FRIDAY ROUNDUP: Boston University clinches Hockey East regular-season championship, Michigan rallies to top Wisconsin in OT, Minnesota Duluth upsets St. Cloud State, Denver edges Colorado College

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Boston University celebrates its Hockey East regular-season championship on home ice Friday night at Agganis Arena (photo: Matt Woolverton).

Boston University won the 2022-23 Hockey East regular-season title after a 6-4 victory over Providence on Friday night at Agganis Arena.

The seventh-ranked Terriers celebrated its Class of 2023 in the best possible way, as BU’s win over Providence, coupled with a Northeastern loss to UMass Lowell, clinched the program’s 11th Hockey East regular-season title and first since the 2016-17 season.

The Terriers battled back from an early 2-0 deficit, scoring three times in the first period and adding a fourth goal early in the second period to take a 4-2 lead. Providence cut the lead back to one, but Quinn Hutson’s second goal of the night gave the Terriers’ a 5-3 lead and proved to be the game winner.

Quinn and his brother Lane combined for four goals, as each Hutson lit the lamp twice. Wilmer Skoog and Matt Brown scored the other two Terrier goals and each added an assist to complete two-point nights. Sam Stevens and Jay O’Brien recorded two assists apiece.

Goaltender Drew Commesso made 22 saves to earn the win. Graduate student Patrick Schena made his Terriers debut, replacing Commesso for the final nine seconds of the contest.

For the Friars, Brett Berard, Nick Poisson, Liam Valente and Chase Yoder scored with Austin Roden and Philip Svedebäck combining for 27 saves.

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No. 3 Denver 2, Colorado College 1

The Pioneers got goals from Justin Lee and Mike Benning to take the Gold Pan game 2-1 at Magness Arena.

Hunter McKown scored for the Tigers, who got a combined 21 saves from Kaidan Mbereko and Matt Vernon.

Denver’s Matt Davis made 21 saves for the win in goal.

No. 4 Michigan 6, Wisconsin 5

Steven Holtz scored his first career goal at 9:06 in overtime to lift Michigan to a 6-5 win over Wisconsin in Game 1 of the Big Ten quarterfinals on Friday at Yost Ice Arena.

Michigan dominated the overtime period. Just before the 10-minute mark, U of M continued to funnel shots and pressure toward the UW crease. Finally, the puck was cycled up to the blue line at 9:06, where Holtz was waiting to receive the pass at the right point where he picked the perfect time to send a shot on net that found its way through traffic and into the back of the net for his first career goal.

With Badgers goaltender Kyle McClellan pulled for an extra attacker, the Wolverines scored the game-tying goal with 1:15 left in regulation when Adam Fantilli appeared to finish off his hat trick from the left dot. After UW challenged the play, it was determined by the officials that Michigan had too many skaters on the ice and the goal was disallowed.

On the following shift, the Wolverines broke through and notched a fifth goal that tied the game at 5-5 with 15 seconds left in regulation. Mackie Samoskevich sent a shot toward the net to generate the chance before being deflected into the slot and propelled across the goal line by Gavin Brindley and Rutger McGroarty, who ended up being credited with the goal while assists were given to Brindley and Samoskevich.

Erik Portillo started in net for the Wolverines and turned aside 38 of 43 shots that he faced to earn the win.

Mathieu De St. Phalle had the hat trick for the Badgers and Sam Stange registered a goal and an assist. McClellan finished with 30 saves.

Minnesota Duluth 4, No. 6 St. Cloud State 3

Minnesota Duluth upset St. Cloud State with a 4-3 win Friday night at the Herb Brooks National Hockey Center.

UMD has now won three games in a row against the Huskies this season.

Eight different Bulldogs recorded points. Quinn Olson netted two goals, along with Carter Loney and Cole Spicer each netting one. Wyatt Kaiser notched two assists and Zach Stejskal finished with 34 saves.

For the Huskies, Kyler Kupka scored a pair of goals and Jaxon Castor made 21 saves in goal.

No. 8 Western Michigan 5, Miami 0

Dylan Wendt and Jason Polin scored in the first period and Max Sasson scored the next three as the Broncos cruised to a 5-0 win at Steve “Coach” Cady Arena.

Ryan McAllister chipped in three assists and Sasson and Polin each had assists for multi-point games.

In net, Cameron Rowe stopped all 17 shots fired his way for the shutout.

For the RedHawks, Ludvig Persson made 26 saves between the pipes.

No. 9 Ohio State 5, No. 10 Penn State 1

Behind a four-point game from Stephen Halliday and 33 saves from Jakub Dobes, the Buckeyes defeated Penn State 5-1 in Game 1 of a Big Ten tournament quarterfinal best-of-three series at Value City Arena.

Ohio State scored the only goal of the first period less than five minutes into the game, with Davis Burnside notching his team-best 14th goal of the season. The Buckeyes took control in the second, with two goals in a 44-second span with the teams skating 4 on 4 and on the power play. Tyler Duke, Cam Thiesing and Cole McWard all tallied in the second.

Penn State’s Ture Linden broke up the shutout with a power-play goal 11 minutes into the third period.

Halliday, who had an assist on three of the first four Buckeye goals, lit the lamp himself at 12:02 for a 5-1 lead.

Dobes made 33 stops and Liam Souliere made 34 for the Nittany Lions.

No. 11 Michigan Tech 1, St. Thomas 0

Blake Pietila did what Blake Pietila does on Friday nights, as he backstopped Michigan Tech to a 1-0 shutout of St. Thomas to begin the CCHA playoffs at the MacInnes Student Ice Arena.

Pietila stopped all 30 shots he faced for his eighth Friday night shutout, 10th shutout of the season, and 20th shutout of his career.

“We knew it was going to be battle; there wasn’t anything pretty about the hockey game,” MTU coach Joe Shawhan said after winning his 118th game to tie for second in Michigan Tech history. “I can’t see anybody in the country being more valuable to their team than Blake. He had to make some really big saves. He was the difference, and he earned it.”

Pietila tied the CCHA record for shutouts in a season and broke his school records for shutouts in a season and career.

“They got a push after we scored,” Pietila said. “That happens when they’re trying to tie it up, and we were able to step up. My job is to stop the puck, especially when we weren’t able to score until late in the game.”

Brett Thorne scored the game’s only goal 11:28 into the third period.

Aaron Trotter made 31 saves for the Tommies.

RIT 5, Mercyhurst 3

Adam Jeffery scored his first two collegiate goals, including what proved to be the game-winning tally with under two minutes left in regulation, to clinch a 5-3 victory over visiting Mercyhurst in Game 1 of the Atlantic Hockey quarterfinals Friday at the Gene Polisseni Center.

RIT put a season-high 52 shots on goal – the most since a 53-shot barrage in a 6-3 win over Robert Morris on Oct. 7, 2016.

The Tigers also improved to 15-1-0 this season when leading after two periods.

In net, Tommy Scarfone made 20 saves for RIT and Tyler Harmon stopped 47 for the Lakers.

North Dakota 5, No. 14 Omaha 4 (OT)

Ethan Frisch struck 1:06 into overtime to pace North Dakota to a 5-4 victory over No. 14 Omaha on Friday night from Ralph Engelstad Arena.

The defenseman snuck down the slot and rocketed home a pass from Riese Gaber to give the Fighting Hawks their third straight OT victory on a Friday night and extends the unbeaten streak to a season-long five straight.

In a contest that saw three goals in the final 3:55 of regulation, Omaha rallied from a 3-1 deficit to knot the game at 3-3, but Dylan James answered back just 52 seconds later with his second tally of the night to quickly restore the NoDak lead.

With Omaha goaltender Simon Latkoczy pulled, UND goalie Drew DeRidder stopped a one-timer from the slot, but Matt Miller pounced on a rebound to tie the game at 4-4 with 32 seconds remaining to send UND into overtime for the fifth straight time, a first in program history before Frisch’s winner capped off the victory and gave the Fighting Hawks a big two points in the NCHC standings.

The third period saw a combined four goals before Frisch’s overtime winner sealed the victory for North Dakota.

DeRidder and Latkoczy each made 25 saves in goal.

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