Beanpot Tourney Kicks Off Tonight

The first Monday of September is Labor Day. The last Monday of May is Memorial Day. The fourth Thursday of November is Thanksgiving. The first two Mondays of February are Beanpot days.

Tonight marks the beginning of the 42nd edition of the latter of these major national occasions, the college hockey tournament held at the Boston Gardern involving four Boston-area schools: Harvard, Boston University, Boston College and Northeastern University.

Excepting the NCAA tournament, the Beanpot seems to generate the most excitement of any college hockey event in New England.

After all, is there any other time when one could find thousands of college students putting down between nine and thirteen dollars apiece to see a regular reason hockey game?

"It's a little bit more exciting with the tournament atmosphere," senior Brian Farrell says. "It's tough to play in the Boston Garden in front of a big crowd, but you get used to it."

Tonight's Games

Two games will be played tonight in the first of the tournament's two rounds.

In the first game, starting at 6 p.m., formerly tenth-ranked Northeastern(15-6-4) will face Boston College (10-12-3) for a right to a spot in this year's final.

Then, at 9 p.m., in what may safely be considered the main event of the night, second-ranked Boston Univer- sity (19-6-0) will take on the third-ranked anddefending Beanpot champion Crimson (12-3-2, 10-2-2ECAC) in a rematch of last year's final.

It might seem unfair that the showcase match-upof the tournament takes place in the first round,but the opening pairings are rotated on an annualbasis. (Harvard defeated Northeastern in thefirst round last year.)

The last time Harvard and BU were on the icetogether, 1992-93 Harvard captain Ted Drury ledhis team in a victory lap with the Beanpot trophyaround the Garden ice after the underdog Crimson's4-2 win. Junior Steve Martins scored twice, whileDrury and Farrell each tallied one goal to key theoffense. Sophomore Tripp Tracy was brilliant inthe net, stopping 30 of 32 Terrier shots.

Tracy is expected to be in the goal tonight.

The Crimson comes into the Beanpot Tournamentwith a sevengame unbeaten streak (6-0-1). Fridaynight's 4-3 overtime victory at Princeton was theteam's first game in 20 days and should help theCrimson get back into its rhythm.

The Terriers are tough but certainly beatable.UMass-Lowell took care of them last Wednesdaynight, 4-2. BU won the rematch on Friday, 5-2, inits most recent game.

The Crimson, however, must stay out of thepenalty box in order to have a good chance atwinning. It sounds like a broken record, but alack of discipline is still the team's mainconcern, The Crimson allowed seven power-playopportunities against Princeton on Friday, whilethe Tigers allowed only three. Furthermore, allthree of Princeton's goals came with a one-manadvantage.

"It comes out of aggressive play," Farrellsays. "It's part a part of the game as long as wedon't take stupid penalties,"

Ice Restrictions

One other obstacle for Harvard to overcometonight is the Boston Garden ice itself, Thesurface measures 191 feet by 83 feet, which issmaller than that at the Bright Hockey Center.

Even professional teams seem to get screwed-upwhen they find out that their speed often getsneutralized by one of the smallest ice surfaces inthe NHL.

Harvard does rely on speed and quick break-outpasses, but the team found a way to score sevenand four goals, respectively, in last year'stournament.

National Ramifications

Winning the Beanpot for the sake of winning isalways the main goal, but tonight's game has amajor bearing on national rankings and theupcoming 12-team NCAA tournament in late March.

Harvard competes in the ECAC, which hasn'tearned the type of respect that the three othermain hockey conferences--Hockey East, WCHA andCCHA--have had over the past few seasons.

Harvard is the only ECAC team that hasconsistently stayed in the top ten (Rensselaer hasmade the list a couple of times) this year. Theother three Beanpot entrants are Hockey Eastschools, which has had BU, Northeastern, Maine,and New Hampshire on the list.

"[The Beanpot] means a lot for nationalrankings in the East," Farrell says. "It would benice if beating BU would make us the number-oneteam in the East for the [NCAA] tournament."Crimson File PhotoSenior forward CHRIS BAIRD drives for a goalagainst BU in last year's Beanpot finale.

It might seem unfair that the showcase match-upof the tournament takes place in the first round,but the opening pairings are rotated on an annualbasis. (Harvard defeated Northeastern in thefirst round last year.)

The last time Harvard and BU were on the icetogether, 1992-93 Harvard captain Ted Drury ledhis team in a victory lap with the Beanpot trophyaround the Garden ice after the underdog Crimson's4-2 win. Junior Steve Martins scored twice, whileDrury and Farrell each tallied one goal to key theoffense. Sophomore Tripp Tracy was brilliant inthe net, stopping 30 of 32 Terrier shots.

Tracy is expected to be in the goal tonight.

The Crimson comes into the Beanpot Tournamentwith a sevengame unbeaten streak (6-0-1). Fridaynight's 4-3 overtime victory at Princeton was theteam's first game in 20 days and should help theCrimson get back into its rhythm.

The Terriers are tough but certainly beatable.UMass-Lowell took care of them last Wednesdaynight, 4-2. BU won the rematch on Friday, 5-2, inits most recent game.

The Crimson, however, must stay out of thepenalty box in order to have a good chance atwinning. It sounds like a broken record, but alack of discipline is still the team's mainconcern, The Crimson allowed seven power-playopportunities against Princeton on Friday, whilethe Tigers allowed only three. Furthermore, allthree of Princeton's goals came with a one-manadvantage.

"It comes out of aggressive play," Farrellsays. "It's part a part of the game as long as wedon't take stupid penalties,"

Ice Restrictions

One other obstacle for Harvard to overcometonight is the Boston Garden ice itself, Thesurface measures 191 feet by 83 feet, which issmaller than that at the Bright Hockey Center.

Even professional teams seem to get screwed-upwhen they find out that their speed often getsneutralized by one of the smallest ice surfaces inthe NHL.

Harvard does rely on speed and quick break-outpasses, but the team found a way to score sevenand four goals, respectively, in last year'stournament.

National Ramifications

Winning the Beanpot for the sake of winning isalways the main goal, but tonight's game has amajor bearing on national rankings and theupcoming 12-team NCAA tournament in late March.

Harvard competes in the ECAC, which hasn'tearned the type of respect that the three othermain hockey conferences--Hockey East, WCHA andCCHA--have had over the past few seasons.

Harvard is the only ECAC team that hasconsistently stayed in the top ten (Rensselaer hasmade the list a couple of times) this year. Theother three Beanpot entrants are Hockey Eastschools, which has had BU, Northeastern, Maine,and New Hampshire on the list.

"[The Beanpot] means a lot for nationalrankings in the East," Farrell says. "It would benice if beating BU would make us the number-oneteam in the East for the [NCAA] tournament."Crimson File PhotoSenior forward CHRIS BAIRD drives for a goalagainst BU in last year's Beanpot finale.