Goaltender Mathieu Caron sat in his crease with his arms in his lap. Michigan players mocked the Dog Pound, trying to rile up a packed section 118 as it cleared out. BU head coach Jay Pandolfo made the lonely trot to center ice with hand in pocket on Saturday, surveying the scene around him.
Pandolfo has led the Terriers to back-to-back Frozen Fours. He has made the team a mainstay in the national top 10. Every opposing coach raves about how “well-coached” BU is. None of this is news.
But as Pandolfo walked down center ice, his team had been swept at home for the first time in his tenure as head coach.
“Can’t find a way to close teams out,” Pandolfo said. “That’s, I guess, the most disappointing part.”
The No. 11 Wolverines made themselves at home in Agganis Arena this weekend, taking both games against the Terriers — first with a dominant 5-1 victory on Friday and then a nail-biting 5-4 overtime winner on Saturday.
Friday was the most lopsided BU home loss since a 5-1 defeat to UConn on Oct. 9, 2021. Saturday was the first time a team completed a sweep on BU at Agganis since Oct. 14, 2017.
The catch: Boston University had the lead entering the third period in both games.
“Last night was a lot worse than tonight, that’s for sure,” Pandolfo said. “If a team’s down in the third, they’re always going to push, especially by one goal. You got to find a way to withstand that push, and we just couldn’t find a way.”
The third period has troubled the Terriers throughout the season. BU has allowed 27 goals so far with just under half of them coming in the final frame. In the last four games alone, the Terriers have allowed an average of 2.75 goals per third period.
No game underscored it more than Friday’s loss to Michigan when Wolverine Evan Werner tied the game at 4:47 of the third, and hell broke loose. Michigan netted four more goals, while BU’s assistant captain Quinn Hutson took a five-minute major and a ten-minute game misconduct before fellow assistant captain Devin Kaplan took a high-sticking penalty.
It was déjà vu on Saturday when BU took the lead at 11:48 of the third period. Then, sophomore defenseman Gavin McCarthy took a boarding penalty — it only took 11 seconds for Michigan to bring the game back even.
“At that point of the game, you have to find a way to kill the penalty,” Pandolfo said. “That’s going to happen, and you got to find a way to get that done.”
The Terriers have recorded 54 penalty minutes in the third period — 46% of the team’s total. The leadership group accounts for 44% of the team’s penalty minutes, while the freshmen take another 37%.
Pandolfo called out his captains Friday night. When asked about Q. Hutson and Kaplan taking the third-period penalties, Pandolfo said he needed more: “Our captains need to be better. They’ve been here long enough. They have to take responsibility too.”
The head coach emphasized that point on Saturday when he moved captain Shane Lachance and Q. Hutson down to the fourth line.
Kaplan and Lachance each answered with a goal on Saturday. Pandolfo complimented their response, saying the two have “a lot of pride.”
A lack of discipline doesn’t just mean penalties. Pandolfo specifically pointed out the team’s untimely turnovers — a problem he said hasn’t improved all year.
“We have to learn from some of these things and learn from the mistakes we’re making … I’m still seeing too many of the same mistakes,” Pandolfo said. “Just way too many turnovers in tough spots, letting the other team have second and third chances because of these turnovers.”
There were positive takeaways from the weekend. For one, transfer senior Matt Copponi seemed to find his groove with a goal Saturday night and several more grade-A chances on top of that. Freshman forward Alex Zetterberg kept proving NHL GMs wrong with a slick goal of his own after the top-line promotion.
The start of Friday’s game and the start of Saturday’s game was a night-and-day difference. Similar to the split with North Dakota last weekend, the Terriers showed resolve on night two of the back-to-back. Even Michigan head coach Brandon Naurato pointed out BU’s fire out of the gate on Saturday.
However, resolve is a moral victory, and moral victories do not win championships.
As Pandolfo often says, the team is young. It will take time for them to find their groove. Seven games is a small sample size, and the Terriers are still above .500.
But from where the team stands right now, BU is far from National Championship form, and it has a steep climb to get there.