Each week, USCHO.com will pick the top 10 moments from the past weekend in our Monday 10 feature.
1. Maine takes four of six points from No. 1 BC
Lynden Breen and Bradly Nadeau each finished with a goal and an assist as No. 13 Maine stunned the top-ranked team in the country on Friday night, a 4-2 victory over top-ranked Boston College in before a sold-out crowd of 5,043 at Alfond Arena.
Six different Black Bears finished with a point apiece the next night as the teams skated to a 2-2 tie in front of another sellout crowd, with BC earning the extra point in the Hockey East standings by winning the shootout.
“It was good to see our guys got better as the game went along,” Maine coach Ben Barr said after Friday’s win, as reported in the Portland Press Herald. “We’re a grind team, and obviously we can make some plays and score some goals, too. We made it hard on them, and that’s what you have to do against a team with that much talent.”
2. Denver, Arizona State split at Mullett
No. 16 Arizona State still has a year to go before joining the NCHC, but it gave fans a taste of what will certainly be one of the league’s better rivalries as it skated to a split in a weekend series vs. No. 2 Denver. The Sun Devils won Friday night’s tilt 6-5 in overtime while Denver took the second game 8-4, after originally falling behind 3-0.
“We chose not to fold in the tent,” Denver coach David Carle said after Saturday night’s win. “We chose to keep going. (I) loved how we finished the game, the last 15 minutes of the third. We showed some maturity in our game.”
3. North Dakota sweeps Minnesota Duluth
No. 4 North Dakota, which received the most first-place votes in this season’s NCHC preseason poll, asserted itself as it began league play over the weekend with a resounding sweep at No. 18 Minnesota Duluth, by scores of 4-2 and 2-0.
UND received goals from Louis Jamernik V and Riese Gaber in the opening two periods while goaltender Ludvig Persson stopped all 30 shots fired his way to earn his second shutout of the season and North Dakota’s fifth straight win over the Bulldogs in Duluth for the first time since a 13-game streak going back more than five decades.
“We’re a confident group,” Gaber told the Grand Forks Herald. “We’ve got a lot of weapons. We showed that this weekend. We’re just going to keep going and doing our thing.”
North Dakota is an impressive 3-1 on the road this season.
“(G)oing on the road and getting three out of four in some tough places to play, you grow exponentially,” coach Brad Berry told the Grand Forks Herald. “I think our group grew a little bit. It’s tough to win in this building. We’ve done it a few times, but it doesn’t happen often.”
4. Providence keeps rolling with sweep of Northeastern, Leaman gets historic win.
One night after edging Northeastern 2-1 in overtime at home, No. 5 Providence went on the road to rout their Hockey East rivals 5-2 at Matthews Arena. Freshman Tanner Adams registered two goals and an assist to help coach Nate Leaman became the Friars’ all-time leader in wins with his 249th at Providence.
Leaman, who coached the Friars to the NCAA D-I championship in 2015, moved past Lou Lamoriello for the all-time program lead, a record that stood for 40 years.
5. Gophers take four of six points from Wolverines
Minnesota twice rallied from third-period deficits during a weekend series at Michigan, winning 4-3 Friday night at Yost Arena while skating to a 2-2 tie the following night. Michigan won the shootout on the second night to salvage the extra point in the B1G standings.
Brody Lamb increased his team-leading point total to 10, scoring his sixth goal of the season and second power-play tally of his career in Saturday’s tie, capping a four-point weekend. After not allowing a power-play goal for the first four games of the season, the Gophers have given up at least one in five of the previous six contests.
6. BU’s Hutson bros are hat trick bros
After stumbling in their Hockey East opener vs. New Hampshire (while ranked No. 1 in the country), and a disastrous exhibition outing vs. the U.S. National Under-18 Team, Boston University is unbeaten in six of its last eight, including a sweep of a home-and-home series vs. UMass Lowell. The Terriers won 3-2 on Friday night at Tsongas Arena, then romped to a 6-1 at home the next night.
Sophomore forward Quinn Hutson recorded his first collegiate hat trick as part of a career-best four-point night to lead BU in Saturday night’s rout. Hutson’s hatty came just one week after his brother, sophomore defenseman Lane Hutson, achieved the feat for the first time in a 5-4 overtime loss to North Dakota.
“Obviously, it’s pretty cool,” Quinn said. “It probably hasn’t happened before, ever, if I had to guess.”
7. Quinnipiac explodes out of ECAC gate
Defending NCAA champion Quinnipiac is not only unbeaten in ECAC play so far this season (3-0-1), the Bobcats have outscored league opponents 16-5.
Collin Graf and Jayden Lee led Quinnipiac with three points apiece in a 5-2 win over rival Yale on Saturday night, while Jacob Quillan and Andon Cerbone added multi-point nights as well. It was the Bobcats’ 13th straight win in the rivalry, improving to 31-7-5 all time against the Bulldogs.
“Yale’s always a really tough opponent,” Quinnipiac coach Rand Pecknold told the university’s student paper. “There’s a lot of emotion that goes into this game every time we play them here or there. I thought we handled the adversity well.”
8. Michigan State unbeaten in four straight
After closing out October with a weekend sweep at Boston College, Michigan State has rebounded nicely since, taking 10 out of a possible 12 points from B1G opponents. The Spartans took two straight at Ohio State the weekend of Nov. 3, then got four of six points from Penn State a week later.
Isaac Howard had a goal and an assist for Michigan State in a 3-3 tie vs. the Nittany Lions, extending his point streak to nine straight games and giving him his fourth multiple-point game of the season. Patrick Geary had his first career shorthanded goal in the tie.
9. St. Cloud takes pair from Western Michigan
St. Cloud State continued its hot start to NCHC play, earning its second consecutive sweep to open the league season with a 3-0 win at No. 12 Western Michigan in Kalamazoo.
Senior forward Veeti Miettinen of Finland scored in his sixth consecutive game, while senior goaltender Dominic Basse stopped all 22 shots he faced to record his third shutout of the season.
10. St. Thomas moves into CCHA’s top spot
In only its third season as a Division I program, St. Thomas finds itself alone atop the CCHA standings following two wins at Bowling Green over the weekend. A 4-3 win Saturday night was the Tommies’ fourth in a row (the longest winning streak in program history) and gave them their first CCHA record above .500.
St. Thomas has outscored Northern Michigan and Bowling Green 18-7 in its last four games. Sophomore forward Lucas Wahlin is St. Thomas’s leading scorer with six goals and six assists. Cooper Gay had a pair of goals in Saturday night’s win.
