Maine gets some mojo back
The big story line entering the final weekend of the men’s Hockey East regular season revolved around the battle for third place, a spot Maine held by 2 points over Providence and UMass after dropping five of its previous seven games.
But the Black Bears were able to right the ship, sweeping UMass in Orono to secure home ice for the quarterfinals. That set up the field for the conference tournament, which starts Wednesday night, and that’s where the week in review begins.
■ Maine coach Ben Barr said last week that his squad needed to “find that edge” that had the Black Bears competing with Boston College and Boston University for the top spot in the league in the first half of the season. They may have done just that after taking a pair of tightly contested matchups — rallying for a 2-1 win in the opener, then taking the second game, 4-3, on senior Lynden Breen’s goal with 1:17 remaining.
With the victory, Maine secured home ice for Saturday’s quarterfinal along with first-place BC — which defeated Merrimack, 6-4, in its regularseason finale — as well as BU, which finished second and closed out the season with victories over Providence and Vermont.
Providence and UMass round out the top five, and they’ll meet in the quarterfinals at PC’s Schneider Arena Saturday at 4 p.m.
■ The conference tournament begins Wednesday night with three first-round matchups. UNH (19-14-1, 12-11-1) narrowly missed out on a bye after sweeping UMass Lowell (8-23-4, 4-17-3) by identical 4-0 scores. The sixth-seeded Wildcats will look to defeat Lowell for the third game in a row at Whittemore Center.
Northeastern (16-15-3, 9-14-1) will host Merrimack (13-20-1, 6-17-1). The teams met three times during the season, with the Huskies prevailing twice. Merrimack won the first matchup, 4-1, at Matthews Arena Oct. 28. The Huskies swept a home-and-home series three months later, outscoring Merrimack, 9-4, the weekend of Jan. 26-27. Northeastern ended the regular season by going 10-4-1.
UConn (14-18-2, 9-14-1) will host Vermont (13-8-3, 7-14-3) for the second time in less than a week. The two met last Thursday, with the Huskies winning, 5-1, to clinch the final home-ice spot. The teams also split two at Vermont the first weekend of November. Matthew Wood, selected in the first round of the 2023 NHL Draft by Nashville, has found his scoring touch the last two weeks, potting five goals in three games.
■ Macklin Celebrini had 6 points in BU’s two wins to give him 54 (29 goals, 25 assists). The freshman leads the nation with 1.69 points per game, just ahead of BC freshmen Will Smith (1.68) and Gabe Perreault (1.67). Smith’s 57 points (18 goals, 39 assists) are tops in the country, just ahead of Celebrini. BC sophomore Cutter Gauthier’s 32 goals are the best in the NCAA.
■ BC and BU held the top two spots in the PairWise, the system used to determine the NCAA field, while Maine moved up to seventh. Providence and UMass are on the bubble after they dipped to 14th and 15th.
■ Harvard kept its season alive with a 1-0 win over Princeton in the first round of the ECAC tournament behind sophomore Aku Koskenvuo’s 38 saves. Concord native Ian Moore’s one-timer from just inside the blue line was all the scoring the Crimson would need to advance to the quarterfinals. It was the second goal of the season for the junior captain, who missed two months with an injury. The Crimson will travel to Cornell for a best-of-three quarterfinal beginning Friday.
■ Holy Cross advanced to the Atlantic Hockey semifinals with a sweep of Canisius, rallying from a 3-1 deficit to win Game 1, 4-3, then prevailing in double overtime, 2-1, in Game 2. The Crusaders had to kill off six penalties, including two in overtime, in the clincher. Holy Cross will host AIC, which swept Air Force, in a best-ofthree series beginning Friday.
■ Stick tap for UMass Lowell announcer Bob Ellis, who is stepping down after 40 years of calling games for the River Hawks. Remarkably, he never missed a game in that span. The team honored Ellis after a recent practice by presenting him with a team jersey with his last name on the back, along with the number 40. It will be strange to tune in to a UMass Lowell game next season and not hear Ellis on the call.