Guest Hockey Blogger: Mook Williams

It's that time again. BC enters the Frozen Four red hot. We can taste a championship and we are facing North Dakota. To get a better understanding of how BC got here and what we can expect, I've brought back my hockey expert and former 'ZBC partner Mook Williams to answer a few questions about the Frozen Four.

1. How do you explain the team's post Beanpot slump? How were they able to snap out of it during the HE Tourney and the NCAA regional?

Mook Williams: Considering what we saw this year throughout the season, it's tough to explain the post-Beanpot slump. Was it John Muse hitting a wall after starting every game this season? The other freshman hitting a wall? Gerbe cooling off? The "BU effect" of placing too much value on the Beanpot? I think it might have been a little bit of each of these factors, a "perfect storm" if you will, that sent BC into an uncharacteristic late-season slump. For a while, it didn't seem like they were coming out, but Coach York managed to break through just in the nick of time.

2. How does BC matchup against North Dakota?

MW: Each year, when you look at the BC / North Dakota matchup, it's always tough to decide which way the edge leans. I can tell you one thing, one man is going to determine the outcome of this game - his name is Jean-Phillipe Lamoureux. The wiry 5'10 155 pound Senior goaltender has been on fire this season, posting a super-nasty 1.63 GAA,.936 save percentage, and 6 shutouts. On a team with skaters as dangerous as North Dakota, those numbers look even more impressive. If any one man in the Frozen Four can steal a game, it is Lamoureux. However, he was the Sioux's starter last year, and was on the losing end of a 6-4 defeat (the last 2 BC goals were empty-netters), so BC has gotten to him before. We'll see how he comes out this year, with plenty of talent ahead of him such as TJ Oshie, last year's Hobey Baker winner Ryan Duncan, Senior defense standout Robbie Bina, and 6'7 240 lb. Junior defenseman Joe Finley. Just as they did in pulling one out against Miami, BC is going to have rely on their speed, tenacity, and goaltending to survive. Aggression is the word of the day, and the team with more of it will come out on top. They had two exciting but scoreless periods cut short by the fog in Conte Forum earlier in the season, and the theme of "payback" looms large for the Sioux, but I don't see the Sioux containing the amazing team chemistry and guts shown by the Eagles as of late. Unless Lamoureux stands on his head (and this could happen), I see BC winning again, and knocking North Dakota out for the third straight season.

3. Despite all these Frozen Fours, BC has only won the championship once during this stretch? We all know the various heart aches and tough losses. Outside of luck, do you see an overriding theme to these losses and is there something York can do differently this year?

MW: It's easy to tag BC with the "Buffalo Bills" of college hockey moniker - always getting to the Frozen Four, but almost never winning it (second most Frozen Four trips in the NCAA, but yet only 2 titles to show for it). You get that impression when looking at the team from afar, but when you go year-by-year, BC just happened to get eliminated by a tough opponent in a tough game. In 1998 you had the upstart Eagles taking national favorite Michigan to OT and falling an inch short of victory, in 1999 you saw the Eagles lose a tight-checking national semifinal OT game to eventual champion Maine, in 2000 you saw BC blow a third period lead in the championship game to the Sioux, in 2001 you saw them win it all, in 2004 you saw a more-shallow BC team run out of gas and into a brick wall in the opposing goal in the national semifinal, in 2006 you saw them almost pull out a win as heavy underdogs on Wisconsin's home ice, and last year you might have seen the first disappointing York-era Frozen Four loss when BC lost a tight game to underdog Michigan State. So, although last year was a game that BC should have won, you can't discount this team for coming up short - in a single-elimination format, it's tough to run off a streak of championships. Just getting to the Frozen Four as many times as BC has in the York era has been amazing, and unsurpassed by any other program. If BC manages to win this year's title or next year's they have the right to the "Team of the Decade" crown. As for York doing something differently, I hope that he doesn't. When you get this far, it's the players who win or lose you the games. York has taken them through practices, drilled them all year, and most likely has prepared them well for the teams they will see in the Frozen Four - it's now the Eagles' time to shine on the ice. Sure, a well-timed TO can turn the tide, like it did against Miami, but I firmly believe that once you get to the Frozen Four, coaching doesn't have much of an effect on the game's outcome.