In what was four Boston College men’s hockey seniors’ final home game, it was only right for them to hear their classmates roar in Conte Forum one more time.
Two goals, scored 39 seconds apart—before some students had even gotten to their seats—fired up a crowd that helped energize a BC offense that had hit a rough patch, ending the regular season on a four-game skid.
“We can keep playing well, we can tighten up small things in different areas, but it wasn’t like we needed an overhaul because our game was in shambles,” BC head coach Greg Brown said about his team’s losing streak.
No. 4-seeded BC (20–14–1, 13–11–0 Hockey East) translated none of the offensive absences from its last four games in a 5–0 win over No. 5-seeded Maine (18–13–3, 12–11–1) on Friday night, keeping its season alive and advancing to the Hockey East semifinal at TD Garden next week.
No. 17 BC introduced itself to the postseason with a bang. Less than five minutes into the opening frame, Teddy Stiga won a puck race after a dump-in from Luka Radivojevic and slammed in the first goal of the game. It was Stiga’s first point since BC’s win over UConn on Feb. 20.
BC recouped in the neutral zone shortly after the center-ice faceoff when Lukas Gustafsson fed a pass to James Hagens, who streaked through the middle of Maine’s offensive zone and fired a shot off a defender’s skate. He promptly picked up the deflection and shelved a shot above Mathis Rousseau’s right shoulder, doubling BC’s lead 5:28 into the action.
“It’s hard to get the traction when a second one goes in a minute later,” Maine head coach Ben Barr said. “You’re just kind of fighting an uphill battle the whole night.”
Conte Forum erupted as Hagens did a sliding celebration in front of the packed student section.
“The fans here are great, and we feed off that,” Stiga said. “I think when you have fans that support you, like BC fans do here, it’s great, and all the guys love it, and we play better from it.”
Gustafsson hit the box for cross-checking around the halfway mark of the first frame, giving the Black Bears their chance to swing momentum. What happened instead, though, was a sequence of blocked shots, Louka Cloutier pad saves, and dump-ins that instead pushed the momentum even further in BC’s favor.
BC headed into intermission with what seemed to be complete control of the game’s flow. Shot totals from both squads remained tight, but Cloutier showed no signs of weariness between the pipes.
Both teams remained highly physical throughout the second period, and each side could only generate a few quality chances.
Landan Resendes saw an opportunity and attempted a lifted shot above Rousseau’s head, but flipped just too high for the puck to sneak in. Maine’s Thomas Pichette found himself on a breakaway with only Cloutier to beat about halfway through the second period, but his shot rang off the right post, and BC carried its two-goal lead into the second intermission.
“I think we got better after that surge at making sure we could match numbers and not give up number rushes after that,” Brown said. “But there was a stretch there where it looked a little dicey.”
The first goal scored in the final period would be critical for either team, as a two-goal lead is considered the most dangerous in hockey. Ultimately, it was the recently returned Oskar Jellvik who provided the cushion for BC and tucked the Black Bears into bed.
Ryan Conmy fed a backhand pass to an open Jellvik in front of the net, who slapped it over Rousseau’s left pad to push the Eagles to a 3–0 lead just 1:34 into the third period.
“To have [Jellvik] in the lineup, and then to see him getting more comfortable is great for the team, and hopefully we can give him some more games to keep it going,” Brown said.
Maine failed to apply pressure on BC’s defense after that, tallying three shots on goal for the remainder of the game as Cloutier ended with 18 saves and his fourth shutout of the season.
“It wasn’t just the great saves, but [Louka] made great plays on their dump-ins,” Brown said. “The fact that he was able to stop pucks and deliver them to our defense really helped us limit our time in our zone.”
Empty-netters later from Dean Letourneau and Hagens in the final five minutes capped off a 5–0 win for the Eagles, sending BC to the Hockey East semifinal.
“The way the last few games have gone, to be responsible, to get above, to not try and add on unless something was there, was really important,” Brown said. “We didn’t force plays—it was really a playoff style that we have to continue.”
