Eagles start their second half with a convincing win
The Boston College men’s hockey team got the second half of their season underway in style on Friday night, blowing out Providence 7-1 thanks in large part to a dominant second period. The Eagles didn’t look rusty at all playing in their first Hockey East game in over a month, with six different players scoring goals and players from up and down the lineup chipping in on the scoresheet.
The Eagles wasted no time jumping out to the lead in this one, scoring on their very first shift of the game. A great passing play between the top line saw the puck move from Cutter Gauthier to Andre Gasseau and eventually to a wide open Oskar Jellvik in the slot. Jellvik fired it home for his 10th goal of the season to give BC a 1-0 lead just 35 seconds into the game. That was it for the scoring in the first, however, as both teams settled down and played solid defensive hockey for the rest of the period. Jacob Fowler wasn’t asked to do much in net but he made all of his saves and both Providence and BC came up empty on a power play chance as the Eagles took a 1-0 lead into the second period.
BC came out strong again to start the second period, with Will Smith and Jack Malone coming close to doubling the lead within the first few shifts. It was Jamie Armstrong who made it a 2-0 game, however, scoring just under seven minutes into the period. The grad transfer from BU tapped home the puck into a wide open net after Malone won a battle for a loose puck in front of the net and slid it over to an open Armstrong for his first of the season and first as an Eagle. Will Smith made it 3-0 just a few minutes later, banking home a rebound from below the goal line before Ryan Leonard scored a bad angle goal of his own on the same shift to give BC a 4-0 lead. Cutter Gauthier fired home a wrist shot with 9:30 left in the period to make it a five-goal lead and chase the Providence goalie and make it four goals in less than four minutes for the Eagles. Jacob Bengtsson chipped in for the sixth goal of the night with a shot from the point that looked like it may have been deflected and BC’s dominant second period came to an end with them leading 6-0.
Providence finally got on the board just over five minutes into the third period when Fowler was beaten by a wrist shot from the slot to make it a 6-1 game. That looked like it might be it for the scoring in this one, but Will Smith put home his second goal of them game with five minutes left in regulation after Ryan Leonard made a nice pass from down low to give Smith a wide open net to shoot at and give BC a 7-1 win.
With the win, the Eagles are now 14-3-1 on the season and 7-2-1 in Hockey East play. Coming off of a long break, this was about as encouraging of a performance as you could have hoped for from the Eagles, as the game was more or less decided by the halfway mark of the second period. BC will have a chance to make it a weekend sweep tomorrow night when they travel to Providence to finish up this home-and-home series.