LOWELL, Mass.<\/b> — One of hockey’s oldest maxims is that playoff hockey comes down to goaltending and special teams.<\/p>\n
On this night, both teams had the goaltending, but only Massachusetts-Lowell had the special teams. On the strength of two power-play goals, Lowell topped Boston University 3-2, taking the first game in their best-of-three Hockey East quarterfinal series.<\/p>\n
The River Hawks went two-for-four on the man advantage, displaying especially crisp puck movement on both goals, while stopping both BU man advantages.<\/p>\n
On the first strike, Lowell moved the puck around with one-touch passes until C.J. Smith fed Joe Gambardella in front where he tucked it around Sean Maguire. That goal tied the game, 1-1.<\/p>\n
The second power-play goal proved the game-winner. Once again Smith provided the setup, his third assist of the game, finding Adam Chapie with a cross-ice pass, alone on the far post.<\/p>\n
“Sometimes your power play clicks and sometimes it doesn’t,” UML coach Norm Bazin said. “I thought it struggled two weeks ago [when we last played], but it got better this weekend.<\/p>\n
“You always like results, but the puck movement for a couple of those power plays was pretty strong. When you get movement, lanes open up. Fortunately for us, we were able to execute a couple times.”<\/p>\n
Not surprisingly, BU coach David Quinn faulted his own team’s special teams.<\/p>\n
“Our penalty kill let us down,” he said. “It’s going to have to get better tomorrow night if we’re going to have a chance to extend the series.<\/p>\n
“[The game-winner] was blown coverage. You can’t allow a cross-ice pass like that to a guy standing all alone on the backdoor. We had a lot of puck-watching and weren’t alert. On both their [power-play] goals, we blew our responsibility.”<\/p>\n
The quarterfinal series between the fourth-seeded River Hawks and fifth-seeded BU had promised to be a tight one. The two rivals finished with the exact same league record and split their games in head-to-head action. Lowell earned home ice based on tiebreaker, and thereby held the advantage over a BU squad that had gone a lackluster 6-7-2 on the road.<\/p>\n
Nonetheless, it was BU that took a 1-0 lead in the second period on a Jakob Forsbacka Karl goal. The first-line, freshman center walked out from the left corner and beat Kevin Boyle, who finished with 33 saves, short side.<\/p>\n
After Gambardella’s power-play goal evened the score, the two teams headed into the third period tied, 1-1. At 11:35, Michael Louria cut into the slot and moving left-to-right, shot back against the grain, possibly hitting a stick before it beat Maguire blocker side low.<\/p>\n
Chapie then added what appeared to be the clinching second power-play goal, but just 23 seconds later, BU’s Matt Grzelcyk shot through traffic and it deflected in to slice the margin to 3-2.<\/p>\n
The River Hawks had to weather the storm after Maguire was pulled with 1:39 remaining to seal the win.<\/p>\n
With the victory, Lowell may have wrapped up an NCAA tournament berth, moving up from 12th in the PairWise Rankings, which approximate the NCAA’s selection criteria, to a tie for 10th. Boston University appears to remain safe at No. 8.<\/p>\n
The immediate focus, however, remains on the Hockey East tournament, which BU won last year and Lowell the two seasons before that.<\/p>\n
To come back against the River Hawks, Quinn noted his team had to play significantly better, but expressed confidence that it would do so.<\/p>\n
“We’ve been pretty good [at coming back from losses],” he said. “It’s been a resilient group. We’re going to have to be very resilient tomorrow night, that’s for sure.<\/p>\n
“But I liked a lot of the things we did tonight. We’re just going to need to clean up the penalty kill and few other areas to create offense.<\/p>\n
“They’re a tough team to create offense off of… and we slowed down to make plays instead of attacking with speed. We’ve got to go to the net more consistently.”<\/p>\n
The two teams face off at 7 p.m. on Saturday and, if necessary, at 4 p.m. on Sunday.<\/p>\n
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