{"id":29082,"date":"2021-11-19T13:41:29","date_gmt":"2021-11-19T18:41:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/?p=29082"},"modified":"2021-11-19T15:31:13","modified_gmt":"2021-11-19T20:31:13","slug":"mens-hockey-terriers-set-for-home-and-home-with-beantown-rival-northeastern","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/2021\/11\/19\/mens-hockey-terriers-set-for-home-and-home-with-beantown-rival-northeastern\/","title":{"rendered":"Men’s Hockey: Terriers set for home and home with Beantown rival Northeastern"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Owen Gund<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

This weekend, the Boston University Terriers (4-7-1, 3-4-1 HEA) are gearing up for a two-game track against the #18 ranked Northeastern Huskies (8-4-0, 4-3-0 HEA). The Terriers will host the Huskies this Friday night at Agganis Arena before making a short trip to Matthews Arena for Saturday’s matchup.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Terriers have not faced Northeastern since March 2020.<\/span><\/p>\n

In his weekly press conference,\u00a0 BU head coach Albie O’Connell talked about how exciting it is to finally face the Huskies again.<\/span><\/p>\n

“It’s nice to play a cross-town foe and another Hockey East opponent and see what we look like this weekend,” O’Connell said.<\/span><\/p>\n

This weekend’s series is another opportunity for the Terriers to take on an opponent ranked inside the top 20. The Terriers went 1-0-1 against No. 8 UMass last weekend.<\/span><\/p>\n

After last weekend’s series, O’Connell said he has noticed his team getting better each practice this season. In Thursday’s press conference, he talked about his team’s improvements in breaking out of their own zone.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

“I think we’ve improved on our breakouts and playing faster,” he said. “Against UMass, we were tough to play against and pushed the puck up ice, and that’s something we’ve been working on all year.”<\/span><\/p>\n

O’Connell also talked about how the team has defended much better. This was particularly noticeable in Saturday’s game, where they held the defending national champions to just 23 shots on goal.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Over the last 5-6 games, we haven’t given up a lot of shots”, he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

O’Connell did say that he wants his players to manage the puck better in the defensive zone, as turnovers have been the team’s primary issue.<\/span><\/p>\n

“If we can limit some of the mistakes in games with the puck management, I think we’ll be in a good spot. We’ve defended pretty well, but we’ve given up some big plays, and a lot of that has to do with turnovers,\u201d\u00a0 he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Another area O’Connell wants to see his team improve in is their discipline. Tyler Boucher and Ty Amonte each took two penalties this past weekend.<\/span><\/p>\n

O’Connell said that Boucher “has been in the penalty box a little bit too much.”\u00a0 O’Connell hopes that the penalties can get cleaned up by the whole team.<\/span><\/p>\n

With just two points in his first 12 games, Boucher has struggled to live up to the expectations that come with being a high NHL draft pick (10th overall to Ottawa this year). <\/span>O’Connell called Boucher “a work in progress” and said that he understands the pressure is a lot for him to deal with in his first college hockey season.<\/span><\/p>\n

“He’s someone who is obviously high-profile being a high draft pick. There’s a lot of pressure on him, so it’s difficult when you don’t get off to the start that statistically maybe you want”, O’Connell said.<\/span><\/p>\n

O’Connell said that Boucher has had “some pockets of good plays,” and he has confidence that the 18-year-old forward will turn his game around.<\/span><\/p>\n

“We’re asking him to definitely be patient with the process and just continually work and try to get better day-to-day. He’s a great kid. He’s all in, and we’re going to stick with him and hope that he can continue to progress.”\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Northeastern plays a similar game to BU. They defend well and have a 1.59 goals-against average. Sophomore netminder Devon Levi has played in all 12 games for the Huskies, who are currently tied for third place in the Hockey East standings.<\/span><\/p>\n

“They do a very good job structurally, and they do a very good job blocking shots, so our shooters are going to have to be sharp to get it by those guys and get it down to the net,” O’Connell said<\/span><\/p>\n

Puck drop for Friday’s game is set for 7:30 p.m at Agganis Arena.<\/span><\/p>\n

Featured Image by Patrick Donnelly<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Owen Gund This weekend, the Boston University Terriers (4-7-1, 3-4-1 HEA) are gearing up for a two-game track against the #18 ranked Northeastern Huskies (8-4-0, 4-3-0 HEA). The Terriers will host the Huskies this Friday night at Agganis Arena before making a short trip to Matthews Arena for Saturday’s matchup. The Terriers have not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18643,"featured_media":28989,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1026,1028,19],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29082"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18643"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29082"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29082\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29083,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29082\/revisions\/29083"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29082"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29082"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29082"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}