Weekend Recap: BU declines opportunity to play for HE Championship

The BU men's hockey team took a bold strategy this weekend by declining a chance to play for the Hockey Tournament Championship and defend their title from last season. At first glance, it may seem like a poor decision and that the team should have performed better against UMass Lowell(2-3 and 0-5 losses)but in all reality it was just another example of Coach David Quinn playing chess while the rest of college hockey plays checkers.

BU is going to make the NCAA tournament regardless of the outcome of the Hockey East Tournament. The NCAA tournament field is decided by a mathematical formula that weighs a number of factors including strength of schedule, quality wins etc. and thanks to BU's regular season where they had 9 wins against the top 14 in the Pairwise, they are a mathematical lock for the tournament. There is no committee that can keep them out despite what the Lowell Sun may or may not believe. The only decisions that come into play is what regional BU will play in. The easiest way to explain this is how others on Twitter have  already done so below.

Weekend Preview :Why are Lowell fans so stupid?

The BU Terriers will face the Lowell Riverhawks in the best college hockey matchup of the weekend. This Hockey East Quarterfinal round between the 4 and 5 seed of the conference is easily the best matchup in the conference this weekend. The only other series that will be even remotely interesting Northeastern at Notre Dame because of their good history in South Bend(3-2-1 vs ND over the past three seasons). Providence and BC should take care of their series rather easily but then again both choked away QF series a year ago so anything is possible there. 

The Terriers face a rested Lowell team who did not play last weekend as BU toyed with and eventually defeated UMass in a Hockey East first round series. Lowell fans and Hockey East fans in general are trying to point to BU's lack of domination as a point of weakness going into this weekend but they are just grasping at straws. Yes, BU could have played better which I'm sure coach David Quinn has driven home this week in practice. They do have to play better than last weekend to beat Lowell but it is also extremely easy to not play a full hockey game against UMass with how bad they are. Every writer, fan, living being in the world knew BU would beat UMass last weekend. Even the drug dealers in Lowell knew BU would beat UMass and they were high for the entire college hockey schedule this season. It is tough to get motivated for a game like that with no students on campus in fairly empty rink. They were still +26 in shots on goal for the weekend but certainly are capable of playing better.

Hockey East Ref Corsi Espisode III

It is the best time of year in Hockey East. The weather is warming up, playoff hockey is starting and I get to write my annual recap of the officiating in the league. As I displayed last year, I am capable of saying nice things about the refs when they deserve it. Now, before I get into the numbers aka ref corsi, I will be the first to acknowledge the flaws in how I track the numbers and rank the refs. The only numbers available are the refs who work the games and the total number of penalties called so that is all that I have to work with. This obviously penalizes refs who get a game with a line brawl or paired with Kevin Shea when he gets BU a ref who happens to have an off night and try to make the game about him. I will be the first to acknowledge that the refs have a tough job and it is impossible to placate all the fans or even all the coaches but overall they do a pretty good job. Last year, I  they called the second least amount of penalty minutes of any conference so they obviously aren't too bad.

This is the second straight year BU was called for more penalty minutes than their opponent. They had 47 more penalty minutes this year(384-337) as opposed to only 23 more penalty minutes than their opponents last year. This is most likely a result of Jordan Greenway being on the roster and getting called for the Gryba "too big" bullshit penalties. Basically the refs feel bad when big guys physically dominate their opponents and call more penalties on them because of it. I'm not saying the refs purposefully are calling more penalties on Greenway than he deserves but they definitely are calling penalties on him due to his size and the fact that other teams hate him for embarrassing them.

Weekend in South Bend Recap

The Terriers split a weekend road trip in South Bend, Indiana with the Fighting Irish of Notre Dame. As a BU fan it is tough to be mad about the effort as the Terriers left it all on the ice both nights. They came out on the right end Friday night behind goals from Ahti Oksanen, Mike Moran and Charlie McAvoy. Oksanen and McAvoy's goals were absolute bombs while Moran's was a beautiful greasy jabbing "shot" from the goal mouth. All three goals were critical as the Terriers held on for a 3-2 win which was their first in the history of Compton Ice Arena.

Weekend Recap- BU takes 3 of 4 points from UNH

The BU Terriers took 3 of 4 points from the UNH Wildcats this weekend after tying them Friday night in Durham before returning home Saturday to get a crucial league win. Friday night was a game that BU dominated in every aspect but the scoreboard. They outshot UNH 40-22 but had some crucial breakdowns that led to some great chances for UNH. Coach Quinn commented on that after the game noting that UNH's goals were too easy while BU had to work for theirs. The Terriers also dominated overtime but could not get one past UNH goalie Daniel Tirone who made some very good saves for the home team. Danny O'Regan had a hattrick for the Terriers as he continues to lead the team in points and has taken his play to an even greater level playing with freshmen Jordan Greenway and Jakob Forsbacka Karlsson.

The Terriers continue to battle and gain points despite battling through a rash of injuries as of late. Senior goalie Sean Maguire was out this weekend with an upper body injury but Quinn said postgame Saturday that he should be back next weekend. Obviously not a sure thing but that will be very good news to have Maguire back who has been very good since January. Robbie Baillargeon was also out for the weekend with a lower body injury which seems to be more of a long term injury at this time. Brandon Hickey was injured Friday night on a dirty hit by UNH forward Shane Eiserman. Eiserman hit Hickey square in the back about 4-5 feet from the boards. Hickey left the game and did not play Saturday night for BU. The league still refrained from suspending Eiserman for no reason. They have every reason to suspend him for that hit. It is a hit that should not exist in any level of hockey. They were quick to suspend BU freshman D Charlie McAvoy in the fall for a questionable hit but have done nothing regarding Eiserman's. I would say that McAvoy's hit was much less dangerous as well but since PC coach Nate Leaman wanted to bitch and moan at the time, the league acted quickly. Coach Quinn didn't complain about the hit because he is more concerned with winning hockey games than whining like the rest of the coaches in the league. Hopefully the league will take another look at the hit and suspend Eiserman.