AMHERST – Just two points stand between the UMass hockey team and another Hockey East regular season championship.
By virtue of Northeastern’s 1-0 loss at Vermont on Tuesday, the No. 9 Minutemen can clinch the title with a win at Boston College on Friday.
UMass (19-10-2, 14-6-2 Hockey East) leads the league with 46 points. With two games remaining for every team except Providence, only Northeastern and Merrimack (tied in second at 41) can potentially catch the Minutemen. That would require UMass losing both games (7 p.m. Friday at Conte Forum and 4:30 p.m. Saturday at the Mullins Center) and either the Huskies or Warriors sweeping their weekend series.
“It’s a good place but it doesn’t guarantee us anything. I think Boston College is starting to play some really good hockey. They got their players back from the Olympics, which as you would expect, has given them a push,” UMass coach Greg Carvel said. “It’s great that we control our own destiny, but we’re going to have to work really hard to control that destiny.”
The Eagles (12-17-5, 7-12-3) are eighth in the conference standings. Their Sunday win over Boston University snapped a two-game losing streak. BC has dropped games to Colorado College and Vermont, both of whom have won less than 35 percent of their games. Notre Dame and Providence hung eight and seven goals on them in back to back games in January.
The Eagles are second in the league in scoring with 102 goals but have also allowed the most (110). No one else has let in more than 99. Their penalty kill ranks 13th (75.9 percent), just ahead of Vermont (73.9). BC has lost 48 percent of its faceoffs, the league’s second worst mark.
“Maybe the record’s not the best, but they’re definitely a good team with some dangerous weapons,” UMass captain Bobby Trivigno said.
Marc McLaughlin is still Hockey East’s second-leading goal scorer (19) despite missing five games at the Olympics. Fellow senior Patrick Giles also has 13 goals. Brandon Kruse has accounted for 21 assists.
“Their record isn’t indicative of what they have as a program,” UMass goalie Matt Murray said. “They have highly-touted, well-skilled guys that everyone knows on the ice. I think they have all the pieces there. It’s never a year that you can take anything lightly.”
Translation: it’s still BC. The Minutemen are 3-2 in their last five games at Conte Forum, including an OT victory last season when the Eagles were the No. 1 team in the country.
Games against BC always carry an extra juice, especially for Trivigno, whose sister Dana Trivigno reached three Frozen Fours with the Eagles and won two world championships.
“They didn’t recruit me at all, or anything, like didn’t even talk to me so I don’t like BC whatsoever,” Bobby Trivigno said. “My sister, so yeah, definitely a huge weekend for me, against my sister.”
GOING OUT IN STYLE – UMass will honor its seniors for the first time in two years after Saturday’s game against the Eagles. It’s the final regular-season game at the Mullins Center for seniors Anthony Del Gaizo, Slava Demin, Ty Farmer, Trivigno and Garrett Wait and graduate students Matt Baker, Cam Donaldson and Matt Murray. They’ve clinched a home game in the Hockey East tournament quarterfinals March 12.
“These kids sacrifice certain things to be Division I athletes, and they’re not pros, but they sure look like pros. They sure act like pros,” Carvel said. “I think people appreciate how much these kids have done and do.”
Over the past four years, they’ve won 91 games (106 for Murray, in his fifth year with UMass). That’s 76 percent of their games. The class helped the program win its first Hockey East regular-season championship and reach its first Frozen Four in 2019. They were the core of last season’s Hockey East tournament and national title teams.
“I’m happy that we’re past a point in COVID where we can do this again for the seniors, especially this senior class. They’ve won a bunch of championships, and they’ve had a big part in turning this program around. They’ve won a lot of hockey games,” Carvel said.
Murray had a version of a senior night last year in an empty arena. Now he’ll get a chance at a more representative occasion after returning for a post grad year.
“I’m sure this will be just as special or if not even a little bit more, because I’ll actually be able to have some family down here this time,” Murray said.
A FEW GOOD MEN – Two of the final Hockey East monthly awards were bestowed on Minutemen.
Trivigno was named the Hockey East Player of the Month, and defenseman Ryan Ufko won his first Hockey East Rookie of the Month for February.
It was Trivigno’s third monthly honor and the first of Ufko’s career.
Trivigno led the nation with 17 points in eight games in February. He had 13 assists and now leads Hockey East in scoring (42 points) and assists (25). His 42 points are fifth in the country.
Ufko scored three goals and contributed 10 points. He had a point in every game.
“They absolutely deserve it. Bobby, to me, is far and away the best forward in Hockey East. He pops off the page. To me it’s not even close. He’s got a Player of the Month, I think he’s Player of the Year,” Carvel said. “Ryan’s of course a very, very good player who’s probably been overshadowed by Scotty Morrow, yet, I think he’s just a few points behind Scotty. So Ryan has become a very well-rounded player… We’re fortunate to have him.”
Kyle Grabowski can be reached at kgrabowski@gazettenet.com. Follow him on Twitter @kylegrbwsk.