It is generally well known that I do not hold the various polls in
high regard because of the subjectivity involved, but I will be
curious to see whether the BU loss to Merrimack upholds my belief.
 
I am inclined to believe that many folks, especially those who only
heard the score, will downgrade their consideration of BU because of
the fact that they lost to an inferior team.  This is usually the way
it goes.
 
But as I am sure the BU people will agree, the truth is that BU played
about as well in the loss to Merrimack as they played in beating
Northeastern 6-2 Saturday night - and perhaps as well as they did in
beating PC 9-2 on Tuesday.
 
56 shots vs MC, 52 shots vs NU...two very similar games.  The
difference is that NU's defense is just not as good as Merrimack's.
Also, despite the way Dale Arnold and Mike Eruzione lauded NU's Todd
Reynolds for stopping 46 of 52 shots (some saves were spectacular),
the truth is that Reynolds did not make the big saves he had to make
early in the game to keep NU within striking distance...the way
Eric Thibeault did early in the MC-BU game.  As a result, BU led NU
4-0 after one but trailed MC 2-1 after one.
 
This BU team is a good one, deserving of being considered at least
among the top few teams in the country (not 8th as one HOCKEY-L
pollster had them last week).  I came away from MC-BU thinking that it
was just a case of a superb team running into an opponent that decided
it was going to make BU try to get around their big defensemen to try
to score goals.  Merrimack played virtually a perfect defensive game,
the kind that would have made it nearly impossible for anyone to beat
them on that night.
 
If I was voting, and had seen this game, I would not have let it
negatively affect where I ranked the Terriers.  It was more of an
aberration, especially when you look at BU's performances immediately
before and after this game.
 
We will see if the voters agree.
---                                                                   ---
Mike Machnik                                            [log in to unmask]
Cabletron Systems, Inc.                                    *HMM* 11/13/93