This is the second of four previews for teams playing in the 2023 NCAA Men’s Frozen Four this week in St. Paul, Minn. Click here for all of USCHO’s Frozen Four coverage.
Boston University Terriers
Season record: 28-9-2
How they got to St. Paul: Won the Sioux Falls Regional, beating RIT 6—3 and Minnesota 6-3
Top players: F Macklin Celebrini (32-32-64), D Lane Hutson (15-34-49), F Quinn Hutson (18-18-36)
Top goalie: Mathieu Caron (28-9-2, 2.37 goals-against average, .915 save percentage).
Why they’ll win the national championship: Macklin Celebrini is the second leading scorer with the country with 1.73 goals per game and has been proven next to impossible to shut down. The Terriers made relatively easy work of their two NCAA tournament opponents so far, cruising past RIT and rallying to beat Minnesota.
Why they won’t win the national championship: In Denver, they’ll be facing one of the top defenses in the country, which will have watched plenty of tape of Celebrini and the Hutson brothers before getting on the plane to St. Paul. Should they advance to a dream matchup vs. Boston College in the final, they’ll have to overcome a team they’ve already lost to thrice so far this season.
The two teams returning to this year’s Frozen Four from 2023 were the two that were eliminated on the first night — Michigan and Boston University.
So an argument can be made that Hockey East’s BU heads to St. Paul, Minn., with a little bit of extra pressure. And Terrier senior forward Like Tuch wouldn’t have it any other way.
“We know what to expect going into it, and the pressure that’s on us,” said Tuch. “The pressure’s perfect.”
The Terriers are hoping for a better result this time around. In 2023, BU was soundly defeated by No. 1 overall seed Minnesota 6-2. The Terriers avenged that loss in the Sioux Fall Regional, handing the Gophers (B1G) a 6-3 loss after falling behind 2-0.
“It’s pretty cool to be able to say you’ve been to back-to-back Frozen Fours,” said BU sophomore forward Ryan Greene. “I never thought that would happen, to be honest. It’s unbelievable. We have a lot of guys who have been there, so hopefully that experience can help us.”
BU’s opponent on Thursday (5 p.m. EDT, ESPN2 and ESPN-plus) will be Denver (NCHC), back in the Frozen Four after winning it all in 2022 right in BU’s backyard. DU is the top scoring team in the nation, averaging 4.71 goals a game.
“(We need to play) a hard, physical and fast game,” Tuch said. “Smother them, don’t give them any kind of space. Play with that swagger. We got a lot of really good offensive players. And we have a really good goalie back there, too.”
In sophomore forward Macklin Celebrini, the Terriers have the nation’s second leading scorer (32-32-64) and a finalist for the Hobey Baker Award, which goes to the nation’s best player. Another potent scoring threat is sophomore defenseman Lane Hutson, who was last year’s standout in BU’s road to the Frozen Four but this year took a backseat, at least publicity-wise, to Celebrini despite having a bigger scoring output.
In front of the net, junior Mathieu Caron enters the Frozen Four with the nation’s fourth best winning percentage, and is coming off a 53-save performance in the Sioux Falls regional.
The Terriers will be searching for their sixth national championship and first since 2009. Second-year coach Jay Pandolfo (who four times participated in the Frozen Four with BU as a player) said he hopes last year’s experience in the Frozen Four will give his team a mental edge in St. Paul.
“Staying in the moment is probably the biggest thing,” Pandolfo said. “We got caught up a little bit in that first game. (Minnesota) came out really hard, and I don’t think we were ready. That’s on me a little bit. But this year I think our guys know what to expect.”
