Beanpot Notebook: Total Domination

CHESTNUT HILL, Mass.--One statistic curtly sums up the seven most recent games in the No. 4 Harvard women's hockey team's series with Boston College--63 to 5. That is the cumulative score by which the Crimson has destroyed the Eagles over the past three seasons.

It didn't always used to be this easy. Just five years ago, B.C. took Northeastern to overtime in the Beanpot final, and the Eagles beat the Crimson 7-2 in 1996, but the two programs have taken off in strikingly opposite directions since then. The Eagles are dead last in the ECAC, and a first-ever Beanpot title seems as distant as ever for them.

"B.C.'s got some talented kids, but it's certainly not going to happen overnight," Harvard Coach Katey Stone said. "They're going to have to be patient and not get discouraged, and every once in a while you might see some of that and that's where the drop-off comes from. But B.C.'s definitely headed in the right direction."

Harvard helped B.C. off to an auspicious start by putting itself down a player with a bench protocol infraction. But the aggressive Crimson forecheck kept the Eagles in their own end for nearly the entire two minutes, making the early mishap irrelevant.

"You have to approach every game the same way," Harvard co-captain Jennifer Botterill said. "That's definitely our focus to set the pace and stick to our game plan."

B.C. did hold Harvard scoreless for the first 9:18, a significant improvement over the Crimson's 13-1win in November when Harvard tallied just 1:35 into the first.

One big difference between last night's game and the November matchup was the distribution of scoring. While the goals were split fairly between Harvard's three lines in November, all but the top line were shut out this time around.

"Did everything we did go as crisply and cleanly as we would have liked? No," Stone said. "But a win's a win and it puts us in the position we need to be in for next week."

Making History

With a victory over No.8 Northeastern next Tuesday, Harvard would become the first team in school history to win three consecutive Beanpot Tournaments. The Crimson won back-to-back in '82-83 before getting blanked 7-0 by Northeastern in its bid for a third.

Making History

The polar opposite of the men's tournament, the women's Beanpot has been dominated by Northeastern and Harvard over its 22-year history. The Huskies have won 14 championships. The Crimson is next with six. Boston University and Brown--an out-of-place Beanpot invitee--have one title apiece.

A Familiar Final

Northeastern and Harvard will battle in the Beanpot final for the 16th time at Conte Forum next Tuesday. The Huskies have beaten the Crimson in 11 of those 15 previous matchups.

A Familiar Final

The last time Harvard and Northeastern met was Jan. 12 when the Crimson scored five goals in the third to turn a 2-1 second-period deficit into a comfortable 6-3 win.

Since an 11-2-0 start that culminated with a 4-0 win over No. 1 Dartmouth--the Big Green's only loss to date--the Huskies have struggled to a 2-6-1 record in their last nine.

It will be Northeastern Coach Joy Woog's first-ever Beanpot. Longtime Coach Heather Linstad--the only female ever to win both ECAC Player and Coach of the Year honors--left the Huskies this summer to jump-start Connecticut's new hockey program.

A Beanpot win is about the only way left for the Huskies to revitalize what has been a relatively disappointing season by their standards. The Crimson will need to be careful not to fall behind in a game with such high stakes.

"We've been on a good streak the last couple of games scoring the first goal," sophomore forward Kalen Ingram said. "Hopefully we can keep that going through Tuesday."

The Looming Battle

This weekend, Harvard will look to extend its six-game winning streak at Princeton and Yale. If the Crimson can sweep the weekend, it will be just a point back of Dartmouth in the ECAC standings going into their Feb. 17 showdown with eight conference games remaining in each team's schedule. Harvard has lost four games in a row against Dartmouth over the past two seasons, including a bitter season-ending overtime defeat in 2000. In the most recent meeting, Harvard blew a two-goal first-period lead before falling, 5-4. Another chance for revenge is just under two weeks away, but the Crimson will have to focus on the task at hand.

"We've got a great weekend ahead [against Princeton and Yale] and we've got the Beanpot next Tuesday, so we're definitely going to be ready for Dartmouth in a couple weeks and for now we're just taking it one game at a time," Botterill said.