The No. 7 UConn men’s hockey team will play for the program’s first ever Hockey East Conference Tournament Title on Friday, March 21 after their 5-2 victory over No. 8 Boston University in the Hockey East semi-finals. Joey Muldowney scored his third hat trick of the season in the win and freshman goaltender Callum Tung made 25 saves in the semi-final game at TD Garden in Boston, Massachusetts.
“We are certainly pleased to be moving on to play for the Lamoriello Cup tomorrow night,” said Head Coach Mike Cavanaugh. “I thought we got off to a pretty good start. I like the way we played in the first period.”
“Our theme in the locker room between periods was ‘stay with it,’ don’t get bored of doing what works and we had an explosion there in the second period,” said Cavanaugh.
From the start, UConn generated scoring chances but Boston University had the upper hand in the first period of the game. The Terriers goaltender Mikhail Yegorov kept the Huskies from finding the back of the net while junior Quinn Hutson got Boston University on the board first on the power play. Continuing through the period, the Huskies had scoringopportunities late on two power plays, but the Terriers penalty kill kept them from scoring the equalizer. UConn entered the first period break trailing Boston University 1-0.
The second period is when the Huskies took control and never looked back. UConn jumped Boston University early in the second period, scoring back-to-back goals to take the 2-1 lead. The first goal came from junior Tristan Fraser after launching the puck past Yegorov. Not long after the first goal, junior Ryan Tattle took matters into his own hands after being left alone on a breakaway and beat the Terrier’s netminder to give UConn their first lead of the game. The Ice Bus kept rolling in the period as graduate student Nick Carabin turned his usual defense into offense and after a save by Yegorov, sophomore Joey Muldowney was in the perfect position to fire the puck in the back of the net. The Huskies created a 3-1 lead over the Terries in just minutes and turned around the entire energy of the semi-final game at TD Garden with an offensive explosion.
With the two-goal lead late in the second period, Tung held down the fort on defense and prevented Boston University from cutting UConn’s lead to one. As the time was running down in the period, a UConn penalty on junior Jake Percival sent Boston University on the power play. However, the Huskies killed off the power play 20 seconds before the period ended and went into the break with a 3-1 lead over the Terriers.
Connecticut’s offense did not stop in the second period but prevailed in the final frame of the Hockey East semi-final matchup. Early in the third period, Huskies added another goal to extend their lead to three. UConn’s defensive pressure caused a Boston University turnover leading to sophomore Jake Richard finding Muldowney right in front of the net for his second goal of the game. That made for the Huskies fourth goal of the afternoon, increasing their lead over the Terries to 4-1. With five minutes left in the third period, Boston University pulled Yegorov in favor of an extra skater in the pursuit to get goals on the board. In the meantime, Muldowney got the puck down to the Huskies offensive zone and knocked it in for the empty net goal, solidifying their 5-1 lead. In the final moments of the game around the 10 second mark, Boston University’s freshman Kamil Bednarik notched a goal past Tung to create the 5-2 final score.
As the buzzers sounded at TD Garden, No. 8/7 UConn sealed the 5-2 win over No. 7/8 Boston University in the Hockey East semi-finals and will advance to the Hockey East Championship game.
In the victory over Boston University, Muldowney had his third hat trick off the season which makes for 27 goals on the year. That puts Muldowney at No. 2 nationally ranked in most goals scored this season in all of college hockey. The forward from Buffalo, New York, only trails Boston College’s Ryan Leonard in goals on the season. After breaking the UConn men’s hockey program record of most goals in a single season at the 20-goal mark, Muldowney continues to add goals and fuel to the Huskies offense as he’s taking the Ice Bus through the playoff season.
“It’s definitely pretty cool, I mean I’ve never played here [TD Garden],” said Muldowney. “This environment, it’s been awesome. I think a lot of us are just trying to take it in, it’s a first for many of us. You know, I think honestly though, it felt like just another game. I think that that’s the kind of team that we have, like we’re winning, it just became a habit and it’s pretty awesome. It starts with our leadership between John Spetz and Hudson Schandor.”
“I think just at this point, we talked about it before the game, just playing for the guys next to you. I think a lot of us are playing for those two [Schandor and Spetz] because they were here before in the finals and they didn’t come out on the winning side of it. I think now it’s just doing it for those two and everybody else,” Muldowney explained about the team’s mindset and camaraderie following the Hockey East semi-final win over Boston University.
After the Huskies were officially championship bound, their next opponent was decided hours later when No. 4 Maine faced off against Northeastern for the second Hockey East semi-final game at TD Garden. After two overtime periods, Maine rallied the 4-3 victory over Northeastern which set the stage for the Hockey East Championship. No. 7 UConn will play for their first ever Hockey East Conference Tournament Title against No. 4 Maine in the Hockey East Championship game at 7:30 p.m. at TD Garden in Boston, MA. The championship game will be available to stream live on ESPN+ or NESN+.