{"id":97981,"date":"2014-10-20T06:30:01","date_gmt":"2014-10-20T11:30:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.uscho.com\/hockey-east-blog\/?p=1305"},"modified":"2014-10-20T06:30:01","modified_gmt":"2014-10-20T11:30:01","slug":"teams-sweeping-splitting-and-uh-oh-getting-swept","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/2014\/10\/20\/teams-sweeping-splitting-and-uh-oh-getting-swept\/","title":{"rendered":"Teams sweeping, splitting, and… uh-oh, getting swept"},"content":{"rendered":"
I think<\/em> I learned these three things this week.<\/p>\n 1. Vermont is better than I thought, and Notre Dame completed an important sweep.<\/strong><\/p>\n These two teams both swept this weekend, but I thought Vermont’s was the more significant. I was surprised and impressed when the Catamounts opened the season by taking it to Northeastern in its own barn, 6-2. But I still thought they’d split their home-and-home series with a Clarkson team that won 21 games last year.<\/p>\n Instead, The Catamounts swept to bring their record to 3-0, outscoring their opponents 11-3. But with two roads wins over very good teams, Vermont has already topped trhe road win totals of three Hockey East teams last year.<\/p>\n Notre Dame, on the other hand, has played all four of its games at home. The Irish got off to a rocky start this year with two losses while hosting the Icebreaker Tournament, but rebounded with two wins over old rival Lake Superior State.<\/p>\n Considering the mileage Notre Dame logs each year, it was important to square up its home record.<\/p>\n 2. New Hampshire and Massachusetts avoided early-season holes with “better than expected” splits.<\/strong><\/p>\n Both of these teams lost their season opener last week, then headed out to Michigan for two-game sets from which they could have been expected to return with 0-3 records.<\/p>\n UMass got destroyed in its opener with Boston University, 8-1, then lost its first game at Michigan State. Although it’s hard to call mid-October games important, grabbing that first win on Saturday by rallying with two goals in the final five minutes, could at season’s end be seen as a key early turning point.<\/p>\n UNH opened with a loss at second-ranked Union — no shame in that — but was then facing No. 10 Michigan for two in its own barn. Last season, the Wildcats dug itself an early hole it never totally crawled out of with a 1-4-1 record against similarly tough competition, so a deja vu of going 0-3 would have been most definitely unwelcome.<\/p>\n Instead, the Wildcats defeated the Wolverines, 5-1, on Friday, and almost made the very good weekend a terrific one. Down 2-1 in the third, UNH outshot the hosts 16-8, but couldn’t get the equalizer.<\/p>\n Still, both UMass and UNH had to feel pretty good about splitting.<\/p>\n 3. As for Northeastern and Maine… uh-oh. My early-season optimism was unfounded.<\/strong><\/p>\n Only two Hockey East teams have yet to secure a single point: the Huskies and the Black Bears.<\/p>\n Northeastern allowed Vermont to come into its building a weekend ago and give it a 6-2 beating. So I suppose it shouldn’t be a surprise that the Huskies lost twice at sixth-ranked Colgate. But getting shut out both nights, 3-0, makes for an ominous start. NU has now been outscored 12-2 in its first three games.<\/p>\n Maine got swept at home by No. 2 Union, which by itself wouldn’t be tragic, but the Black Bears also lost two in Alaska. Opening the season 0-4 while getting outscored 16-5 ups the stakes for next week’s return engagement at home against Alaska-Anchorage.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I think I learned these three things this week. 1. Vermont is better than I thought, and Notre Dame completed an important sweep. These two teams both swept this weekend, but I thought Vermont’s was the more significant. I was surprised and impressed when the Catamounts opened the season by taking it to Northeastern in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":140328,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1425],"tags":[1236,1490],"coauthors":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n