Thanks for the great article on the Jamboree games at BU,
Adam. The next night, Saturday, the other two games of
the Jamboree were played in Providence. The format was
20 minutes, a 3-minute intermission & switch sides, 10
minutes, 15-minute intermission and make ice, 10 minutes,
a 3-minute intermission & switch sides, and finally a
20-minute period. Scores:
Merrimack 0 Northeastern 5
Lowell 5 Providence 7
GAME THREE
Lowell's got a few guys who can make some things happen
this year, one being Shane Henry, a freshman from Langley,
B.C. who centers the first line, and he got the game-winner
just three minutes into the first period when he rammed home
a rebound of a Dave Gatti shot. Lowell also has Mark
Richards, probably one of the top three goalies in Hockey
East. Richards played the whole game (well, until 6:05 of
the third period, anyway - more later) while Merrimack's
three goalies all saw a period of action.
The Warriors will probably have a lot of trouble when they
fall behind early, as they did against Lowell. Saturday,
they just didn't look very good, and I think part of that was
allowing Lowell's penchant for cheap shots to draw them
away from their game plan. But Merrimack wasn't a team of
angels, either, and both teams were instigating roughness
against the other. Lowell had the better of the scoring
chances and capitalized five times by the first few minutes
of the third. Five different scorers tallied for Lowell:
Henry, Dave Pensa, Gerry Daley, Brendan Flynn, and Tim
Smallwood. But the real story of the game was its mishandling
by referee Drew Taylor which turned a battle between two
enemies into a war.
The war culminated at the aforementioned 6:05 of the third period
mark, when Teal Fowler was partially screening Richards. Fowler
whacked the Lowell defender in front of him and then was cross-
checked in the back of the head by Richards. That touched off
several minutes of fighting that involved all players on the ice
except Merrimack goalie Yannick Gosselin. Fortunately, the
benches did not clear. The end result was the ejections
of Lowell's Richards and Travis Tucker and Merrimack's
Fowler and Doug Greschuk. Even though the game was an exhibition,
all four will have to sit for their teams' first games this
Friday, when Lowell hosts Colgate and Merrimack hosts Alabama-
Huntsville. The loss of Richards is the biggest to either team.
Four other Chiefs (Stevens, Erickson, Pensa, Bazin) and three
Warriors (Hentges, Naylor, Dooley) received ten-minute misconducts,
but the game was over for all intents and purposes anyway.
Lowell had the edge in shots, 36-28, and the Chiefs got two
goals each off of Merrimack netminders Gosselin and D'Amore, and
one off of Doneghey.
At this point of the season, I'd have to say that Lowell seems to
be much farther along than Merrimack is. But the Warriors also
didn't play with any discipline, something that has to change
once the season starts.
GAME FOUR
I only saw the first period of this game before I had to
leave. Northeastern has a freshman, Derek Edgerly from
Stoneham, MA, centering junior Matt Saunders and senior
Brian Sullivan on the first line, and from early looks the
kid isn't too bad. A large part of where Northeastern goes
will depend on how many scoring opportunities Saunders and
Sullivan, who combined for 43-42-85 last year, will get.
The Huskies looked pretty good in the first period, though they
got some help from an inexperienced Providence team that is also
missing Mike Boback until December. With the departure of strong
goaltending tandem Matt Merten and Mark Romaine, the mantle has
passed to inexperienced sophomore Brad Mullahy (1-2, 3.77 in 5
games last year), and he didn't look too good in the first in
allowing the Huskies to take a 3-0 lead. Northeastern's first
goal came a couple of minutes into the game on a 100-footer by
Rob Cowie from his side of the red line.
So, we left after the first with NU up 3-0, and WCCM's Dan Roche
said that he was surprised at how well the Huskies looked - and
I told him that knowing the Huskies, they'd probably play just as
badly in the second.
Bang! By the time we made it to the car, it was 3-3, and before
we got onto route 95 in Providence, it was 5-4 Huskies. Six goals
in less than ten minutes of play. At this time, the Providence
College station faded out, and I picked up the paper the next day
to find that Providence had scored the last three goals of the game
and won, 7-5.
As I posted last Friday, the two games played at BU will be on
NESN here Tuesday night (7 & 9 pm) and the two at PC will be on
NESN Wednesday night (7 & 9 pm).
- mike
p.s. thanks to the people out West for the scores!
p.p.s. ice was awful near the end of each half.