BU: '22-'23 Season: Sail The Boats

[joen05]

I'm in a group of season ticket holders that are ALL former band members (Spanning from the 80's through the late 90's). So yeah, there's a large group of former band members who are hardcore BU hockey fans. My flex: I traveled to every Frozen Four BU played in during the 90's except for 1997. And was, of course, in the building for 1995 and 2009. My wife was also in the band and we've made our kids BU hockey fans. Our oldest goes to Fordham, so no hockey conflict there. #BUFandomLife

This is awesome to hear. I was a hockey fan before BU, but being in band at BU really solidified my hockey fandom. Loved the team even though they were pretty awful my first year. It was nice being the in opposing band at Conte for playoffs that year ;-). Still wish more other teams would bring their bands to opposing rinks during playoffs.... if they even allow that anymore.

[J.D.]

Borek deserves it - as good as Pandolfo has been, Merrimack was picked to finish 8th and they finished 2nd. BU was picked to finish 2nd and finished first. Everyone knew BU could be good, and it turned out that way. No one though Merrimack would be, so to me the amount that Merrimack surpassed expectations exceeds what Pando was able to do at BU.

As for the "free agency thing" - you still have to make the team work together. Borek did that with guys getting together for the first time at the collegiate level. Pandolfo has had the benefit of a lot of these guys already being together.

Love Pandolfo, especially compared to Albie. But Borek deserves this.

Ya it's not even a debate. It's not like Borek brought in top tier transfers either. Not the most talented team but he's gotten everything possible out of them.

[RENCEB]

Ya it's not even a debate. It's not like Borek brought in top tier transfers either. Not the most talented team but he's gotten everything possible out of them.

Thanks J.D. I always appreciate your perspective (even if you are a layman ;-)).
Borek has leveraged the transfer portal perhaps better than any other coach in college hockey. All of those players were available to every team, but he convinced them to come to North Andover and contribute. The BU's and BC's of the world can bring in younger high end talent given their respective tremendous hockey program traditions and yearly excellence. The "others" have to make use of all team building avenues that are available to them.

Borek also had to deal with the tragic death of his top Assistant Coach, Josh Ciocco, who died 1 week before the season started. That had to have had a tremendous impact on the team, both emotionally and on their play on the ice. That had to be really difficult for Borek to navigate.

Pandolfo and Barr have done great jobs with their respective teams, but this is Borek's year.

[Lemonade]

Ya it's not even a debate. It's not like Borek brought in top tier transfers either. Not the most talented team but he's gotten everything possible out of them.

It helps when they are all 24 and 25 year old players with 5 years of college hockey experience. Granted that's how Merrimack has to do to compete at this level but doesn't mean I have to like free agent college hockey.

[RENCEB]

Scott Borek, Jay Pandolfo, and Ben Barr have been named the finalists for Hockey East's Coach Of The Year Award. Personally, I think Borek will probably win but Pandolfo deserves it. Borek added 7 Graduate Students from the transfer portal - granted that's todays college hockey scene but is that really coaching? Its more free agency. Pandolfo took the same team and won HE and is top 5 in the country while turning around the program. Barr did a fantastic job with Maine but I don't think wins it.

A couple of things here. Borek added 6 grad students and 1 undergrad from the portal. All good players, but no game changers (you know, like Lane Hutson). As others have already stated, and I think you ultimately agreed, he blended them with the existing players and has made it work.
"Pandolfo took the same team....". Really, the same team? Did he have a hand in recruiting the Hutson brothers and Jeremy Wilmer? They've kinda had a pretty big impact on your season, don't you think? Albie was a train wreck as a head coach and Jay is a HUGE improvement.
I appreciate your fanaticism with all things BU, but c'mon, sometimes you need to take off the scarlet and white glasses.

[J.D.]

It helps when they are all 24 and 25 year old players with 5 years of college hockey experience. Granted that's how Merrimack has to do to compete at this level but doesn't mean I have to like free agent college hockey.

I don't like it either but BC and BU also have the same opportunity to leverage the portal in their favor. A guy leaves early? Look for the best portal option. Chances are kids would love to come to BC and BU for a year. At least in BCs case it really hasn't translated to some great strategy/option.

[J.D.]

Borek also had to deal with the tragic death of his top Assistant Coach, Josh Ciocco, who died 1 week before the season started. That had to have had a tremendous impact on the team, both emotionally and on their play on the ice. That had to be really difficult for Borek to navigate.

I forgot about this and it's a great point by you.

[Lemonade]

I don't like it either but BC and BU also have the same opportunity to leverage the portal in their favor. A guy leaves early? Look for the best portal option. Chances are kids would love to come to BC and BU for a year. At least in BCs case it really hasn't translated to some great strategy/option.

Its an interesting angle because most 5th year guys aren't most likely going the pro route or they wouldn't be coming back for a 5th year. More often than not they are good role players but there is a massive advantage of them having years of experience and being 25 years old vs some 18 years olds they are playing against. Not to take anything away from Borek as I think he will win the COY its just the broken system in NCAA hockey. Does BC or BU need grad transfers - maybe a few but their pipelines are already stuffed and they aren't looking for role players. It seems the portal is a place to pick up goalies though as BC did with Benson as a stop gap between top recruits. I am old school and like to see players go to a school and develop rather than just shop around like free agents. But hats off to Borek - he built a very good team with those players.

[Harry Cleverly]

I agree that Borek will win it - I just despise bringing in a bunch of 25 year olds to compete but as you stated they still have to play together.

They can collect their degrees and pensions at the same time.

[DNAEagle]

This is college hockey in 2023, I don't like it either but bringing in hired hands is the way forward I think and Borek has been able to capitalize on that.

[Lemonade]

Not much changes in the top for rankings....it the most insane stat of the week Quinnipiac gave up 5 shots IN THE ENTIRE GAME to Yale. FIVE....BU gave up 5 breakaways to Vermont....both teams won....just in different ways. A BU/Quinnipiac matchup would be insane to watch - talk about a clash of styles.

[Scarlet]

As a follow up to the conversation about Pandolfo as a finalist for Coach of the Year, Lane Hutson is a finalist for Player of the Year and Rookie of the Year. What are the odds he gets both? Will one cancel out the other and get neither? Levi is also a finalist and he didn't get it last year (I think). Will they figure Lane will get ROY and award Levi POY?

And Nick Zabenah just got HE Player of the Week! That's two weeks in a row for BU players and ones not normally considered the first line stars. I like to see that.

[brassbonanza]

It helps when they are all 24 and 25 year old players with 5 years of college hockey experience. Granted that's how Merrimack has to do to compete at this level but doesn't mean I have to like free agent college hockey.

Not a big fan of Matt Gilroy?

[Scarlet]

Also - the ticket office sent out the email to order tickets in the BU section for this weekend. Interesting to note that you can buy tickets for each night rather than a package for both nights. You never used to be able to do that. Also, the link takes you to the TD Garden site. And they're trying to join the Ticketmaster site with the TD Garden site so I had to create a new password to use for both. I checked my email to se if I had a link to the tickets so I could download to my phone. Nothing. So I went to Ticketmaster.com and it showed no tickets. Ugh. I went to the TD Garden site and it's not user friendly at all to find tickets you ordered. I finally did and was able to download them. What the hell was the point of joining Ticketmaster and the TD Garden sites if you can't access tickets on both?

[J.D.]

As a follow up to the conversation about Pandolfo as a finalist for Coach of the Year, Lane Hutson is a finalist for Player of the Year and Rookie of the Year. What are the odds he gets both? Will one cancel out the other and get neither? Levi is also a finalist and he didn't get it last year (I think). Will they figure Lane will get ROY and award Levi POY?

Are these the same voters who voted UMass to finish 2nd/3rd or whatever it was after losing their goalie and all viable scoring?...

I think Borek and Hutson are locks for COTY and ROTY. I would vote for Hutson as POTY but I am skeptical it will happen. I feel like over the years voters often get these things wrong and prefer to weigh seniority. Of course we also just saw a rookie team with 5 forwards and no goalie on it. So here is my rank of how I think it will go:

1. Levi POTY
2. They share the award
3. Hutson wins it outright