward. Parker said junior Kevin Shattenkirk and Colby Cohen played their best games of the season, and the pair was in rare form at the points of BU’s power play. Aided by slick wing-to-wing cross-slot passing from Connolly and sophomore Vinny Saponari, the Terriers averaged almost three shots per power-play chance.
“We had a lot of good plays,” Parker said. “We were poised with the puck. We got the puck in the zone. We got control of the puck in the zone.”
The power play improvements were a reflection of a more focused and intense effort, according to Parker. The same concentration and energy also helped BU prevail in a number of 1-on-1 loose-puck chances and win 39-of-69 faceoffs –– a far cry from last Saturday’s 19-for-60 showing against the No. 8 University of Massachusetts-Lowell.
“I thought we came to play tonight,” Parker said. “It was like night and day from the last game. We came with an effort. We came with a lot of brains. We came with a lot of focus. We came with a lot of intensity. All the things we measure our team by, we would say we won this game tonight by the things we measure.
“I’d be very, very happy to continue playing the way we are.”
Kibbles and Bits
Northeastern junior Tyler McNeely suffered an elbow injury in the first period and was not on the ice or the bench for the second and third periods. Cronin declined to comment further on the extent of the injury after the game. . . . Northeastern hit two posts Friday, including one off the crossbar when an isolated McNeely beat Millan gloveside midway through the first period. . . . The Terriers registered at least two shots on every power-play chance they had Friday. . . . Sophomore David Warsofsky, who missed Friday’s game with an injury to the adductor muscle in his hip, will not decide until Sunday if he’ll play when BU travels to the University of Maine.
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