The climb up the Hockey East standings starts with a big weekend.
For New Hampshire and Merrimack, what better way to begin an upward trend than with a sweep? Both teams had opened 2022 on winning notes in non-conference play before carrying the positive results into their first league games of the calendar year, sweeping nationally-ranked Boston College and Providence teams, respectively.
The ninth-place Wildcats have played more games than the two teams above them in the race, but their 15 points are just four shy of fourth after this past weekend’s 3-2 and 5-2 triumphs over BC. Merrimack and UConn sit three points above, tied for seventh.
“I thought we played a real solid team game from the goaltender out and had a lot of different guys contribute all weekend long,” UNH head coach Mike Souza (Wakefield, Mass.) said. “We did a good job managing the puck, which is imperative against that team because they’re great in transition. … We didn’t want to get into a track meet or turn pucks over and tried to get them to go 200 feet to beat us.”
Souza’s club struggled to find offense earlier in the season, scoring more than two goals just twice in a 16-game span before breaking out for a 7-1 win over Mercyhurst on New Year’s Eve. Perhaps a corner has been turned in that department since the Ledyard Classic as UNH has outscored its opponents by a 20-6 margin during a current four-game win streak, its first since January of 2019.
Seven different players scored UNH’s eight goals against the Eagles. Freshman defenseman Colton Huard has lit the lamp in his last three games, a stretch that started with a four-point effort in the Wildcats’ Jan. 8 win over Clarkson.
Another key to the recent turnaround and added scoring punch has been the return of seniors Will MacKinnon and Ryan Verrier (Reading, Mass.) on the back end. The duo has helped to shore up the team’s transition game and completed a solid defense corps.
“I think our transition has improved not just with the puck but without it, making sure we’re tracking pucks and having good structure. That has led to some quality opportunities,” Souza said. “Colton has gotten his feet under him after missing the early part of the year, and having Ryan and Will back from injuries has made a big difference. They’re real competitive kids that eat up big minutes and play hard.”
Merrimack clawed its way to a pair of one-goal wins, 3-2 and 2-1, needing a season-high 33 saves from sophomore Zachary Borgiel and a team total of 27 blocked shots to make the difference on Saturday night in Providence. Junior defenseman Declan Carlile scored in both games, while senior Logan Drevitch (Middleborough, Mass.) had the eventual game-winner in his 100th career contest.
“The best thing about the way the game ended, which was obviously really stressful and difficult, was that we had Declan and a number of other guys laying out,” Merrimack coach Scott Borek (Swampscott, Mass.) said. “When one of the best players on your team like Declan is laying in front of shots, you know that the rest of the team is going to do the same.”
The team-first attitude has helped the Warriors win four of their last five games. Half of their 10 wins this season have been decided by one goal.
“In the past, we’ve been the team that would be in games like this and find a way not to win the game, but I think this team is finally starting to … understand there’s no reason it shouldn’t be us winning,” Borek said on Saturday. “That was a tough one, but our guys battled. It will help us in the next adverse situation, which I’m sure we’ll have next Friday” against first-place UMass Lowell, winners of five straight.
The trend of one-goal games isn’t unique to North Andover. Souza’s Wildcats have won seven of their eight contests decided by the slimmest margin, proving that Hockey East is just as tight as ever.
“We’ve had so many close games, tie games and overtimes that I feel like I’ve been saying this since I’ve been back at UNH,” Souza said. “It’s becoming more commonplace in all of college hockey, there’s so much parity. I’m sure that drives the balance in our league. … We can’t afford not to be at our best for us to be competitive.”
Still streaky
The longest unbeaten streaks in all three New England-based conferences continued this weekend, but ECAC-leading Quinnipiac continues to top the charts with a 15-game run that was extended with a sweep of regional foes Harvard and Dartmouth. The latter game -- a 3-1 win for the Bobcats on Sunday -- pitted Rand Pecknold (Bedford, N.H.) against his former assistant Reid Cashman’s Big Green for the first time.
Sophomore Ty Smilanic’s two-goal game against the Crimson included an appearance on SportsCenter, but senior captain Wyatt Bongiovanni scored twice himself to beat Dartmouth and defenseman Brendan Less added the goal in between against his former team. Sophomore Yaniv Perets needed to make 13 saves in his seventh shutout of the season to begin the weekend.
https://twitter.com/QU_MIH/status/1482469823045152770
Boston University’s streak moved to seven games as junior Jay O’Brien (Hingham, Mass.) scored eight seconds into Friday night’s overtime to equal a 2-1 win at Hockey East rival UConn. O’Brien, who missed the final three games of the first semester, has logged three goals and eight points during a four-game point streak dating back to Dec. 31.
In Atlantic Hockey, first-place American International’s 5-4, 6-3 sweep of Mercyhurst moved its win streak to eight games. The Yellow Jackets haven’t lost since Nov. 27 after UConn grad transfer Brian Rigali capped off a three-goal weekend with two points in Saturday’s series-ending triumph. Rigali’s fourth point of the series was the game-winner in the second period.
THREE MORE STARS:
Hockey East - Andre Lee, UMass Lowell
Lee led the River Hawks to a weekend sweep of Maine, scoring a power-play goal and assisting on junior defenseman Jordan Schulting’s eventual game-winning goal in a 4-3 Saturday triumph at Tsongas Center. He is UMass Lowell’s second-leading scorer this season and has netted a team-high 11 goals, four more than his closest teammate.
Before becoming one of seven total 10-goal scorers in Hockey East, the winger from Sweden also marked the scoresheet in the series-opening, 5-3 win, setting up Carl Berglund’s goal to begin a 3-0 start for the home team.
ECAC - Clay Stevenson, Dartmouth
The sophomore from British Columbia set a new career-high saves mark for the fourth time in nine collegiate appearances as he stopped 47 shots on 49 shots in Dartmouth’s first game of the 2022 calendar year on Sunday night, a 3-1 loss to No. 2 Quinnipiac.
Stevenson kept his team in the game all throughout, stopping 19 shots in the first period and all 28 he faced over the final two periods. Following the game, Stevenson owned a .922 save percentage that trailed only Perets (.948) for tops in all of ECAC Hockey.
Atlantic - John Jaworski, Sacred Heart
Jaworski continued a stretch of points in four out of the last five Pioneer games as he scored two goals and added three assists in a weekend split at Bentley. The sophomore forward netted the team’s first of three power-play goals and set up two others -- both alongside senior Nick Boyagian -- to pace Friday’s 5-1 win in Waltham.
The Iowa native is now SHU’s fourth-leading scorer this season. He also scored goals in both games of a series at Niagara to begin the 2022 portion of the schedule.
THIS WEEK’S HAT TRICK:
1. Hockey East collision course: The Hockey East standings can change quickly with six points up for grabs during any two-game conference set, but some level of clarity could be established during this coming weekend’s slate. Massachusetts and Northeastern are set for a home-and-home set with just one point separating them in second and third place, respectively.
Providence and Boston College look to break part of a fourth-place tie while meeting in a series of their own. The Eagles begin the weekend at home just two days after a non-conference trip to Notre Dame on Wednesday, while Northeastern plays its own rescheduled game with Vermont on Tuesday.
First-place UMass Lowell and Merrimack look to continue their winning ways in a renewal of a longtime rivalry, while Boston University hosts Vermont and UConn welcomes in New Hampshire in the league’s remaining two-game series.
2. Heart finally home: Sacred Heart has remained in the thick of the Atlantic Hockey race in fourth place despite having played just two home games all season at the Webster Bank Arena in Bridgeport, Conn. The Pioneers will more than double that number this week as Army West Point makes a Tuesday visit and first-place AIC travels down for the weekend.
The weekend will pit Holy Cross against Army in a home-and-home set beginning Friday in Worcester, while Bentley hits the road for Canisius.
3. Covered in Ivy: Ivy League schedules have been most impacted by the recent run of COVID-related postponements, but there is a full slate on tap for this coming weekend at this point. Harvard and Dartmouth will both be at home against the North Country pair of St. Lawrence and Clarkson, the latter of which is sitting right behind the Crimson in the league race.
Quinnipiac hits the road to Colgate and Cornell following a Tuesday visit from Princeton. Yale -- which earned a shootout win over Colgate on Sunday night -- and Brown are slated to make the shorter New York trip to the Capital District for games with Rensselaer and Union.
