College Hockey:

This Week in Hockey East: Nov. 29, 2007

On Slippery Slopes

Before moving on to look at a few specific teams, two coaches’ comments illuminate the parity within Hockey East.

“The margin this year between winning and losing, from my perspective, is very thin,” Boston College coach Jerry York says. “Weve played 12 games, and seven have already gone into overtime.”

Northeastern coach Greg Cronin might have his team in first place, but he knows its hold on the lead is a tenuous one.

“With the exception of the North Dakota and New Hampshire games, the other ones were all one-goal games,” he says. “It’s a slippery slope we live on right now in Hockey East. If you slip, you could find yourself in the middle of the pack or in last place in the matter of a couple weeks.”

‘Nuff said.

In Second and Trying Harder

In the free-for-all known as the Hockey East standings, New Hampshire ranks second behind Northeastern both in total points and percentage. The Huskies have so far been UNH’s nemesis, delivering its only two losses. Considering that the Wildcats were expected to go neck-and-neck with Boston College for the title, the current result is either more or less on par — 7-2-1 and a number six national ranking isn’t exactly chopped liver — or perhaps just a little disappointing since BC has faltered.

“Overall I think we’re somewhat pleased,” UNH coach Dick Umile says. “We’re a little inconsistent playing a 60-minute hockey game, which you’re going to have to do in this league as we’re finding out. But we’re making progress.

“We lost to Northeastern, but they’re playing well. [Brad] Thiessen played well in the net. We played okay, but they found a way to beat us, bottom line.

“They’re a good team. There’s no question this is the year that the league is really up for grabs.”

The UNH offense leads Hockey East with 3.90 goals per game despite a mere 13.8 percent conversion rate on the power play. (Only Boston University is also over the 3.00 threshold.) The Wildcats have been dominant at times, scoring five goals in three of the last four games, but in the two losses to Northeastern the Huskies held them to only a singleton each night. Not coincidentally, those nights the power play was a collective 0-for-15.

“Short hand has been okay, but the power play hasn’t been great,” Umile says. “We’re still trying to find out what to do there, trying different combinations. Hopefully that will get better.

“We still like to move the puck and generate some offense. We like our forwards and our defense has been involved, which has been great. Brad [Flaishans] is playing well, so we’ve gotten some offense from our defense.

“We’ve got some young talented forwards that are getting better. [James] vanRiemsdyk, the Thompson kid from New Hampshire [Paul Thompson], and [Phil] DeSimone are playing well for us.

“But we’re always working at the defensive aspects of the game because that’s ultimately what you’re going to need at the end.”

As the number-two overall pick in the NHL draft, vanRiemsdyk was expected to make an immediate impact and he has, tying Matt Fornataro for the team scoring lead with five goals and nine assists. However, “the Thompson kid from New Hampshire” — he’s likely to keep that moniker for his full tenure at UNH as a Granite State native from Derry — has also made his presence known (6-4-10). When paired with vanRiemsdyk and Thomas Fortney two games ago, he immediately clicked, recording two goals and two assists.

“He’s a kid that played for the Junior Monarchs,” Umile says. “He was going to come in next year, but when Trevor [Smith] left early it opened an opportunity for him and he was ready to play.

“He’s a smart hockey player. He’s got a good stick. We’re very, very pleased with him.”

Umile has surprised some by giving backup goaltender Brian Foster more action (three starts in 10 games) than in the past. The sophomore has responded, matching senior Kevin Regan’s stats while going 2-0-1.

“Kevin [has been] nicked up, but he’s doing fine now,” Umile says. “He’s our goaltender. He’s going to play the majority of the games.

“But Brian proved last year that he’s a real good goaltender. He’s done a good job for us, and hopefully he’ll play a little bit more that he did last year. He’s gotten himself some starts and we’ll see where it goes.”

Looking ahead, Umile sees the current logjam in the standings as a good thing for his team.

“[The parity] will make us all better even though I think we’re beating each other up every weekend,” he says. “We’ll all be better teams at the end. It will be interesting to see how it shakes out.”

Resurgent But Thin

After three ties in four games, Massachusetts-Lowell coach Blaise MacDonald had grown tired of the “kissing your sister” results. So a week ago last Tuesday, he pulled out all the stops.

“I took a page out of Richie Umile’s book,” MacDonald says. “I went to the mock turtleneck and it produced a victory.”

The River Hawks followed that 3-0 win at Merrimack with another, 6-2, at home.

“Merrimack is playing really well, so we knew we had to be at the top of our game to compete,” MacDonald says. “I was really happy with our effort and execution on that Tuesday night. It was one of our best games of the season. We got great goaltending and had terrific energy.

“[On Saturday], we were sluggish in the first period, but [Nevin] Hamilton gave us a chance to stay in the game and then we broke it open on some fortunate, timely goals in the second.”

The wins were Lowell’s first in league play, but the resulting 2-3-4 record was enough to vault the River Hawks into a bazillion-way tie for fourth place.

The Tuesday-Saturday sweep wasn’t a fluke. Over the past six games they’d also tied UNH, Massachusetts, and Providence. Their only loss came at the hands of first-place Northeastern, 2-1, with the difference coming on a power-play goal.

“We are most proud of our consistency,” MacDonald says. “We work very, very hard at practice every day. I think we’ve competed very well in every game, even the BU game where we had a 4-2 lead going into the third. We played well; we just got outmatched for 20 minutes.

“We’ve had a couple of great chances in most of our ties to win the game. We’ve been battling very, very well and easily could be in second place. But we’re happy with our overall consistent play against a very tight league.”

An important part of Lowell’s success has been its goaltending, a position that has sunk several recent River Hawk teams. Sophomores Carter Hutton (1.36 GAA, .945 Sv%) and Nevin Hamilton (2.61, .911) have formed a strong tandem.

“That’s been the most frustrating thing since we’ve been here,” MacDonald says. “We feel like we’ve changed a lot of the elements of our program and have played very well during that time but really lacked in consistent goaltending. When it seems everybody else gets it and you don’t, it’s even more amplified.

“Hutton and Hamilton have played as well as all the other goalies in the league. They’ve given us a chance to get some confidence. The underlying variable that drives success is confidence and usually that comes from your goaltending.”

On the offensive end, Mark Roebothan leads the goalscoring with six.

“I don’t look at Mark’s role as a real goalscorer for us as much as a guy that jumps into the battle zones and works for dirty goals,” MacDonald says. “Because of his behavior in getting into those areas recently, he’s scored some of those goals.

“We’re very much a collective unit when it comes to putting goals up on the board. It’s been great to see his gritty, hard work and determination pay off in goals lately.”

Despite the strong performances of late, MacDonald knows his already banged-up team doesn’t have the depth to withstand an onslaught of injuries. The uncertainty the program faced during the offseason scared away some recruits. Then serious illness and injury claimed another two players expected to be key contributors.

“We went into the season with one extra forward and one extra defenseman,” MacDonald