2014-2015 Hockey LEast Awards

With the Hockey East awards being announced tonight, it is time for the fourth annual Hockey Least Awards. We made our preseason predictions back in October and we weren't far off the mark on most of our selections. If you don't want to get made fun of in this post, you should stop sucking at hockey.

(Worst) Coach of the Year- John Micheletto(UMass)- Micheletto lead his team to a last place finish despite having two underclassmen already sign pro contracts within a week of their season ending. He clearly can recruit(besides goalie) but his lack of ability to install any type of defensive system whatsoever typically is not a good recipe for success. UMass literally tried to go chance for chance with a BU team loaded with draftpicks and highly skilled guys. You are never going to win that battle. Micheletto seems like he will return for next season which is mostly because UMass doesn't have an AD to fire him and as a Massachusetts tax payer I thank them for this because I don't want to be paying his buyout.

Our pre-season pick, Mike Cavanaugh, gave Micheletto a run for his money with a second half for the ages. Cavanaugh lead his team to a stellar 1-6 record over their last 7 games. None of which were against the top 5 teams in Hockey East.

Pre-season Pick- Mike Cavanaugh

(Worst) Player of the Year -Danny Linell(BC)- Linell played in an astounding 25 games for the Eagles this year at both forward and defense. He did little to help the team in either position notching one assist during the course of the season. This was coming off back to back seasons where he did record double digit points for the endangered species Eagles BC fans are very confident about their team getting better next year and they should be...because Danny Linell won't be on it. Linell really is the definition of addition by subtraction. For these reasons, he wins the anti-Eichel award. Congrats to Danny on a great career! You are so good below average at hockey.

Our-preason pick, Thomas Di Pauli, had a career year with 28 points so we missed on that one. Well played Di Pauli , well played.

Pre-season Pick- Thomas Di Pauli(ND)

Weekend Review: The wagon rolls along

The BU Terriers continue to dominate and humiliate their competition as they beat Merrimack College 6-2 and 5-0 in a controlled scrimmage that some people called a "Hockey East Quartefinal". The Terriers outshot Merrimack 101-46 over the course of two games and outscored them 11-2. Friday night, the Terriers were paced by two goals from Jack Eichel who scored his 20th of the year as did Danny O'Regan who made a great move in on the rush off a great pass from Evan Rodrigues. The best way to describe the Terriers effort this weekend was dominant. If this team plays with the same mentality for 60 minutes throughout the postseason, they will not lose a game.

Weekend Preview: BU enjoys double bye, awaiting opponent in HE semifinals

The BU Terriers are enjoying their second consecutive "bye" week of the Hockey East Tournament this week as 6 other teams battle for the 3 other semi final spots. Out of those 6 teams, BU could only face 4 of them in a semifinal. Those four teams are UNH, UVM, Notre Dame and UMass Lowell. As a BU fan you definitely should be pulling for UNH as that would be the easiest path to the final aka a triple bye to the HE final. UVM, Notre Dame, and Lowell all present stiffer challenges defensively to the talented BU team that will have two players over 50 points after this weekend's two scrimmages against Merrimack (BU will count points for these scrimmages just like Maine did with Paul Kariya and his "100 point season 91 point season except these games technically count so BU isn't making stuff up like Maine with Kariya). Senior Evan Rodrigues currently sits at 49 points while future Hobey Baker Award winner Jack Eichel sits at 55 points. Merrimack will provide BU some good live play before the semifinal round but the BU defensive corps may need to get some extra work in practice next week as Merrimack was 11th in scoring in Hockey East this past season and don't seem to pose much of a threat offensively unless you are Clay Witt in OT.

Photo Credit: Michelle Jay/Daily Free Press

Hockey East Officiating Regular Season Stats

Welcome to this year's Hockey East officiating stats post. Contrary to popular belief, Hockey East refs really aren't that bad. There are a few who should do less games/be fired but that will the case with any league.  The league's penalty minutes called have steadily dropped in the time since last season and the numbers here will prove that. They have also dropped since the first half. This is all a great sign if you are a Hockey East fan as I haven't heard a single person call for more penalties. Granted if the refs put BU on the powerplay a few more times, they may have gone undefeated(Penalty minutes were 140-129 against BU this regular season).

Obviously, this isn't a flawless way to track penalties called by each individual ref but the average over the course of the year gives a decent indicator of which refs call the most penalties.

Hockey East Refs-Average 20.1 pms/game, -3.54 penalty minutes/game from 2013-2014 season
             
* If you include the two line brawls (BC/MC, MC/UNH), the average goes up to 20.68 but it is still a significant drop.

Weekend Recap: Regular Season Hockey East Champs

This weekend , the #4 BU Terriers completed their regular season schedule with a home and home versus Northeastern. Both teams were coming off the emotional OT victory last Monday in the Beanpot final.  BU won that game in OT on a Matt Grzelcyk goal because it was the Beanpot and that's where winners find a way to win and losers find a way to lose. Friday night may have been the worst defensive effort from the Terriers this season as they were pinned in their own zone throughout the game. They faced deficits of 3-0 and 6-2 but still gave themselves a chance to win after Evan Rodrigues' goal of the game made it 6-5 with just under six minutes left. Three out of the five BU goals did come on the powerplay as both Northeastern and BU finished the game 3/4 on the powerplay. BU could never get the equalizer as a goal from Brien Diffley was called off with about ten minutes left which would have made it 6-5 at the time. The referees blew the goal off for a creas violation even though it appeared Matt Lane was neither in the crease or in contact with Clay Witt. The referee pair of Scott Hansen and Tim Low are generally very good and two of the better ones in the league but it appeared they blew this call even though they could see it on replay.

Matt O'Connor allowed 5 goals and was pulled in the second period but none of them appeared to be his fault. Connor LaCouvee played well in relief even though he was eventually given the loss for allowing the sixth goal, which came on a 5 on 3 powerplay. Overall, it was a rough night for just about everyone on the roster who wasn't named Rodrigues, Eichel or O'Regan. The positives from this game is the team's belief that they can come back from any deficit no matter the score or the time remaining. Obviously, you want to avoid those types of situations but you have to love the fight in this team no matter what the situation is. They have bounced back strong from these types of games in the past and did so again Saturday night.