As a die hard BC Hockey fan, I've had the unbelievable chance to experience some wins that I will always remember for the rest of my life, particularly the 2006 NCAA Northeast regional final and the 2012 Beanpot championship. While I haven't lived through the hard years such as many fans did all throughout the 90's, there are certainly two games that automatically jump out to me as the worst days in BC Hockey history. One was the 2007 NCAA championship vs Michigan State, a game in which we were certainly the better team but they just found a way to put the puck in the net. The other took place on March 25th, 2011 in St Louis, Missouri vs Colorado College. Just minutes after the NCAA tournament brackets came out, I had ten people call me and ask about how good Michigan was because they were the #2 seed in the West regional and they assumed we would just blow by CC. Admittedly, I thought it was going to be a cake walk as well.
Since there were so many questions as to where BC would play, I was not able to catch a flight out to the Gateway to the West but I sat (ok, stood), in front of my grandfather's TV for an hour before the game started, just chomping away at my finger nails. The whole time, my grandfather just sat there and said "Mike, don't worry, we're going to kill them", "They have nobody". I kind of laughed at it nervously but since I didn't know much about any teams out West, particularly a four seed, I was very confident in BC's ability to advance.
Just 19 seconds into the game, Jimmy Hayes potted home his 21st goal of the season and we went crazy, high giving each other, pumping fist, screaming in joy, and already doing our research on Michigan.
And then it happened.
CC ended the period with 4 goals in a 15 minute span, with the fourth tally coming in the final two minutes of the period, while BC was on the power play. I refused to lose hope but deep down, I knew the run was over. A regular season title, a Beanpot, a Hockey East tournament trophy, a four game sweep of BU, the best line in BC history, I thought to myself, how in the world is this possible? Think about this. That team's fourth line was Paul Carey (plays in NHL)- Pat Brown (plays in NHL)- Kevin Hayes (Plays in NHL). I am not sure that will ever be replicated here, maybe the 2015-16 team has a chance to be as deep but they won't have the top end speed that the 2011 team had in Whitney (x2), Atkinson, Gibbons, Kreider, and Almeida.
A win on Friday won't heal any sort of "wounds" from that game but it would certainly put a smile on each coach, player, fan, and blogger that had to go though that horrible game. Colorado College may not be a very highly ranked squad with a number of future NHL players, but as my grandfather and I learned four years ago, never say never.
Go Eagles.
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