The Boston University men’s hockey team (1-0-0, 0-0-0 HE) hosted the University of Waterloo Warriors (0-0-0) for an exhibition game before the group heads to University of Michigan next weekend. The Terriers had contributions from up and down the lineup in the 7-1 victory.
“A lot to be happy about tonight –– I thought for the most part we played the right way,” head coach Jay Pandolfo said in the post game press conference. “It was really nice to see some other guys that didn’t play the first game get a chance to play tonight and contribute.”
BU dressed their entire roster –– minus Wilmer Skoog and Luke Tuch –– for tonight’s competition, giving guys the chance to step up and earn real gametime minutes. Pandolfo said he liked what he saw from junior defenseman Thomas Jarman and sophomore forward Tristan Amonte.
From puck drop, the Terriers were all over Waterloo and established a solid forecheck within the opening minutes. There was a lot of open ice and BU came out with an opportunistic style of play, throwing rubber on net from all over the offensive zone.
The Warriors are physically a much larger team, but the Terriers still played a threatening game and used their speed to their advantage. Through the 60 minutes, the scarlet and white were first to pucks and consistently moved the action up ice.
“The speed of our guys, the pace we play at, I think that made a big difference for us tonight,” Pandolfo said. “I thought we were on pucks, I thought we were transitioning really fast.”
Waterloo got their first and only goal at 12:50 off an odd-man rush. Freshman forward Nate Bierd dished a cross-crease pass to fifth-year forward Andrew Cordssen-David who knocked it in on the doorstep and gave the Warriors a 1-0 advantage.
Senior forward Matt Brown had been showcasing his stick-work in the first period before tying the game at one apiece. Following a scrum in front of Waterloo’s net, Brown collected the coughed-up puck and tapped it home at 15:44.
“It always feels good getting one, especially since we put up so many tonight,” Brown said in the post game press conference. “It’s a good game for our team to sharpen up, and our focus now is shifted to Michigan.”
En route to his eventual hat trick, freshman forward Quinn Hutson headlined the middle frame with two tallys. His first of the night was a slap shot from the inside of the right circle, dealt to him by freshman linemate and forward Jeremy Wilmer. The goal at 6:21 was yet another showing of the chemistry the “kid line” has created early in the season.
Q. Hutson then lifted BU to a 3-1 lead at 13:49 off a back-hand pass from the left pipe by junior forward Dylan Peterson that he dumped past the goal line while stationed in front. By the end of the second period, the Terriers were leading 47-9 in SOG and continued to find their swagger.
“He knows how to put the puck in the net, he has that skill,” Pandolfo said of Q. Hutson. “It’s not easy to do but he can shoot the puck past the goalie –– at the end of the day, that’s what you need to win games.”
BU dominated the final 20 minutes of play and got some good practice in on the man-advantage cycle. Sophomore defenseman Ty Gallagher displayed the growth and maturity in his game since his rookie season with his squad’s only even-strength goal of the period.
The highlight-reel-worthy sequence started at the blue line. Gallagher proceeded to weave through three Warrior defensemen and sniped a top-shelfer from below the face-off circle at 4:45 to make it 4-1. By this point in the matchup, it was simply all BU.
In a storyline you couldn’t write better if you tried, freshman defenseman Lane Hutson placed the puck on the stick of his older brother, Q. Hutson, down low to complete the hatty with 7:48 left on the clock. The power play lamplighter made it 5-1 –– and that’s now four goals in two games for Q. Hutson.
“It felt pretty good,” Q. Hutson said in the post game press conference. “Lane was trying to pass to me all night I think so it was good that one of them finally went in.”
Senior forward Ethan Phillips and Amonte capped the competition off with BU’s last two goals of the game. Senior forward Jay O’Brien, who played well all night, slipped the puck to Phillips from below the goal line and he blasted it in on the power play at 13:25.
The Terriers were on the penalty kill to end the matchup, but that didn’t stop Amonte from making his mark on the score sheet. With 18.7 seconds remaining, Amonte went one-on-one with a Waterloo defenseman, beat him at the crease, and buried one short-side for the final 7-1 score.
With 15 goals in their first two showings of the 2022-2023 campaign, there’s a lot of guys on the BU roster that are feeling confident with their own offensive production. Brown said he attributes this success to the get-to-the-net mentality the team has taken to heart.
“Getting pucks on net and willingness to get to the net,” Brown said. “We’re doing a good job of getting pucks through and it’s all about beating their D men to the rebounds.”
The Terriers will now prepare for their weekend in Ann Arbor where they’ll face the University of Michigan Wolverines in one of their biggest tests of the season. Pandolfo and Brown said the squad’s focus this week will be cleaning up the details of their game, while sticking to the BU identity.
The series will open on Friday at 7:00pm and close on Sunday at 5:00pm. The Boston Hockey Blog will have full, on the ground coverage of the Michigan weekend so make sure to follow along on Twitter @BOShockeyblog and Instagram @boston.hockey.blog.
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