Boston College Athletics
BC Collides with Harvard in Beanpot Consolation
February 22, 2015 | Men's Hockey
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BOSTON COLLEGE vs. COLLEGE
Boston College and Harvard will meet for the 11th time in a Beanpot consolation contest on Monday, Feb. 23, at TD Garden. It marks the Eagles' first consolation bout at the Beanpot since 2009, where the Eagles defeated Harvard, 4-3. All-time in Beanpot consolation games against Harvard, the Eagles are 8-2. The Crimson has not beaten Boston College in a consolation game since 1985. The first HU win came on 1958 The Eagles have taken down Harvard in a consolation game in 2009 (4-3), 2005 (4-1), 2002 (3-0), 1999 (6-4), 1996 (6-2), 1988 (4-2), 1984 (5-2) and 1967 (6-5). Earlier this season, Harvard marched into Kelley Rink and snapped a nine-game losing streak to the Eagles. The Crimson's last victory over BC occurred on Nov. 7, 2006, before upending Boston College, 6-3, on Nov. 11. In that game, senior Brad Barone earned his first-career start in between the pipes for the maroon and gold. Harvard' penalty kill kept BC off the board in its seven power play chances. In all, Boston College possesses a 71-45-5 mark over the Crimson, including a 26-14 mark in the Beanpot Tournament. Before the Nov. 11 loss at home, BC had won the previous nine tilts by a goal margin of +27. Jerry York is 23-6-2 all-time against Harvard behind the Eagles' bench.
HARVARD HUNT
Since the two teams last met, the two teams have combined for 26 victories, 14 losses and four draws with BC owning the slight edge, 14-5-3 to 12-9-1. Harvard went about its business in interesting fashion following the Boston College victory. On Nov. 14, HU beat Brown with another six-spot, 6-2, before losing to Yale, 2-1, on Nov. 15. Following that, Harvard won seven-straight games by a combined score of 29-12. Capping that stretch with a win over RPI on Dec. 30, the Crimson went on to lose eight of its last 14 games. Saturday night's 3-2 victory on the road against Clarkson marked the second win in just nine games. Harvard had topped the Pairwise charts amidst its run but has since slipped, clinging on tied for 16th. Junior Jimmy Vesey continues to light it up for Harvard and is second only to Boston University's Jack Eichel for the points race, averaging 1.54 ppg with 20 goal and 20 assists through 26 games played. Vesey's 0.77 goals per game, however, stands as the top mark in all of college hockey while a quarter of his 20 total tallies have come via the power play. Classmate Kyle Criscuolo is 11th in the country with 1.27 points per game. Harvard's offense still stands as a top-10 unit, scoring 3.31 goal per game for 10th in America. Senior goaltender Steve Michalek's 2.38 goals against average (37th) and .925 save percentage (.925) has the Crimson defense slotted in 29th, overall, surrendering 2.50 goals per game. Harvard's special teams have been lethal all year long with a combo of the 11th-ranked power play (21.3 percent) and tied for the seventh-best penalty killing unit (88.1 percent).
AVOIDING HISTORY
Boston College head coach Jerry York is coaching in his 21st Beanpot for the Eagles. York has yet to finish last in the tournament.
FRISKY FROSH
WIth Noah Hanifin's two-assist performance on Feb. 20, Boston College now has all three of its freshman at the 20-point plateau. This marks the second-straight year three rookies have hit the 20-point plateau as Ryan Fitgerald (29), Austin Cangelosi (26) and Adam Gilmour (20) as Alex Tuch (12-14-26), Zach Sanford (5-15-20) and Noah Hanifin (4-16-20).
SENIOR SCHWANN SONG
The senior class of Brad Barone, Brian Billett, Danny Linell, Michael Sit, Quinn Smith, Cam Spiro and Destry Straight played in their last regular season game as Eagles at Kelley Rink on Friday night. This group enters the Harvard game with 101 victories, including one NCAA championship (2012), two Hockey East regular season titles, one Hockey East Tournament championship and three Beanpot trophies. These Eagles have never won less than 22 games in a season.
ALL WE DO IS WIN - WIN - WIN
With an 18-10-3 mark heading into Friday's contest, the Eagles mathematically have locked up another winning season. In its 93 season of varsity hockey, BC had totaled 74 winning seasons for a winning percentage of 80 percent. It's the 18th-straight winning season under Jerry York.
PARSING THE PAIRWISE
Heading into the Lowell contest, BC has jumped into a ninth in the Pairwise ranking, possessing an RPI of .6290. The only team the Eagles trail in the Pairwise rankings right now is Boston University, which is in seventh.
HOCKEY EAST IS HEATING UP
Like every time this season, the race of the Hockey East championship is a bottleneck. Heading into the weekend, of the regular season, Boston University can clinch the outright regular season title with one point against Northeastern. The Eagles (25 points) are four points behind the Terriers with UMass Lowell, Providence and Notre and (23) right behind tied for third. Northeastern and Vermont are tied for sixth, only three points behind BC for sixth. Boston College has not completely locked up a first-round bye in the Hockey East playoffs jsut yet.
TRACKING TWENTY
If Boston College wins two more games this season, it wil mark the sixth-consecutive year BC has won 20 or more games. It will match Jerry York's streak of six-straight 20-win seasons starting in 2002-03 and concluding in 2007-08.
HIT ME WITH YOUR BEST SHOT
Shots on goal has had a significant impact on the Eagles' results this season. When BC limits its opponents to 20-29 shots, the Eagles are 11-5-1. When allowing 30 or more, Boston College is 5-5-2. When BC takes 30 or more shots, Boston College is 11-3-2.
WHERE THE OFFENSE STANDS
Through 30 games, Boston College is scoring at a rate of 3.03 goals per game, tying the Eagles for 17th in all of college hockey and tied for fourth in Hockey East.
CAN'T TUCH THIS
Alex Tuch earned BC's third Hockey East award of the season, earning Hockey East Rookie of the Week honors on Feb. 16. The Baldwinsville, N.Y., native scored a goal with 9.6 seconds left to force overtime against Vermont on Feb. 13 before scoring the game-winner and an assist in BC's 6-5 win on Feb. 14. Tuch now leads the Eagles in points, having logged 12 goals and 14 assists. On the national landscape, Tuch is seventh amongst all rookies in college hockey with 0.87 points per game and is tied as the fourth highest-scoring freshmen in Hockey East.
DEFENSIVE POSITIONING
BC's defense is currently tied for 23rd, surrendering 2.42 goals per game. That mark ranks fifth in Hockey East.
BLUE-LINE BOPPERS
The Eagles' defensive corps is not having a problem lighting the lamp itself. Boston College has scored 94 goals on the season with 18 coming from the twigs of the blue liners. In BC's first victory of the season against RIT, four of Boston College's six goals game from defensemen (Matheson, Doherty, Santini, McCoshen). Three of BC's top seven scorers are defensemen (Teddy Doherty, Noah Hanifin and Michael Matheson).
McDOUBLE
Sophomore defensemen Ian McCoshen turned in his first-career two-goal game and fifth-career two-point performance against UVM on Feb. 14. The Faribault, Minn., native followed that with his third power play goal of the season and game-tying tally against Lowell on Feb. 20.
McCoshen also scored his second-career game-winning goal and first of the season against Michigan on Dec. 13. McCoshen has scored a goal in each game against Michigan.
HANIFIN HYPE
Newcomer Noah Hanifin tallied his fifth multi-point performance of the season on Feb. 20 (0-2-2) and has secured an assist in his last four outings. Hanifin scored his first-career goal as an Eagle against Colorado College and followed that with his first-career mutli-point game with both assists on Adam Gilmour's 5-on-3 tallies against UMass. At UMass on Nov. 21, Hanifin registered his first-career three-point performance. Hanifin has scored a point in 10 of his last 13 outings, including his fourth goal of the year on Jan. 30.
LAST LINE OF DEFENSE
Sophomore goaltender Thatcher Demko just started his 50th-career game on The Heights on Feb. 13, 2015. This season, Demko is 16-9-3 and currently ranks 28th in the NCAA in goals against average with a mark of 2.24. Demko's save percentage of .923 is good for 26th in college hockey. Demko's winning percentage of .625 has him ranked 20th in the country.
