We have rolled into our third weekend of the Hockey East season, and the fireworks continue. As has been the trend so far this season, we have seen shocking defeats and stunning upsets in games involving the conference’s best and brightest. The consistent headlines of the year so far are Boston University’s goaltending is holding them back, Providence is a Legit Natty Contender, Boston College is as good as they had hoped, and UNH has that dawg in them.

As it has become my standard, I will start with the programs that were in a downward trend this weekend. Boston University splitting their series on the road against Notre Dame was not how the Terriers imagined following their loss to UNH a week ago. A 4-1 loss on Friday, where Caron posted another RBS (Save percentage below 85%), was the result of the offense being unable to convert for more than one goal on 44 shots. Boston University did get their revenge in an 8-2 win on Saturday, but for a team that was ranked first in the country just 16 days ago, the damage from consecutive losses to unranked opponents was already done. With plucky UMass on tap next week, BU will likely be playing to keep their National Championship dreams alive next weekend. UConn’s awful start continued into this weekend where they split 1 and 1 with Union (NY). The series featured a 4-1 loss on Friday, and a 5-0 shutout win on Saturday (A fantastic game from Ethan Haider). I try not to be too negative on guys, but Nashville Predator’s draft pick Matthew Wood needs to create more for the Huskies if they’re going to turn things around to be a .500+ team in 2023-24. It doesn’t feel fair to include Boston College here, but their loss to 2^nd ranked Denver, 4-3 on Saturday, needs to be included due to the result of Denver’s loss to Providence on Friday. The Eagles had a great win against Rensselaer on Friday, and the team saw multi-point outings from Cutter Gauthier, Ryan Leonard, and Will Smith, Jacob Fowler was fantastic as well in both games. The Eagles wanted a different result against Denver at home on Saturday, and it’s a tough loss in the pairwise rankings for them, but it will serve as a motivator for this group to rally around for the rest of the season. I’ve never played competitive hockey but losing a game at home via two powerplay goals in the third period (including the game-winner with an essential player in Gauthier in the box) seems like something that a group of 20-plus young men don’t want to experience more than once in a season.

              Moving on to happy thoughts and teams who are trending upward as we rapidly approach November. UMass Lowell took care of business in back-to-back road games at Colgate. Matt Crasa blew Colgate’s doors off on Friday night with an iconic 4-goal performance enroute to victory. Merrimack downed Clarkson 4-1 on Friday night where Mac Welsher and Chase Stevenson took care of business on offense. At the time of writing, the Warriors have not played their second game of the weekend against St. Lawrence. UMass Amherst had another banger of a weekend, extending their winning streak against top-20 opponents to 3 games. Ryan Ufko, Aydar Suniev, Jack Musa, and Scott Morrow continued to impress by racking up another 8 points between them this weekend. Hrabal in goal also posted a beefy 32 save shutout on Saturday against the 19^th ranked Minnesota State. If they continue this run at Boston University next weekend the Hockey East will have officially been flipped on its head. The Providence Friars continued their rapid ascent into national championship contenders the weekend. Tanner Adams willed this team to victory on Friday night with a 3-point performance, including the GWG, against 2^nd ranked Denver 4-3. If that wasn’t enough, they also took care of business Saturday against Rensselaer 4-2 with Chase Yoder potting 2 short handed goals, the second of which ended up being the game winner. Finally, the headline of the weekend was Quinnipiac’s (the defending national champions) first visit to UNH in over thirty years. Friday saw UNH fall victim 5-2 to this prolific opponent, but Saturday was a much different story. I’m not usually a reactionary person watching hockey, I get irritated when players take silly penalties and when referees make baffling calls. I get on my feet for huge hits, and I can’t help but smile at high end skill goals. Cy Leclerc quite literally had me on my knees on the floor in front of the TV when he wrapped the overtime game winner on Vinny Duplessis. The Wildcats, for the second weekend in a row knocked off a top-4 opponent, bringing their record to 2-1-0 with wins against opponents who, at the time, were ranked 1^st and 4^th respectively. This team has gusto, and they’re getting on a run. Confidence is such an important part of hockey, and this team should be overflowing with it as they barrel into a matchup with 16^th ranked Northeastern on Thursday.

              Another great weekend of Hockey East action is in the books, and things are only getting more exciting as we approach the last weekend of October. Boston College has another heavyweight weekend coming up with a series against 8^th ranked Michigan State. Maine is the next Hockey East team to cut their teeth against 4^th ranked Quinnipiac. If Maine can steal a victory in that series, the entire NCAA will be flipped on its head at this point. Northeastern has a pair of games against UNH and Merrimack respectively, which will test which will help establish the true top-5 of the Hockey East this season. The last series to look ahead to is UConn and UMass Lowell. A pair of losses there would likely end any postseason aspirations for UConn based on their awful start to the season. As always, this was a great time, and I can’t wait to see how it all turns out.