Tomorrow, the Eagles will take on a Fighting Irish team that ranks amongst the top teams in the country. Notre Dame is currently ranked #4 in the USCHO poll, and are #2 in the pairwise rankings. The Irish are led by big forwards Anders Lee (12 G, 5 A) and TJ Tynan (3 G, 17 A) and are strong at the goaltending postion with Mike Johnson leading the way with a 2.24 GAA which ranks him fifth in the CCHA. Like I said last weekend, BC has not lost two in a row since losing to BU at Fenway and then to St Lawrence in a Christmas tournament which was over a year and a half ago. If BC gives that effort they gave vs BU, expect them to lose by a wide margin simmilar to last weekend. The Irish are an extremely talented team up front with five of their forwards being NHL draft picks, and four defenseman to go along with that. This year, Notre Dame moved into the brand new state of the art Compton Ice Arena, and will show it off tomorrow vs the Eagles in a game that will be televised on CBS College Sports, puck drops at 7:35. After last weekend, not many people are giving the Eagles a chance vs an Irish team that has won six of it's last seven, and are also coming off a huge win @ #10 Western Michigan on Tuesday. If the Eagles give that effort we have seen at times this season like the ones @ North Dakota, @ UNH, @ NU, and vs Maine, I know BC can win a game that means A LOT (I will get into that in a little). It will be tough, but a win in South Bend could give this team the confidence it needs when it plays BU in two weeks.
Keys for the Eagles.
1. Get pumped for this game. BC just got killed by BU, If that sentence alone doesn't get them amped up to play this game then I don't know what will.
2. ND's PP ranks first in the CCHA and twelfth in the country. If BC gets penalties like they did vs BU, guess wat ? they will lose.
3. Limit Tynan's and Lee's chances. These two players are good, very good. Try to keep them as far away from Parker Milner as possible. Try to limit the shots from the perimeter, not up close.
4. Give a solid effort. This a huge game, and when I mean huge I mean one if the biggest games of the year. Give it your all and you can win, play like you did vs BU, your gona get killed.
Why this game means so much
For those of you that are not familiar with the pairwise rankings, it is the system that the NCAA selection committee uses to select the sixteen teams that will play in the NCAA tournament. Right now, BC is seventh in those rankings, and ND is second. A win on the road vs a good team = a good amount of pairwise points. If BC can win on the road vs a great team, then they should move up big time in the pairwise.
Last time out and series info- The last time these two teams met was on 10/23/10 and the Irish managed to bring down the then #1 Eagles by a score of 2-1. Boston College is 16-12-2 all time vs Notre Dame.
Prediction- Losing two games in a row under Coach York doesn't happen often especially after that effort vs BU. BC in a nail bitter, 4-3.
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