BU women's hockey beats Providence 5-1 despite lack of attention to detail

11/01/2024 05:16 PM

The Boston University women's hockey team came out of the Tara Watchorn lines lab in Syracuse and found what worked.

The Terriers (7-3-0, 5-1-0 Hockey East) had room to experiment while visiting the Orange. The Providence College Friars, coming off a close win at home against then No. 14-ranked Northeastern University, leave less room to mess with what has been working.

Providence (5-4-0, 2-3-0 HEA) was going to be a litmus test for how the BU offense would perform against a team of a similar caliber after playing either high-ranked or unproven programs.

The 5-1 BU win, its sixth in a row, looked convincing on paper, but head coach Tara Watchorn was unsatisfied with little mistakes that piled up throughout the game.

"We're a very skilled hockey team that's learning how to score goals," Watchorn said. "Not enough attention to detail. [The game] should have been a lot different in terms of shot count, should have been a lot different for the momentum."

Both teams have been reliant on their goaltending, letting the offense build off of the presence in the net behind them. Terrier senior Callie Shanahan and Friar senior Hope Walinski have been sitting at the top of Hockey East in both minutes and save percentage, and entering the game today, Shanahan was fourth in the nation with a .960 save percentage.

The Terrier penalty kill continued to look strong in front of Shanahan as well and not just defensively.

Sophomore forward Alex Law's speed caught the Friar defenders sleeping once again on the penalty kill, creating an odd-man rush into the BU offensive zone. Sophomore forward Neely Nicholson caught up to Law driving the net and fired Law's pass into the back of the net, beating Walinski blocker side to give BU a 1-0 lead at 3:26.

The Terriers didn't let their foot off the gas throughout the frame. The offense maintained pressure in the offensive zone.

Freshman forward Lola Reid, hot off her conference Player of the Month honor, continued her offensive tear by collecting the puck from a battle behind the net and firing it over to senior Ani Fitzgerald.

Walinski made the initial save on Fitzgerald, but she left the rebound up for grabs. Junior Riley Walsh took her chance and shot the puck home to extend the lead to 2-0 at 8:17 of the first.

The Friars made a push at the end of the period, but the Terriers cleared the puck as the buzzer to kill their momentum.

The second period was off to a slower start than the first, with both teams going back and forth, chasing each other down the ice and back. The Friars were aggressive in the neutral zone, creating battles along the board and breaking up passes along the blue line in their own defensive zone.

Providence went to the power play on a Luisa Welcke hooking call, but the BU penalty kill remained steady, limiting any good chances the Friars could get to score on Shanahan.

BU added onto its lead at 13:42 of the second, off a booming Julia Shaunessy shot from deep that was tipped in by Clara Yuhn.

"I know that Julia is probably going to shoot the puck. She likes to shoot it from the blue line," Yuhn said. "The past couple games, she's ripped a few shots at me, and they haven't gone in the net. They've just hit me and bruised, so I was happy that this one went in."

The Friars played a clean game for 47 minutes, until junior forward Reichen Kirchmair got called for tripping. BU was handed their first power play of the matchup, but it was unable to do anything with it, getting two shots on net and nothing else to show for the man advantage.

Shanahan's 27-save shutout ended with just over four minutes left in the game. Providence pulled Walinski for the extra attacker. The extra pressure in the Friars' offensive zone led to a scramble in front of the net and ended with Providence forward Dylan Berman poking the puck in to get the Friars on the board.

BU countered with an empty net goal to make it 4-1 as senior forward Christina Vote, who had a clear look on net, passed the puck to a driving Ani Fitzgerald so she could score her second goal of the season.

Reid put the game on ice with a second empty netter for her seventh goal of the year. Walinski came back into her crease to limit further damage until the clock ran out.

"Two unselfish plays during the end of the game," Watchorn said. "Those [happen] when you're scoring like that at the end of the game. That's the testament to the identity we want."

The Terriers will play the second game of the home-and-home series in Schneider Arena in Providence, hoping to clean up the details in their second look at the Friars.