Your Northeastern Huskies traveled down Storrow Drive tonight for the opening round of the Beanpot Tournament at the Bright-Landry Hockey Center. With BU already slotted in for the Championship Game (shootout win over BC – you hate to see it), the only thing standing between your heroes and a tilt on the TD Garden Ice were one of the basement dwellers in the ECAC, the Harvard Crimson. Oh yeah, if you’ve been living under a rock as of late, next week’s championship game is at the TD Garden for the first time… not a big deal.
The ‘Dawgs are feeling “bean-ish”. And to be perfectly honest, these pics are too good to not share throughout this article, shout out Delaney!
Harvard has had a tough go of it so far this season with an overall record of 3-15-1, but you know what everyone says: The Beanpot is different. Records are tossed out the window, teams are playing for bragging rights in the city, every team has a chance and this game means more to these squads than any other regular season game. Tonight proved no different as Harvard battled the Huskies for 60 minutes and Alex Pellicci stood on her head in the Harvard net.
The Huskies were flying from the opening draw and didn’t take their foot off the gas all night. Wearing their alternate 3rd red sweaters (gotta be extra sweet wearing those beauties and then beating Harvard at Harvard), the Huskies had their skating legs from the early going and were hunting the puck all 200 feet. Harvard tried to set a physical tone early with a run at Skylar Irving in the opening minute, but The Mayor of Kingston ducked the check and generated a scoring chance on the top line’s first shift.
Tory Mariano got whistled off for a “body-checking” call?? (a 10-ply call if I’ve ever seen one) and the Huskies were on the PK early on. Oh yeah, guess who else was ready from puck drop? The Great Wall of Gwyneth in the NU net. The reigning goaltender of the year might not have had the busiest of nights, but when she was tested she was ready and passed with flying colors (black and red mostly). Philips was tested on the early PK, but she was lights out and gave the entire squad a chance to catch their breath. I was lucky enough to welcome Gwyneth Philips on the podcast earlier this week and while it’s not available as a podcast just yet, you can find the YouTube video version below.
I may sound like a broken record at this point, but The Nailgun Line generated the most chances to open this one up. These 3 beauticians were up and down the ice making their mark felt by everyone on the Harvard roster. Mia (no nickname as of yet) Langlois had a shift that I think embodies what this line is all about: There was a play just about midway through the period where Langlois hustled back to break up a play and then on the offensive end drew a hooking penalty by moving her feet. Just a microcosm of how this line played tonight. Lily (the OG Nail Gun) Brazis was EVERYWHERE tonight. Big battles at the dot, driving the net and fierce on the fore-check. I also want to compliment her for not snowing Pellicci in the later part of the game cause I certainly believe she wanted to. And the Honey Badger? Ella Blackmore? This master of the neutral zone? Hunting the puck, generating offense and taking shots along the wall without giving up possession. The Hockey Gods absolutely LOVE this line.
But you know who was going to get the Huskies on the board right? If DraftKings covered women’s hockey I would have put a mortgage payment on this one (don’t tell my wife I said that): Taze Thompson. Maybe they didn’t have beans up in Alberta growing up because her thirst for Beanpot Genos knows no bounds. Lily Shannon from the LW corner found Mariano at the top of the umbrella and she wasted no time putting the puck on net. Thompson dropped off her defenders and found a soft spot at the top of the paint and re-directed the puck past Pellicci’s glove. For those scoring at home, that goes down as a PP-GWG for Taze. Thompson scoring big goals in the Beanpot is rapidly becoming a Boston tradition.
The nasty ramped up as the period wound down, as first Jules Constantinople and then Lily Yovetich took umbrage with Harvard players crowding Philips’ paint. Good to see the snarl ladies, you gotta love it. While it was getting nasty around the NU net, it was getting treacherous at the other end of the sheet as the NU fore-check really ramped up. The Husky forwards were suffocating the Harvard outlets and retained possession for long stretches in the offensive zone. This reflected on the stat sheet as NU outshot Harvard 15-4 in the opener.
In the middle frame, Harvard attempted to establish a fore-check of their own but once they got dusted a few times by the quick outlet passing of Megan Carter, Abbey Marohn and Rylie Jones, they abandoned ship and tried to clog the neutral. The best bid of the period was when The Premier Power Forward in Women’s Hockey Today drove the RW 1:4 and crashed the net bringing two defenders with her. Katy Knoll doing Katy Knoll things takes on many shapes, and she brought her skating legs today. Heavy on the fore-check and relentless on the backcheck it was almost as if the Harvard team maybe didn’t wish her a happy birthday?
The Huskies dominated this period also as the lopsided 26-8 SOG can attest. Whenever Harvard got any type of offensive setup, someone ate a puck and initiated a breakout. Whenever Harvard had numbers, someone busted back on the backcheck and denied the opportunity. And in those rare cases when a shot did get through? Philips gobbled it up like Ms. Pac-Man.
In the final frame an early PP for NU got the ice tilted towards the Harvard net and they couldn’t tilt it back. The Crimson didn’t land their first shot on Philips until almost the midway mark of the period. In the last 5 mins of regulation it seemed as if NU was losing in the way they pushed the puck and kept it in the Harvard zone. The top line of Irving, Knoll and Peyton “The Matrix” Anderson had numerous looks in the last few minutes and ate valuable seconds off the clock. Huge play by Knoll as the clock wound down to eat a puck at her own blue line and then body the puck to Irving for the clear. Skirvs found Thompson off the bench but her bid at the ENG sailed wide.
The Huskies welcome in UNH to historic Matthews on Friday before heading to the TD Garden to take on BU in the Beanpot Championship game next Tuesday. Thanks to the generosity and hard work of WomenX, you can get discount tickets for next Tuesday’s game.
Enjoy some sites and sounds of the Beanpot to hold you over until next week.
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