Vermont topped Boston College 4-1 in front of a sellout crowd of 4,003 at Gutterson Fieldhouse. It was the 2009 Hockey East opener for both teams.
“I thought it was a pretty intense game,” Boston College coach Jerry York said. “Hockey East usually heats up as the season goes along, but I thought this was a pretty good battle.”
Junior Joe Whitney scored the only goal for BC, assisted by sophomore Cam Atkinson. Seniors Colin Vock and Brian Roloff scored for Vermont, along with junior Wahsontiio Stacey and freshman Chris McCarthy.
BC took an early 1-0 lead in the first period when Whitney scored with a wrist shot from just outside the right circle at 4:36.
“That’s a goal I need to have,” Vermont goalie Rob Madore said. “It was a bad goal and I got a bad read on the shot and at this level if you’re not seeing shots like you should, they’re going to be in the back of the net.”
Following the goal, the game remained scoreless for several minutes until Roloff scored a power-play goal at 17:51 to tie things up 1-1, assisted by McCarthy and junior Jack Downing.
Just seconds later, at 18:31, Colin Vock slid the puck past BC goalkeeper John Muse from just outside the crease. The goal was put under video review, but was ultimately upheld.
BC junior Carl Sneep made a wrist shot shortly after that appeared to be the game-tying goal, but this was also reviewed by the officials and was ruled no-goal.
Vermont’s McCarthy scored the only goal of the second period at 15:35. As he was skating by the crease with the puck, he slid backwards and slipped the puck into the net, giving the Catamounts the 3-1 advantage.
“I saw Jack (Downing) had the puck at our blue line,” McCarthy said. “I just cut across the ice; he made a great play to get it to me, I got alone with the goalie and buried it.”
The final goal of the game came when Stacey one-timed the puck past Muse from the tip of the crease at 7:39, giving Vermont a 4-1 lead.
“We didn’t capitalize on good chances I thought,” York said.
“I think the storyline of the game was us capitalizing on the few chances we had and really our penalty kill,” added Vermont coach Kevin Sneddon.
The penalty kill was able to get lots of practice in the game, as Vermont had nine penalties in the game, compared to seven for BC.
“Seemed like we had a lot of penalties in a row and that takes some life out of your team, exhausting your key players in those situations,” Sneddon said. “I was really impressed with the way that our team had energy.”
The game also represented a new beginning for McCarthy, who scored the first goal of his college career in the second period.
“I thought he had a great first game,” Sneddon said. “He was a factor in the game for us in a very positive way.”
