With Trophy Season beginning tomorrow night in the first round of the Beanpot when BC takes on Comm. Ave Rival BU, I figured I'd help make people aware of just how good BC's hockey (both men's and women's in fact) has been since Thanksgiving.
The day after Thanksgiving I had the misfortune of attending the Holy Cross-BC hockey game. Only reason I really went was because my father is an HC grad, and I never even had a thought that BC would lose the game. Well BC lost the game despite a ferocious attempt at a comeback in the 3rd period, and although the HC loss at the time seemed like one of the worst losses the program has sustained given the opponent that I can remember, looking back on it, the loss may have been a blessing in disguise.
Since the loss, BC is 11-0-1, have moved up to #2 in the most recent polls behind #1 Minnesota who has been equally as hot as BC, and as a result of the loss to HC, Jerry York, college hockey's all time winningest coach, put together the line of Johnny Gaudreau, Bill Arnold and Kevin Hayes, which has set the college hockey landscape on fire.
If you go to USCHO.COM you will see that Gaudreau (the favorite to win the Hobey Baker award) leads the nation in points, and right behind him at #2 is Hayes, and if you scroll down just a tad more Bill Arnold is at #6. Having three of the top six point getters in the nation on the same team, let alone on the same line, is absurd (in a good way). It will be interesting come April to see if Gaudreau and Hayes finish one and two in Hobey Baker votes. I'm not much of a college hockey historian but it wouldn't shock me if this would be the first time two players on the same team competed for the sport's highest individual award.
I know college hockey is a tough sport to follow because once you start to get into it, it takes a few weeks off in December and it doesn't garner much attention from the sports media compared to other sports, however with the addition of ESPN, there are more television outlets than ever that are broadcasting the sport. Now along with ESPN, there is the NBC Sports Network, CBS Sports Network, the Big 10 Network and NESN locally here in New England that all broadcast college hockey games now. Although college hockey is a niche sport, since it's regional (mainly in the Midwest and New England, although somehow Alabama-Huntsville has a team) and so few schools have a division 1 team, college hockey fans have to be happy the with the direction the game is going. On any Friday night now, one can watch 4-5 games on TV, which five years ago you would be lucky to see maybe 2 games at most.
So if you are a BC Alum or fan, and if you haven't started following this year's hockey team I recommend you start tomorrow night because the rest of the season has the makings to be a memorable one. Another reason to start following the hockey team is that I have found them to be the perfect remedy to the nagging pain the hoops team has inflicted on me this year.......
.......Speaking of the BC basketball team they suffered YET another horrendous loss yesterday. I was really hoping to not have to write this section of the Rant after they played one of their best games of the year in their victory over Virginia Tech earlier this week, but yesterday's loss again re-opened the wound that won't stop bleeding.
I won't spend too much time writing about this team, because quite frankly they don't deserve much of my time, but watching yesterday's Syracuse-Duke game made me long for a day when BC hoops is relevant again. During my time at BC (2003-2007) going to a basketball game was fun. The squad had swagger and was competitive. In 2006 the team was one half court shot by Louis Hinnant that actually almost went in to win the ACC tournament and a questionable goaltending call against Villanova from advancing to the Elite 8. Flash forward 8 years and the basketball team is struggling to finish the season with double digit wins. I'm not asking the team to be Syracuse or Duke, because I am a realist and know that that won't happen, but I am asking for a team that can compete and has a shot every year of earning an NCAA tournament bid.
I know this year's squad isn't going anywhere, and by now the writing is on the all that the Donahue era is most likely going to come to a close at season's end, but the way yesterday's game ended irked me so much. Up by 1 with under a second to go, and it looked like Eric Atkins wasn't going to get a clear shot at the hoop and Olivier Hanlan decides to foul him. Granted Atkins missed the back end of his 2 foul shots and the game went to overtime, Atkins made up for it with his near buzzer beating 3 pointer to win the game for the Irish. Yesterday's game was just another installment in the coulda-shoulda-woulda games that BC should have won.
Well that will do it for now, I will have another Rant later today with my Super Bowl predictions.
PS:
Couple of items to share, first off thanks to my buddies at Soaring to Glory a great website if you are a BC fan, for doing the math about my magic number question yesterday in regards to BC clinching Hockey East's regular season title. Also, one of my loyal readers JOD asked if I would share the story about his high school alma mater's hockey squad Fairfield Prep Hockey . I know a couple of my readers are proud grads of Fairfield Prep so I figured I would throw them a bone and spread the news about the Fighting Jesuits.
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