Eagles Left Out In The Cold By Terriers

The No. 4 ranked Boston College women's hockey team saw its six-game unbeaten streak end last night thanks to an effort that lacked both consistency and efficiency. A strong first period gave way to two sloppy ones, and the Eagles fell to the Boston University Terriers 6-0 at Walter Brown Arena. BC was shut out on the road for the first time in over a year, and showed head coach Katie King Crowley just how far her team has to go.

"I thought we played great in the first period," Crowley said. "After that I don't know. It looked like we got lost out there. BU played at a high level tonight and they kept it up through the whole game. They were able to take advantage of our mistakes. We had a couple of chances tonight, and we weren't able to do anything with them."

The two teams both came out strong in the first period, each getting a handful of chances on goal. A strong effort in goal by Corinne Boyles kept the game scoreless until 19:49 of the opening frame, when she was beaten from close range.

The second period was a different story, however, with BU dominating the Eagles for the full 20 minutes. Boyles stood on her head for the majority of the period once again, but ran into some bad luck when a puck that was chipped into the zone hit off the boards and off her skates before finding the net. Just three minutes later, BU extended its lead to 3-0 with a nice passing play that left Boyles without a chance.

The teams went into the second intermission with the Eagles down 3-0 and failing to impress. Crowley stressed the importance of a more consistent effort from her team but did admit that it was almost inevitable that something like this would happen at some point this year.

"I think one of the things that gets overlooked is that we're very young," Crowley said. "I know we have eight seniors, but we're really young. Two of our freshman forwards are out there almost every other shift, and we have two defensemen out there a little bit. So it's hard when you're looking to be consistent because some of these kids are pretty young. But we've got to try and get through this and keep going forward."

BU put the game away midway through the third period with three goals in an eight-minute span. The Eagles came close on several occasions throughout the game but were never able to finish a play and beat the BU goalie. The Terriers ended the game with a 36-30 advantage in shots and far more quality scoring chances than the Eagles. BC never looked like they could get back in the game, and BU walked away with the well-deserved win.

"It's a tough loss," Crowley said. "I think we could have been in it if we played like we did in the first, but now we've got a bit of a rest before we go back at it. The tough thing about our schedule is that we'll get a chance to play four or five games in not a lot of days, so these days off are a good time to rest."

With the loss, the Eagles fall to second in the Hockey East behind Northeastern, who has the same number of points in one fewer game. BC next plays on Tuesday against Northeastern in the Beanpot. Following that, the Eagles face another challenge when they will play four games in an eight-day span.