There haven’t been too many times during the course of the Beanpot’s 69-year history that you’ve been able to use “BU” and “drought” in the same sentence.
But when you’ve won nearly half of these tournaments and at one point could refer to it as the “BU Invitational” with little pushback, seven years qualifies as a drought. When the Terriers last won the Beanpot in 2015, it was then-junior Matt Grzelcyk scoring the overtime winner.
Boston University ended that seven-year drought Monday night, beating Northeastern 1-0 to capture its 31st Beanpot and, in the process, prevent the Huskies from winning a fourth straight. It was also the first major trophy for fourth-year head coach Albie O’Connell.
The Terriers didn’t need overtime this time, but the game did go right down to the wire. After 57 minutes of physical, tight-checking, scoreless hockey, they finally broke the deadlock with 2:46 to go when St. Louis Blues draft pick Dylan Peterson finished off a centering pass from Jamie Armstrong on a 2-on-1.
“For me, I’m happy we won,” O’Connell said when asked about ending the drought. “I’m happy when we win any game. For the players, it’s great excitement. The opportunity to play in the game and then to play the way they did. They played really well. They really performed in kind of a pressure environment, a loud building. There were a lot of plays that could’ve went the wrong way if we weren’t playing the right way, but I thought the guys did a really good job of playing a championship-type game.”
In the game’s closing minutes, the Terriers did what they had done all game: They swarmed the puck in their own zone and gave Northeastern little in the way of quality looks. BU’s defense suffocated the Huskies offense, holding them to nine shots on goal through the first 40 minutes and 19 total for the game.
That effort was made even more impressive by the fact that the Terriers were missing their top defenseman in Alex Vlasic, a second-round pick of the Blackhawks who was unable to play due to a non-COVID illness.
But the Terriers have been playing good team defense throughout the second half of the season, and that didn’t change even with Vlasic sidelined. It’s a big reason they’ve been one of the hottest teams in the country, as they’ve now won seven games in a row and have a 13-1-1 record since Dec. 1. They haven’t lost in regulation since Nov. 27.
It’s been a remarkable turnaround since a 4-9-2 start to the season, with BU climbing from well outside the NCAA tournament picture to now inside the top 16 in the Pairwise rankings used to determine the 16-team field.
Among those who stepped up to play a key role both Monday night and throughout this hot stretch was Bruins 2021 seventh-round pick Ty Gallagher. The freshman has been consistently logging top-four minutes for BU and looked poised breaking the puck out throughout Monday’s win.
New Jersey Devils prospect Case McCarthy and Carolina Hurricanes prospects Domenick Fensore and Cade Webber were excellent as well, with McCarthy and Webber in particular being called upon for the key defensive-zone faceoffs in the final minute.
On the rare occasions that the Terriers did let shots through, sophomore goalie Vinny Duplessis was there to make all the saves he needed to. Duplessis’ strong play over the last couple weeks has allowed BU to overcome another key loss, as usual starter Drew Commesso is away at the Olympics with Team USA.
“I thought it was a really tight-checking game,” O’Connell said. “Not a lot of space out there. It was very physical. Pretty pleased with the way we played. We were pretty thorough. I thought we skated well. I thought we had some physicality to what we were doing. …Not having Vlas, Alex Vlasic’s one of our best players. So I thought our D corps played well. And Vinny Duplessis, he was the man tonight.”
Northeastern got great goaltending from its own backup netminder, with T.J. Semptimphelter once again standing tall in place of Hobey Baker candidate and Canadian Olympian Devon Levi. One week after stopping 41 of 42 shots in the Huskies’ opening-round win over Boston College, Semptimphelter, a freshman, stopped 28 of 29 shots against BU.
Not only did Peterson’s late winner give the Terriers the win, but it also spared the Beanpot from having its championship game decided by 3-on-3 overtime and possibly a shootout. While the tournament has historically always been decided by continuous 20-minute, 5-on-5 overtimes, the NCAA recently standardized overtime rules across all regular-season games so that everything is now five minutes of 3-on-3 overtime followed by a shootout if needed. The Beanpot committee submitted a waiver to be exempt, but was denied.