@BCHockeyNews 22m
According to @Buccigross, the Eagles are back in Worcester at the DCU Center! @BCHockeyNews learns its opponent at noon on @ESPNU #WeAreBC
@bchockeyblog1
They're switching up the fourth line. Matty G in. Merry Christmas.
pick6pedro {l Wrote}:Tough region, but to be expected.
PhillyandBCEagles {l Wrote}:pick6pedro {l Wrote}:Tough region, but to be expected.
Meh, could've been a lot worse. Denver doesn't impress me at all and hopefully UML/Minn State will beat each other up. Lowell is playing well right now but they're certainly not a team we can't handle.
pick6pedro {l Wrote}:PhillyandBCEagles {l Wrote}:pick6pedro {l Wrote}:Tough region, but to be expected.
Meh, could've been a lot worse. Denver doesn't impress me at all and hopefully UML/Minn State will beat each other up. Lowell is playing well right now but they're certainly not a team we can't handle.
Really? Of course BC can beat anyne. And I admit I don't know a ton about these teams, but we've lost 3 of our last 4, played only 3 games over a 4 week span, and each of those teams is on a strong streak (Lowell 3/4 and shutout their opponents at the garden, Minny St is 12-0-1 in their last 13, and DU has won 4 straight). There is always cause for concern when we are the coldest of the 4 and the only non-conference tourney champ.
PhillyandBCEagles {l Wrote}:pick6pedro {l Wrote}:PhillyandBCEagles {l Wrote}:pick6pedro {l Wrote}:Tough region, but to be expected.
Meh, could've been a lot worse. Denver doesn't impress me at all and hopefully UML/Minn State will beat each other up. Lowell is playing well right now but they're certainly not a team we can't handle.
Really? Of course BC can beat anyne. And I admit I don't know a ton about these teams, but we've lost 3 of our last 4, played only 3 games over a 4 week span, and each of those teams is on a strong streak (Lowell 3/4 and shutout their opponents at the garden, Minny St is 12-0-1 in their last 13, and DU has won 4 straight). There is always cause for concern when we are the coldest of the 4 and the only non-conference tourney champ.
Momentum from week to week is overrated in college hockey, IMO. It's not like any other sport where you're playing games at a consistent clip, whether it's once a week in football, every 3-4 days in NCAA basketball, basically every other night in the NHL/NBA, almost every day in baseball. You play two games in 2-3 nights and then you have 5 days off, making each weekend its own event.
NorthEndEagle {l Wrote}:cat hair pee fire
pick6pedro {l Wrote}:PhillyandBCEagles {l Wrote}:pick6pedro {l Wrote}:Tough region, but to be expected.
Meh, could've been a lot worse. Denver doesn't impress me at all and hopefully UML/Minn State will beat each other up. Lowell is playing well right now but they're certainly not a team we can't handle.
Really? Of course BC can beat anyne. And I admit I don't know a ton about these teams, but we've lost 3 of our last 4, played only 3 games over a 4 week span, and each of those teams is on a strong streak (Lowell 3/4 and shutout their opponents at the garden, Minny St is 12-0-1 in their last 13, and DU has won 4 straight). There is always cause for concern when we are the coldest of the 4 and the only non-conference tourney champ.
twballgame9 {l Wrote}:pick6pedro {l Wrote}:PhillyandBCEagles {l Wrote}:pick6pedro {l Wrote}:Tough region, but to be expected.
Meh, could've been a lot worse. Denver doesn't impress me at all and hopefully UML/Minn State will beat each other up. Lowell is playing well right now but they're certainly not a team we can't handle.
Really? Of course BC can beat anyne. And I admit I don't know a ton about these teams, but we've lost 3 of our last 4, played only 3 games over a 4 week span, and each of those teams is on a strong streak (Lowell 3/4 and shutout their opponents at the garden, Minny St is 12-0-1 in their last 13, and DU has won 4 straight). There is always cause for concern when we are the coldest of the 4 and the only non-conference tourney champ.
I'd worry about losing 3 of 4 if they weren't all to the same team.
pick6pedro {l Wrote}:twballgame9 {l Wrote}:pick6pedro {l Wrote}:PhillyandBCEagles {l Wrote}:pick6pedro {l Wrote}:Tough region, but to be expected.
Meh, could've been a lot worse. Denver doesn't impress me at all and hopefully UML/Minn State will beat each other up. Lowell is playing well right now but they're certainly not a team we can't handle.
Really? Of course BC can beat anyne. And I admit I don't know a ton about these teams, but we've lost 3 of our last 4, played only 3 games over a 4 week span, and each of those teams is on a strong streak (Lowell 3/4 and shutout their opponents at the garden, Minny St is 12-0-1 in their last 13, and DU has won 4 straight). There is always cause for concern when we are the coldest of the 4 and the only non-conference tourney champ.
I'd worry about losing 3 of 4 if they weren't all to the same team.
That's definitely a consideration. I would also worry less if it wasn't a combination of lines 2-4 disappearing, line 1 having trouble getting into the zone, awful D lapses, and soft goals allowed. Which also highlights the importance of matchups with this team.
I'm not doom and gloom, I just don't get those who seem to think BC can sleepwalk into the finals.
B.U. or B.C.? Hockey Star Let Brother Pick
By PETER MAYMARCH 25, 2014
Behind Johnny Gaudreau (13), a 5-foot-8, 159-pound left wing who topped Division I with 30 goals this season, Boston College is an N.C.A.A. tournament favorite.CHESTNUT HILL, Mass. — The hockey rivalry between Boston College and Boston University has played out on many ice surfaces. Boston University has won more Beanpot championships. Boston College has had better luck lately in the N.C.A.A. tournament, winning four titles in the last 12 years.
But it was in a home in southern New Jersey three years ago that the rivalry took a decided turn in Boston College’s direction. Johnny Gaudreau and his younger brother Matthew sat in their Carneys Point home and debated the merits of both universities.
Johnny Gaudreau favored Boston College. Barely 5 feet 6 inches at that point, he liked that the Eagles sent small players like Brian Gionta and Nathan Gerbe to the N.H.L. He had been collecting B.C. apparel for years.
His brother, 15 months younger, favored the Terriers. He had been collecting B.U. apparel for years. The brothers were determined to go to college together, and Johnny Gaudreau decided to give Matthew the final say.
“They had narrowed it down to B.U. or B.C.,” said Jane Gaudreau, their mother. “John said: ‘I’ll let Matty pick. I’ll go with him.’ I know Matthew was leaning towards B.U., but he chose B.C.”
She added, “That’s how John ended up there, because Matthew picked it for him.”
Now Johnny Gaudreau, a left wing, is making his younger brother look prescient. Finishing his junior year, he is the overwhelming favorite for the Hobey Baker Award, given to college hockey’s top player.
Boston College spent much of the season ranked No. 1 and enters this week’s N.C.A.A. tournament as one of the favorites, despite having lost to Notre Dame in the Hockey East quarterfinals. Notre Dame is the only team the Eagles have lost to since Nov. 29.
Gaudreau, still diminutive at 5-8 and 159 pounds, is a big reason for the team’s success. He led Division I with 30 goals and failed to produce a point in only two games: Oct. 27 against Minnesota and March 16 against Notre Dame. He matched a Hockey East scoring streak set 21 years ago by Maine’s Paul Kariya with a point in 31 consecutive games, accumulating 61 points during the streak. He was the conference’s player of the month three times and became only the third player to win consecutive Hockey East player of the year awards.
“Believe me, I never saw any of this coming,” Gaudreau said this month. “I never expected to have the kind of season I’m having.”
He may be an army of one in that line of thinking. The former Northeastern assistant Albie O’Connell, who recruited Gaudreau, said: “He’s the best player in college hockey. He is steps ahead of everyone.”
Jim Montgomery, the Denver coach, who had Gaudreau on his United States Hockey League team in Dubuque, Iowa, compared Gaudreau to the Detroit Red Wings’ Pavel Datsyuk and the Chicago Blackhawks’ Patrick Kane.
“His creativity is off the charts,” Montgomery said. “He does things you don’t see anyone else doing, like Datsyuk. His footwork and handwork are extraordinary, and his puck protection is like Patrick Kane’s.”
As it happens, Gaudreau and Boston College will play Montgomery’s Denver team in the first round of the N.C.A.A. tournament Saturday. The Eagles won the national championship Gaudreau’s freshman year, when he was second on the team in points behind Chris Kreider, now with the Rangers. Last season, Gaudreau led the team in scoring with 21 goals and 30 assists, was a finalist for the Hobey Baker, and scored seven goals to lead the United States to a gold medal at the world junior championships.
“I’m just glad we have him, because he could have gone anywhere,” Boston College Coach Jerry York said.
Well before the Gaudreau brothers made their college decision, Johnny Gaudreau committed to Northeastern as a 15-year-old. He then missed two straight showcase tournaments for the top college prospects because he did not earn a spot on the southern New Jersey district team that traveled to those events.
He said he wondered at that point if he would play college hockey at all. He was convinced he was too small to play at a high level in college.
“Most of the top players are committing to colleges and playing in this tournament, and I couldn’t even make my district team,” he said. “I was too small. I didn’t even want to try out again when I was 18. But the coaches at Northeastern said I should.”
At that 2010 tournament, he had his coming-out party. York remembered seeing a pint-size whirling dervish and wondering: “Where did he come from? I had never seen him before.”
U.S. Hockey Report rated Gaudreau the No. 1 forward in the tournament, adding, “Gaudreau was the show here.” By that time, Gaudreau had made the decision to spend his senior year of high school playing for Dubuque of the U.S.H.L. He was named the league’s rookie of the year, and expected to head off to Northeastern.
But in June 2011, Northeastern Coach Greg Cronin left to join the Toronto Maple Leafs. His assistant, O’Connell, left to take a similar position at Harvard. Gaudreau asked Northeastern to release him from his letter of intent, and the university complied. In early August 2011, after a whirlwind recruiting visit to five New England universities, Gaudreau chose Boston College. Matthew Gaudreau joined him this year and appeared in six games as a freshman.
In the summer of 2011, the Calgary Flames drafted Johnny Gaudreau in the fourth round, with the 104th overall pick. He was stunned by the news. He had decided to skate with some friends at a local rink rather than watch the draft, convinced he would be drafted much later, if at all.
“I was ranked 204,” he said. “I didn’t want to watch the draft and then not get drafted.”
Gaudreau is now wrestling with what to do at the end of this season. He enjoys college life and playing with his brother, but has little left to accomplish at the collegiate level, especially if Boston College wins another national championship.
The Flames are telling Gaudreau to focus on the coming tournaments and then make the decision. Gaudreau’s mother would like to see her son finish college and graduate, and he said his mother usually prevailed in these kinds of things.
“I don’t think he gets it that when you go out there, it’s not going to be all fun anymore,” Jane Gaudreau said. “I don’t think he gets he may be taking the spot of someone who has a wife and three kids.”
She added: “As his mom, I’d like to see him take one more year to get a little bigger, a little stronger, and to enjoy his senior year. He’s never had a homecoming. He’s never had a prom. He missed his high school graduation. He said he’d have a graduation picture for me.
“Have your senior year. You will never get that back.”
If Matthew Gaudreau gets to decide again, he and his brother will return to Boston College. And if Jane Gaudreau was choosing, her sons would be Eagles for another year.
But neither one will probably get that chance. This time, Johnny Gaudreau is going to make the call himself.
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