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Hockey East DOMINATES Pairwise Conversation at Holiday Break · This Week in Hockey East

• 0:02
  SPEAKER_01: We go down the stretch.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: First semester coming to an end in the college hockey season.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_01: We talk about a huge rivalry game in New Hampshire.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_01: One more Hockey East game on Nesson on Saturday.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_01: And some thoughts on where the leagues are right now.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_01: It's this week in Hockey East.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome into this episode of This Week in Hockey East.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Bridget Prue here with Eric Galante, and we have uh one game coming up here on Nesson this weekend.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: It is UNH against Dartmouth.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: And Eric, you saw Dartmouth recently, UNH, uh obviously the Hockey East side of this, Dartmouth coming in from the ECAC.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: They've been ranked for a good chunk of this season, but what does UNH have to bring in order to beat them?
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think they're gonna have to bring a lot.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_01: I think, first of all, when we think of UNH, we think of their rivalry as Maine, right?
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_01: And obviously, deservedly so.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_01: But this is a pretty big rivalry in the state of New Hampshire.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I think this is the biggest game that we've seen in this rivalry in quite a long time.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_01: And I want to say maybe ever, but you know, this is a Dartmouth team that's competing at a level they've not competed at at a long time.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_01: Rickashman's done a really good job.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: So this is about as big a game in this rivalry in a long time.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_01: So that makes it really exciting to start with.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, we had UNH on Nessen against Northeastern last week.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_01: We talked a lot about it.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: If you were on the listen to the broadcast last week, they've been really good here recently with the win against Northeastern.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_01: They're 5'1-1 over their last seven games.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_01: They're allowing under two goals per game in that span.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: And the biggest thing that stands out is the demarcation line of that stretch is Nikolai Jensen coming back from injury after he missed the first six games of the season.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: Ever since he's come back, he adds so much in terms of experience, and he also just stretches the depth of U and H defensively, right?
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_01: He plays with Alex Gagney.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_01: It sends Heward down to that other group, and it just really stretches out what UNH can do defensively.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_01: You and I have talked so much about the fact that UNH, what do they do?
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_01: They limit shots, right?
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_01: That's going can be close to our things we're not going to say anymore because everyone who watches this show knows it.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: But the fact that they can do it with a full and healthy defensive core is what really makes them go right.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_01: So that stands out.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_01: I think the offense also stands out as well.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: They scored five goals against Northeastern the other night.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_01: They did that on fewer than 20 shots, Bridget.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_01: That top group for UNH, it's not a top group that we talk about in the same way as, you know, just to take Northeastern, a Williams London Ritzcovian, who we're going to talk about a little bit later, a Leonard Perot and Higgins, uh, you know, BU's top group Providence.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_01: We don't talk about Sy Leclair, Liam Devlin, and Ryan Conme in that class, but I kind of feel like they deserve to be there.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_01: When you watch them, they're really good at creating.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: Ryan Conney might be the most underrated player in the league.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, is that crazy to say?
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_01: But I think he might be.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_01: Um, he's averaging more than a point per game for his career uh now in his second season.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and the other guy's Marty Lavins, one line down from that.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: Mike Sousa called him kind of the driver of the team.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_01: Lavins scored two goals against Northeastern on Friday.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_01: He has three in his last three games.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_01: So this UNH team really is putting themselves in a position.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_01: They're inside the cut line in the pairwise, as of this recording.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, they have these non-conference games like this against Dartmouth could be really, really crucial for a UNH team that didn't end up missing by much last year.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: This is not going to be an easy team for UNH to beat.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: And like you mentioned, their rivals in proximity, both teams playing uh both campuses in New Hampshire.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: So it should be a good one here on Essen.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_01: And it's one that Dartmouth really needs, right?
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_01: Because after the weekend they had, they were in such a good position.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_01: They were up in the top five in the pairwise.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: I gotta tell you, I was pretty impressed with them against Boston College.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: They play that Quinnipiac style.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_01: Reed Cashman was an assistant for Ram Pecknold before he went to the NHL to Washington for a couple of years, and they play that really tough neutral zone style that can be difficult the first time you see it.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_01: The one thing that is helpful here for New Hampshire, remember, they've already played Quinnipia this year, and they've played them consistently the last few years.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_01: They split with them earlier this year.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_01: So they have seen this style, which should help UNH a little bit in this game.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_01: So this is one of those really important matchups.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, for Dartmouth, they're still in the driver's seat in the ECAC, but now it looks like they may need to win the league in order to get in the tournament.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_01: And New Hampshire, these non-conference games, are gonna be a difference because their second half schedule is absolutely brutal in Hockey East.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, they still have three games with BU, three games with BC at Maine, their two-game series with UMass, and their two-game series with Lowell.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_01: That's all in the second half.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_01: So, what that means is their strength of schedule is gonna be just fine.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_01: Can they take care of these games?
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna see on Friday with UNH and Dartmouth.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_01: We have plenty more, including a Saturday hockey game with Northeastern and Merrimack coming up.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_01: We'll talk about that on the other side.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome back.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_01: We have more Nesson College Hockey action on Saturday.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_01: We don't want this first half of the season to end.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_01: We got another game for you.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_01: Northeastern at Merrimack on Saturday.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: It's a Merrimack team coming off a split against Anchorage.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_01: One guy who's really stood out here recently for me, Bridget, is David Sacco for Merrimack.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_01: He has five goals in his last four games for Merrimack, two multi-goal games, including on Friday against Anchorage.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_01: Merrimack's, they're still trying to find their offense, but you do see it in Spurts sometimes.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_01: You saw it Friday in that victory for Merrimack after coming home from Northern Ireland.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm really interested to see what they do with this Northeastern team, which has seen a chair of up and down so far.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_01: Um, one person, though, for Northeastern who really stands out that I know you want to talk about is Cam Lund.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, Cam London.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_00: We heard from him earlier in the season.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: He wanted to have more of a shot first mentality, maybe was passing uh too much last year, was maybe missing some points that he could have had, some goals that he could have had.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: Well, he's definitely changed his philosophy this season, and it's working out really well for him.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: And he is our service credit union scoring leader.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: He led all hockey East skaters uh last weekend with a five-point weekend, two goal, uh, two goals and three assists, uh, including the game-winning goal against Brown.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_00: And he's been consistent.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_00: He finished the weekend with 11 shots and a plus four rating, went seven for 14 on face-offs.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: So he's a guy that you're getting a 200-foot game from.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: He's he's winning those face-offs for you.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: He's good defensively, and he has been putting numbers up.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: And that's not to mention the streak that he's on, and he's been playing really well for a while.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: He had eight points in four consecutive games and tallied a goal in three straight games coming into this weekend series.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: So uh he holds a team high eight goals and 17 points, second in uh second in hockey east with 11 points.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: So he is definitely somebody that they've leaned on on the offensive side of things.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: And to look at where they stand right now coming into this game, they've won three of the last four, including that big win over number three, well, now number two, Boston College.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_00: So they still have uh extremely hard strength of schedule coming up as well, like you mentioned in the last segment with UNH.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like every you can say that about pretty much every hockey east team because the conference is so strong right now, and we'll get into the pairwise and the rankings coming up soon.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: But uh yeah, they have two games left against number seven seven uh Providence, they have uh a game against BC guaranteed for the bean pot, uh, two games against number 13 BU, uh, a game at number five main, and two games uh versus number 10 UMass Lowell.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: So still a gauntlet, it feels like.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and I think that's the thing, right?
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I know their record is not where they wanted to be, but the thing that stands out to me, Bridget, is unlike the last two years where Northeastern got off to a little bit of a slow start and they were in like the 40s in the pairwise.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_01: So then when they went on their run in the second half, it wasn't quite enough to get up higher where they needed to be.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_01: They're, as of this recording, 23rd, which is almost hard to believe for what their record is, but that speaks to the strength of schedule that you've talked about, and they have some potential for that schedule to continue.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_01: So if they can figure this out, and I think the two things they have going for them is number one, you mentioned Lund, that top group, that Williams London, Riscovian group is as good as any line in this league right now.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_01: And number two, they've basically done all of this without their power play.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_01: And considering A, Jerry Keefe's history on the power play, and B, Northeastern's history on the power play, you have to think that that's gonna figure itself out eventually.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_01: And if they can find those two things, they have a chance.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_01: And so uh some momentum here going into the first half.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_01: We mentioned it on the broadcast last week.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_01: It's kind of interesting.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_01: They have a much shorter winter break than everybody else.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_01: It's just two weeks before they kick off the Led Your Bank Classic up at Dartmouth.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_01: So be interesting to see how they do in their final test as they take on Merrimack.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna go around Hockey East when we come back.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for watching this week in Hockey East.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome back.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_01: It's time to go around Hockey East, presented by the Boston Harbor Hotel.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_01: Visit hockeyeastonline.com for your chance to win championship tickets and a two-night stay at the Boston Harbor Hotel.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_01: Not a ton of women's action this week, so we just wanted to sort of go through a couple of things that stand out to us.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_01: Bridget, why don't you start?
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, there's only one game left before the winter break for the women's side that's made in Merrimack tomorrow at 6 p.m.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: So, like you said, not really previewing too much here, but I think it's an important time to look back at some standouts from the earlier parts of this season.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: The women, of course, are further along in their schedule than the men.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_00: The men are still less than halfway through their hockey e schedule.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: So to take a look at some standouts and somebody that I think nobody really had on their radar, probably because she's a freshman and because nobody knew what the goalie situation was going to be like at Northeastern this year.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_00: They had Paige Doborski, who is a veteran.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_00: They had Lisa Junson, who has just jumped right off the page.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I've been fortunate enough to broadcast a few of those Northeastern games, uh, including uh her one of her shutouts.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, she now has four this season.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_00: She is a freshman from Sweden.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and so far I've liked everything from her personality to her style of play.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: And to just go through some of her numbers from this year.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: She's the only goalie in the nation with under one goal per game average.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_00: So, and you think back to Gwen Phillips, who did that two seasons ago, and you think back to Aaron Frankel, who, you know, was always hovering right there, best numbers in the country.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_00: And somehow Dave Flint has done it again.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I mean, he was a goalie himself, and he's always been a great coach, getting his goalies to the highest level.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_00: So she's currently an 0.88 goals against average, which is really impressive.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_00: She's also the top goalie in the country in safe percentage.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_00: She's only played eight games, four of them were shutouts.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_00: Her record is 6-2-0, but the losses came to a ranked BC team and then BU in her very first collegiate game ever.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and she's only she's not given up more than two goals in any game that she's played so far this season.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: Some of the scores are a little higher because teams have scored empty nets, but she's not given up more than two goals, and that explains the amazing numbers that she has so far.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_00: And uh right now that leaves Northeastern in a pretty good position ending the first half.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_00: So they're in that top group, which is what we've been calling it in the women's side of Hockey East.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: And that top group has consisted of mostly BC, BU, UConn, and Northeastern.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: So they're right in the mix for that.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: They're only four points back from first place.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, so that is a really tight group up at the top there, the women's side of Hockey East.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_00: They're also just outside the top 15 USEHO.com poll.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um, pairwise, they're 13th.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: And just a reminder: the women's side, only 11 teams go to the tournament uh based on percentage of, because there's fewer uh women's teams uh to go off of.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: But that makes it really tough to get in one of those at-large bids.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: So you really need to be top 10 or maybe I would say top eight to feel like you're comfortable because five spots automatically go to conference tournament winners and then six at-large bids.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: So unless there's overlap in those at-large bids, which a lot of times there are, but uh, I still think they're set up in good position to potentially make the tournament.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: And also remember that they've won uh six of the last seven hockey east tournaments, except for last year's.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think the most interesting thing is that, you know, we've talked about these top four a lot.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know that we can sit here and figure out which one of the four is the best of them.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_01: And that should make the second half pretty exciting.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um, one more thing I want to note.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_01: Um, how about Vermont here recently?
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_01: I I know that they're coming off a two to one win this weekend against Merrimack.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_01: I know that the record overall may not be where they would want it to be, but they've only allowed nine goals in their last seven league games, despite going two, four, and two in that stretch.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Jane Gervais has really been incredible.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_01: She's our Jersey Mike's, a sub-above player of the week, was great against Merrimack.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, she stopped 135 of 144 shots in that seven-game stretch.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, Vermont and UNH were right around those, you know, right underneath those four teams that we've talked about.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: So when you look at Vermont's schedule, which is brutal down the stretch of the season, uh, they have three games with each of those top four teams, the way their schedule works down the stretch.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_01: Pretty remarkable.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_01: But they have the ability to keep the puck out of the net.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: So, are they gonna do that to some of those teams and be able to really affect this race?
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_01: I'm really interesting to see what we get from this group.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_01: Coming up, we'll continue around Hockey East.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_01: More to come on this week in Hockey East.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome back to This Week in Hockey East, the segment brought to you by Boston Children's Hospital.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_01: Let's continue to go around Hockey East.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_01: Let's look at the men's side at a huge non-conference game last week.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_01: And what a statement for the Providence Friars as they sweep Colorado College.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_01: That's a massive win, not just for the Friars, but the league as a whole, Bridget.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I was there.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: I broadcast both of those games.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: It was a really physical series.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and it was obviously really important for the pairwise for Providence College.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_00: Colorado College came in, uh, the number eight team in the country, Providence was number 10.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: With both of those wins, they shot up to number seven.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, the pairs pairwise implications as well, they went up.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: And they're pretty safe at number six right now.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: Like when you're when you find yourself at in the top six, you know, maybe seven or eight, uh, come the halfway point of the season, you feel pretty good because if you think you can continue to play good hockey at this pace, then you know you're not gonna fall that far back, and then you're setting yourself up for a potential at-large bid in the tournament, and we all know how hard it is to be the team that wins Hockey East uh the championship and get in that way.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_00: So hockey actually has a chance to get in five or six teams this year if uh we were looking at the pairwise and where it stands today, which we'll get into a little bit later.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: But to talk about the Colorado College series, uh, some of these friars have been just taking steps forward.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: And some of those are young players and some of those are transfers and older guys.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: I think that this team has more depth than we've seen the past few seasons.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_00: And when I say that, I mean their entire left side of their roster, all of their left wings are freshmen and they're all contributing.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: They have uh some guys that came in from transferring, like uh Ryan O'Reilly, who's come in and helped.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: They've had uh they've just had Logan Will come in and have a great weekend as well.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: So their depth in terms of having a great balance of veterans and freshmen, but they can roll any line.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_00: I've watched Nate Lehman feel comfortable rolling his fourth line as much as his second line, and and he keeps on going.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: And a couple of other standouts for Providence we want to look to.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_00: John Mustard, one of the freshmen who's having a really great stretch.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_00: He's one of the fastest players, Nate Lehman said, since Brendan Tanneh, who obviously we know was on the national title team.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: He's been played over 500 games in the NHL.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's a really good uh compliment being paid to John Mustard to say that.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: But he's had eight points in his last five games, three goals, five assists in that stretch on a five-game point streak.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: So he started to come on.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: And the numbers are there now.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_00: He was scoring and he was assisting on goals that kept getting called back.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: So the numbers would have been even better if those had gone their way.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_00: But now you really start to see it on the score sheet.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_00: And another player who's had a really good first half and they needed him to was Phillips Fed back.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_00: He's 9, 2, and 1 uh so far this season.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_00: Top five in the conference in safe percentage.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_00: And he is our night shift all academic standout.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_00: He's been backstopping the Friars to a lot of these wins.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_00: They've been putting up strong performances against good teams, and that's what set them up really well right now in the pairwise.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and I think that pairwise conversation is one that, you know, we're gonna talk about a lot, but as we sort of hit a natural resetting point here at the end of the first half, it's not the first time in the last few years that hockey has been in a pretty good position on December 10th uh with six teams in the field.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: It was the case last year, right?
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: They would have had six.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_01: But the thing that feels a little bit different this year is number one, the strength of schedule for a lot of these schools is pretty impressive and at a place where it's likely not to drop because of how good the league is as a whole.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_01: Number two, where Hockey East's record is against out-of-conference opponents.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_01: Remember, that's such a critical part of the pairwise RPI formula.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_01: Your out-of-conference record.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: And hockey East is above 700 winning percentage in non-conference games.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_01: They have not, they've been good, but they haven't quite been at that level in a pretty long time.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_01: And that's why that Providence series, as we talk about, is huge, not just for Providence, but the league as a whole, because it's also losses to the NCHC's record.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_01: But you have six teams in the top 14 right now.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, a bunch of those seem pretty safe.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_01: You have a bunch of teams whose record maybe doesn't jump out, but they're in position because of how good the schedule is.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_01: The thing that's going to be crucial here over the next couple of weeks, as we look at some of these holiday tournaments, because hockey east is so good, your only chance to sort of lose ground is the non-conference holiday tournaments sometimes, because some of those teams could be lower down in the pair wise and really hurt you.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_01: So teams like UConn will go to Milwaukee, they'll play Alaska, and then the winner or the uh winner-loser of Wisconsin and Farris State.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_01: They gotta be able to get results there.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_01: They play Connecticut Ice, they'll get a game with Quinnipiac, potentially.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_01: They have to be able to get that game.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we talked about Northeastern a little bit and where they are.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_01: They'll have the Ledyard Bank Classic.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_01: They have a guaranteed beatpot game.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_01: Even UMass, a huge get to get a game on the road out of Ganis to move them into the top 20.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_01: They have a game against Cornell and Tempe at the turn of January, potentially a game against Arizona State.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_01: And then even in league, they still have three with Maine, two with BC, two with Lowell.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: It gives you a chance.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_01: There's teams that I think we're sitting here and we're saying it's not that they're gonna have to hold on, but they have a chance.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_01: And that is the biggest thing that you could hope for.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: Come back with some short shifts on the other side this week in Hockey East.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome back to this episode of This Week in Hockey East.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Bridget Prue here with Eric Galanti.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's time for some short shifts presented by the Shift Group, helping former athletes and veterans become elite business professionals.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_00: And Eric, you had the pleasure of broadcasting a wonderful game on Monday.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: Boston College and UMass Lowell physical series was really fun to watch.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it was.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_01: I think it was something that we'll see in March uh coming up between those two things.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, there were a couple of streaks, though, that I thought were worth shouting out.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_01: Number one, uh Mirko Battazzoni was the first guy to score a power play goal off Boston College all year.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_01: BC went 39 for 39 on their penalty kill before he scored on that 40th attempt.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, just going by recent history, the latest into the season that a team had a perfect penalty kill by date, uh, you look at November 12th in 2021, Michigan Tech, uh, that's going over the last five or six years.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: So Boston College was a full month longer than that with a perfect penalty kill.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_01: So a pretty remarkable streak comes to an end.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_01: And by the UMass power play, which UMass low power play, excuse me, which has been basically the best power play in Hockey East all year.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and then just a second note that win for Boston College, their 18th consecutive home win that ties the program record going back to 1990 and 1991.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: So they'll take that winning streak into the Merrimack game on January 10th.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_01: Two pretty impressive records as the Eagles finish the first half 12-3-1, and finally number one in the pairwise.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and my shortshift has to do with the professional women's hockey league.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: Their season has now started, and we want to spotlight the fact that there's a lot of hockey east alumni that you can go watch in the league.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and just the fact that the this conference has put out so many good players.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, so 25% of the PWHL is made up of hockey East alumni.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_00: There's 35 different players, there's four people on coaching staffs that are involved in the PWHL on that side of things.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_00: And you kind of you when you look through it, they the hockey east has put out so many good goalies recently that you you see almost one on every team.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: There's Elaine Chule, there's Sandra Abstrider who played at Providence not that long ago, Gwen Phillips, Aaron Frankel.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_00: It just seems like the list goes on for the quality goaltenders that have come out of this league.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: Abigail Levy is well for Boston College.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: And uh the good news is a lot of them play for the Boston Fleet, or at least will be coming back to play uh against the Boston Fleet at UMass Lowell uh at the Song Center.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: So you still have a chance to go see them.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, it's great hockey.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_00: I was involved with the league uh last year, and I was always impressed with just the start that the league had, and it continues now in its sophomore season.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: Or you can watch some of them right here on Nesson, right?
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: You can watch them on Nesson.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for joining us.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_01: Fun episode today.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_01: Enjoy the last couple of games before we get to winter break of the college hockey season for Bridget Prue.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Erica Lanti, and we'll talk to you soon.