A week after squandering their spot atop the USCHO rankings by going 1-2-0 the Boston University Terriers did better this past weekend, grabbing three points in a home and home with the Warriors of Merrimack.  Meanwhlie, Lowell played a couple games at home and won both of them, first clubbing UConn 6-4 in a mid-week affair and then beating the Maine Black Bears in a surprisingly narrow 3-2 overtime victory.  While goaltending performance at Lowell has a lot to do with the defensemen and system under coach Norm Bazin, it’s worth mentioning that former Minuteman Kevin Boyle has one of the top winning percentages in the league with a 7-1-3 record so far for the River Hawks.  The Vermont Catamounts had the a weekend off and this Saturday will face Saint Lawrence.

Providence and Northeastern split an odd Wednesday-Saturday home and home this past week, despite Friar goaltender Jon Gilles only giving up three goals total in the two games.  Boston College took three points from New Hampshire, even though the Eagles continuing to struggle on the power play this season.  BC has only scored six power play goals total this season with half of them coming at the Minutemen’s expense unfortunately.  In addition to their loss at Lowell, the UConn Huskies also lost earlier in the week 1-0 to the Brown Bears.  Since their big games where they took three points from BU and BC earlier this season the Huskies are just 1-4-2 since.

With those results BU and Lowell are atop the Hockey East standings, with the River Hawks having a game in hand on the Terriers.  Vermont is just one point behind.  There’s a logjam in the middle with just five points separating 4th and 8th place.  UMass remains in last place, with the three teams ahead of them all holding two or more games in hand on the Minutemen.  These standings will remain as is until January.  While there are some matches between Hockey East opponents coming up, they’re all non-conference tilts.

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North Dakota is still #1 in this week’s USCHO rankings.   With their win and tie against Merrimack, BU moves up a spot to #2.  Lowell dropped to #8 despite winning both their games this past weekend.  Vermont didn’t play a game but moves into the top ten at #10.  Lots of Hockey East representation at the bottom of the rankings with BC at #16, Providence at #18, and Merrimack at #19.

USCHO.com Division I Men’s Poll

December 08, 2014

It’s also probably time to start looking at Pairwise Rankings.  Well, not for UMass’ purposes of course.  Here are the Top 20 currently in the Pairwise.

As you can see Hockey East is currently in line to get four teams in, but their spots in the top 16 are shaky at best.

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BU’s Danny O’Regan was able to outshine teammate Jack Eichel’s four assist performance on Saturday with a hat trick and an assist, capturing Hockey East Player of the Week honors with his actions.  Notre Dame’s Robbie Russo, who I was very impressed with in the games against the Minutemen, grabbed the Defensive Player of the Week honors with his two goal, three assist performance in Amherst.  Lowell’s Michael Louria was named Rookie of the Week.

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Do you like Power Rankings?  Well here’s one from SBN College Hockey and another from Scott McLaughlin at WEEI.  I think you can probably guess where UMass falls in both of them.

You’ll notice I keep tweaking the weekly Monday post and what it covers.  As readers if there’s something you’d find interesting or informative coming off a weekend of hockey, I’m always open to suggestions.

Last week at this time Boston University found itself atop the national USCHO rankings for the first time this season.  They went out the next night and dropped a 3-2 decision to Harvard.  After bouncing back with a home win over Colgate, they travelled to Dartmouth yesterday where they lost 2-0.  Needless to say, they will not be #1 when rankings are covered later in this post.  BU wasn’t the only victim of the suddenly resurgent Harvard squad.  The Crimson also took down the River Hawks 4-2 in Lowell on Saturday.  After outscoring UMass 14-2 in two games last week Vermont travelled up to Maine and swept the Black Bears by a combined score of 10-4.  The Catamounts now have the 7th best offense in the country.

Providence didn’t allow a goal this past week, shutting out Army 3-0 on Tuesday and then Boston College 1-0 on Saturday.  Merrimack swept Clarkson at home during the weekend.  This coming weekend’s opponent for UMass, Notre Dame, continues to struggle, losing 3-2 in overtime to Union on Friday and then getting shellacked at home by Ohio State, 5-1.  In addition to getting shutout by Providence, Boston College dropped a 6-2 decision to Minnesota on Friday.  The then #3 Gophers travelled to Northeastern the next night, losing a shocker 3-2.  UConn dropped a 1-0 decision at Brown in their only game on the weekend.  New Hampshire played only once this past week, a 2-1 loss last Tuesday to RPI.

With all that, here’s how the Hockey East standings look currently.  Vermont continues to lead, though they’ve played four more games than any other team.  Boston College now has a losing conference record and find themselves tied with Notre Dame for 6th.  Despite going winless in their first ten games, Northeastern has now won three of their last four with two of the victories coming in conference and are tied with UConn for 8th.  UMass is tied for last with New Hampshire, who has three games in hand on the Minutemen.

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With BU losing two of three this past week we were likely going to get a top team in this week’s rankings.  That team is North Dakota.  Interesting to see that seven different teams are getting first-place votes currently, including #3 BU and #7 Lowell.  Vermont moved up two spots to #11.  Quinnipiac’s split with the Minutemen dropped them one spot to #15.  Providence’s two shutouts gained them four spots to #16.  Boston College at #17 is on the verge of dropping out of the rankings entirely, which would be very unfamiliar territory for them.  Merrimack on the other hand breaks into the polls this week at #18.

USCHO.com Division I Men’s Poll

December 01, 2014

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When you don’t give up any goals on the weekend you get named Hockey East Defensive Player of the Week, which is exactly what happened to Providence’s Jon Gilles.  Gilles has a league best .940 save percentage this season.

Northeastern’s Kevin Roy was named Player of the Week after scoring the game-winner against the Gophers.  Jarrid Privitera of Vermont was the Rookie of the Week after scoring three goals this past week, including the game winner against the Minutemen last Tuesday.

	WARRIOR HOCKEY PLAYER OF THE WEEK
	#15 KEVIN ROY, NORTHEASTERN (Jr. F; Lac-Beauport, Que.)
	Junior forward Kevin Roy fired home the game-winning goal against No. 3 Minnesota with 2:36 remaining in the third period to help Northeastern complete the 3-2 win Saturday night. The victory marked the Huskies’ 500th win at Matthews Arena.

	PRO AMBITIONS ROOKIE OF THE WEEK
	#19 JARRID PRIVITERA, VERMONT (Fr. F; Old Tappan, N.J.)
	Vermont was a perfect 3-0-0 last week thanks in part to the offense provided by rookie Jarrid Privitera. The forward from Old Tappan, New Jersey scored a goal in all three games, including the game-winner against Massachusetts on Tuesday and crucial insurance goals for the Catamounts in two non-league tilts at Maine.

	HEA DEFENSIVE PLAYER OF THE WEEK
	#32 JON GILLIES, PROVIDENCE (Jr. G; South Portland, Maine)
	Gillies earns Hockey East Defensive Player of the Week accolades for the second time this season after going 2-0-0 on the week, shutting out both Army and No. 11 Boston College. The junior netminder made 65 saves over the weekend, including 43 in the Friars’ win over the Eagles for his third shutout of the season and the 12th of his career.

– See more at: http://www.hockeyeastonline.com/men/pres1415/201412/dec1wr.php#sthash.7tKpHOlK.dpuf

Do you like splits?  Well this past weekend in Hockey East was for you.  The biggest story of the weekend was that Northeastern got its first win of the season at home against UNH after losing in Durham the night before.  Vermont got blanked in Providence 3-0 on Friday but rebounded with a 2-1 win on Saturday.  What I found most surprising about that series is that the Friars, the #3 team in the country to start the season, only got 2300 fans to each of the games.  That’s disappointing and surprising, despite the slow start for the team.

Merrimack hosted Notre Dame this past weekend and after losing a tough one in overtime on Friday bounced back to a surprising 4-1 win on Saturday.  Even out of conference we saw a split has Penn State dominated #4 Lowell by a score of 4-1 on Saturday after losing 5-3 the night before.  In a split against two different teams this past week Boston College continued to struggle on Tuesday in a 3-2 loss to Harvard but travelled out to East Lansing and beat the Spartans by the same score Friday.  No split for Boston University as they travelled up to Orono for a 3-1 victory in their only game of the weekend against Maine.  And in the “Well, that’s college hockey…” result of the week UConn followed up its three point week against BC and BU by getting shutout 2-0 against Sacred Heart.  What’s interesting about that game is that it was played at prep’s Taft School in honor of Jason Pagni, a force in Connecticut hockey and someone who meant a lot to UMass great Jon Quick.

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Minnesota got swept by Minnesota-Duluth this past weekend which means we have a new #1 team this week.  That team is Michigan Tech.  Michigan Tech!  If Union winning the championship last year and the Huskies of Tech being the top team in the country isn’t a huge affirmation to the fact that any team in college hockey, even success-challenged UMass, can climb to the top I don’t know what is.  North Dakota stays at #2 and BU climbs all the way to #3 with their 6-1-1 ranking.  Needless to say David Quinn is the early favorite for coach of the year.

Minnesota drops to fourth after getting swept by the Bulldogs while Lowell’s loss to Penn State drops them a spot to #5.  Saturday’s opponent Vermont dropped one spot from tenth to eleventh after splitting at Providence. Friday’s foe BC is just behind them at #12, dropping out of the top ten with their recent struggles.  Vermont’s split with Providence dropped them one spot but Providence’s split with Vermont dropped them three spots to #19.  Merrimack is set to break into the Top 20 next week if they can build on their 7-3-1 start.

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Apparently spending a week growing Movember mustaches isn’t enough for UMass players to get a mention in the Hockey East Weekly Awards.  Important to note that Vermont sophomore goaltender Mike Santaguida was defensive player of the week.  Meaning it’s not just Brady Hoffman that Catamount opponents have to plan for.

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The big news around UMass hockey today was that Austin Plevy signed his National Letter of Intent to join the Minutemen next fall.  This link includes a profile and commentary from Coach Mick on Plevy.  Those who have followed along with FTT’s recruit updates know that Plevy, a former Merrimack recruit, is one of the top scorers in the AJHL and will likely be able to contribute right away for the 2015-16 season.  Plevy is currently leading the Viterra Cup standings, which measures the accumulation of each player of the game designation around the AJHL.

Speaking of UMass spending their bye week on their mustaches, the UMass team, spurred on by head coach John Micheletto has fully embraced Movember, where guys grow facial hair to raise awareness of prostate cancer.  Although as someone who goes through every day with facial hair I never really know what to do when November rolls around (do I shave and start from scratch?  do I just mold the usual goatee into something else entirely?) this is a great cause and one that hits home since I faced a prostate cancer scare myself a few years back myself.  Clicking on the above Collegian link will show you that Mike Busillo should already be crowned the Movember champ for UMass.  Friday’s game against BC will feature some mustache themed contests.  I encourage everyone to donate to Coach Mick’s Movember page for this cause.

UMass athletes, coaches, and administrators have created the following video in support of the “It’s On Us” campaign to battle on-campus sexual assault:

Finally, here’s a must read about a Union hockey player who finally got to meet the person whose life he helped save last winter before a game this past weekend.

Minnesota remains atop the USCHO poll this week but they’re sharing some first place votes with #2 North Dakota and #5 Michigan Tech.  Boston University is tops among Hockey East teams at #3 after beating Boston College and tying UConn this past week.  Lowell is just behind them at #4, jumping a couple spots after taking three points from Northeastern.  BC slides from third all the way to eighth after losing to UConn and BU last week.  The Eagles now have a three game losing streak.  They’ll play Harvard on Tuesday and then travel to Michigan State (who might as well be an affiliate member of Hockey East at this point) before they come to Amherst on the 21st.  Vermont’s sweep of Maine lifts them to #10 in the poll, giving Hockey East four teams in the top ten.  Providence’s split with Merrimack drops them four spots to #16.

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UConn grabbed two of the weekly Hockey East awards after their win over BC and tie against BU.  BU’s Jack Eichel won just his first weekly award of the season despite dominating statistically so far.  Frank Vatrano and Dennis Kravchenko were named Top Performers for their efforts against AIC.  Zack LaRue was recognized in the milestones for his first multi-goal game and “Minuteman Freshman” also got a nod too for his assist.  That dude is great, I’m not sure where we’d be without him.  (I’m guessing they meant Dominic Trento)

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UMass is 11th in the SB Nation Hockey East power rankings.

Vatrano’s four game point streak is mentioned in their weekly Notes and Numbers piece.

Cornell coach Mike Schafer was suspended a game for saying some not so nice things about Quinnipiac coach Rand Pecknold after losing 1-0 to the Bobcats.  Funny that the guy who seems very concerned about player safety wanted UMass to play on slush last year.

It’s a bye week for the Minutemen but FTT will still be active.  We have two weeks of games to catch up on with our recruits.  And on Wednesday or Thursday I’ll take an early look at how the Minutemen have fared against expectations so far this season.