By Patrick O’Rourke
BU News Service
Putting up a stinker in a loss to the National U-18 team on Friday night at Agganis Arena, the BU men’s hockey team is just thankful they can redeem themselves on Saturday night when Wisconsin pays a visit.
The Terriers lost, 7-4, in an effort in which nothing seemed to go right. The scoring margin came despite BU outshooting the U18s, 45-22.
“Some nights it jumps in the net for the other team, other nights it doesn’t jump in the net for you,” said BU head coach David Quinn. “But give [Team USA] a lot of credit, they were opportunistic.”
“We knew it wasn’t going to be our night right from the first goal.”
The Yanks drew first blood just 43 seconds into the game. With BU forward Robbie Baillargeon giving chase to the puck below the goal line, it made a strange bounce off the backwall, landing on the tape of USA center Travis Frederic, who scored to give the U18s the lead.
The Terriers tied the score exactly five minutes later when Ahti Oksanen took the feed from freshman Jordan Greenway. Team USA would take the lead at 11:31 to go ahead, 2-1, a lead they’d take into the first intermission.
Team USA would outscore the Terriers by the same margin to go ahead, 4-2. BU outshot the U18s, 14-7, in the middle 20. BU commit Kieffer Bellows scored his second goal of the game at 14:11 of the period, just 58 seconds after Danny O’Regan had tied the game. Casey Mittelstadt added to the lead 28 seconds later.
“Right now we’re just too immature,” said Quinn. “We play immature hockey, we play high-risk hockey. That’s not how we’re going to have success.”
The Terriers inched within one goal at 6:29 of the third period when Matt Lane put home the rebound of a Bobo Carpenter shot. But Team USA responded with three unanswered goals in a span of 4:10 to go ahead, 7-3.
Oksanen got his second of the night with 1:25 left, but it was too little, too late for BU.
If there was one other silver lining for the Terriers, it was the showing put forth by commits Bellows, Clayton Keller, Chad Krys, and Jake Oettinger. The pups combined for nine points (2-7–9) on the night, with Bellows and Keller posting a game-high plus-three rating. Oettinger made 41 saves between the pipes.
