Eagles crush Lowell 5-1

Despite 8 penalties that tallied up to 31 minutes in the box, BC men's hockey rolled past Lowell 5-1 Saturday night at Lowell's Tsongas arena. The Eagles were lead by goals from Cam Atkinson, Brian Gibbons, Bill Arnold, and the Hayes brothers. BC took the 1-0 lead at 4:43 when Cam Atkinson put in his own rebound to give the Eagles the early lead. BC's first line of Atkinson-Gibbons, and Joe Whitney was outstanding, getting 2 goals for the Eagles. Lowell played a very tough game in the first 2 periods, with the score 1-0 after 1. BC then took the 2-0 lead after Jimmy Hayes intercepted a pass by the Lowell goalie on the boards and put the puck in the open net. BC was really dominating Lowell the whole game until Patrick Wey took a 5 minute game misconduct penalty for a hit from behind at 15:18 of the second and Tommy Cross was already serving one of his 2 penalties on the night for holding. After everything got sorted out, Lowell then got a 5-3 for 26 seconds and another 5 minutes of PP thanks to the Wey penalty. The momentum of the game really switched at that point, but Lowell's PP was horrible for the 5:26 of PP they had which gave the momentum back to BC heading into the 3rd. BC's speedy penalty killers were always on the puck and Lowell could not set it up at all. BC was able to kill of the first 5:00 of the Wey penalty and go into the second with a 2-0 lead. The third period was a crazy 20 minutes to say the least. There were 7 combined penalties in the period (3 for BC) (4 for UML) Lowell). Lowell finally broke through at 7:04 of the third to make it a 2-1 game. Things were all downhill from there for the River hawks, as BC scored the final three goals of the game. The first of which was a shorthanded goal from who else but Cam Atkinson his second of the night on a great feed from Brian Gibbons. After BC took the 3-1 lead, Kevin Hayes put the cherry on top with a goal from Kevin Hayes on a great pass from behind the net from Barry Almedia who played a very strong game on the PK and on even strength. Bill Arnold added his 6th goal of the year to make it 5-1. Yes this was a big win for BC with UNH taking 4 points at Providence and BU taking 3 points at Maine but the Eagles continued to take to many penalties. Taking 10 in all, BC's PK was amazing not allowing Lowell a PP goal on their 8 chances. The killers were C.Atkinson, Gibbons,Whitney,Alemdia(who was amazing on the PK but missed a breakaway),S,Whitney,J.Hayes B.Arnold and Paul Carey. The Eagles improve to 14-5 in Hockey East (18-6 overall) and stay in a tie for first with UNH. BC's next game is next Friday night vs. UMASS Amherst. This will be BC's last tune-up before the Beanpot against archrival BU which is 2/7.

Grades-
PP- B-. The first unit was able to set it up multiple times and get lots of shots. The second unit was not as good they were not able to get as many shots on goal when they were on the ice.

PK- A. I don't know if it was how bad Lowell's PP was or how good BC PK was. Yet the Eagles have the best PK in the country and they proved why tonight.

NOTES
1. Coach Mike Cavanaugh was not behind the Eagles bench because he was out recruiting.
2. The Eagles get their 4th win in a row VS. Lowell dating back to last year.
3. With the win, BC takes the 57-33-7 lead in the all time series with Lowell.
4. Coach York improves to 40-16-2 VS. Lowell at BC.
5. With 2 Yale losses, BC will move into #1 in the country on Monday.
6. Patrick Brown was out of the lineup and was replaced by Tommy Atkinson.