BC Women’s Hockey vs. Boston University, Hockey East Semifinals: Final Thoughts & Prediction

It’s playoff szn!

A women’s hockey preview? Can it be?!

Yes, your favorite mostly-retired women’s hockey editor has returned to get you up to speed on the Women’s Hockey East semifinals. It’s the Battle of Comm Ave, it’s for a spot in the championship game, and it’s between two very, very even teams. As such, the casual Eagle-enjoyers among you will no doubt be tuning for some Wednesday evening hockey, and you’ll need to get caught up on all the details heading into the game.

Let’s dive right in.

WHO

No. 15 Boston College Eagles (21-12-2, 16-9-2 WHEA)
at No. 13 Boston University Terriers (22-11-2, 18-7-2 WHEA)

WHAT

The Battle of Comm Ave: Hockey East Semifinal Edition

WHERE

Walter Brown Arena
Allston, MA

WHEN

Wednesday, March 5th, 2025
6:00pm EST

HOW TO WATCH

Tonight’s game, like all Hockey East conference games, will be streamed live on ESPN+. Here is a direct link to the game.

AS CLOSE AS IT GETS

Not only are BC and BU neck and neck in just about every ranking out there (11th and 12th in the Pairwise, 13th and 14th in KRACH, 18th and 19th in GRaNT), but all four league semifinalists are essentially tied and ranked nearly consecutively in all the rankings — and after the games on Saturday, they actually were:

I’m not sure we’ve ever had a tournament Final Four this close in either men’s or women’s hockey — certainly not in my memory.

BU SEASON SUMMARY

Boston University, just like the other teams at the top of the league, really, has been wildly inconsistent this season. They had a stretch early in the year when they won eight in a row which vaulted them to the top of the league standings, but since then they’ve bounced around between getting a nice win against a contending team and dropping points the next night.

Of all the top Hockey East teams entering the postseason, the Terriers are probably the most unhappy with how their regular season ended (despite Northeastern coming in with arguably the worst form). In their final three games of the league schedule, BU managed to take only 1 of 9 points and blew a wide-open chance at the regular season title, only to get swept by UConn on the final weekend to lose the trophy by one point. Yikes.

Their Hockey East quarterfinal nearly saw 8th-seeded Vermont boot them out of the postseason early as the Catamounts held a 3-2 lead on the Terriers in the third period, but BU managed to claw their way back to a tie in regulation before sneaking away with the 4-3 overtime win.

BC SEASON SUMMARY

Don’t get too excited about BU’s stumble into the postseason, though — all four contenders dropped multiple points over the final couple weekends, and BC is no exception.

It’s actually pretty remarkable how similar BC’s and BU’s seasons have been. Both teams were swept by top WCHA programs early in the year. Both teams got a sweep against an eastern foe immediately after (though you have to like BC’s pair of wins over then-3rd ranked Clarkson more than BU’s over Syracuse). Both teams rattled off eight straight wins in October/November to set their claim as league contender…

…and then both teams settled into inconsistency from there. BC’s end-of-year struggles saw them lose 5 of 7 in the stretch run before stopping the bleeding with 8 of 9 points over their last three games, but it wasn’t the hot streak you’d have liked to see going into trophy season.

As for their Hockey East quarterfinal, BC didn’t quite have the scare the Terriers did in their first round matchup against 6th-seeded Maine, but it was a back-and-forth affair against the only WHEA team the Eagles swept in the regular season. The Black Bears led twice and tied the game at 3-3 in the second period, but every Maine goal saw an admirable BC response with an Eagle hitting the back of the net less than four minutes after each of the Black Bears’ three tallies.

WHO TO WATCH FOR

It would be cheating to say BC’s Julia Pellerin, the league’s leading scorer, and Sydney Healey, the top scorer for BU, are the ones to keep an eye on. Pellerin in particular has been electric for the Eagles, and you’ll certainly want to pay attention when she’s on the ice. But playoff hockey brings out the best in the most experienced players, and I’m actually going to shift to BC senior Abby Newhook and BU grad student Lindsay Bochna as who I most expect to shine.

Bochna transferred to the Terriers after four years as the Miss Reliable of the Friars, never the team’s top scorer but always among the top few. That continued with her move to Boston University as she’s put up a solid 7-11—18 line, second on the team in points… and second on the team in penalty minutes. Why is that important? Because you know she’s willing to scrap, and in a physical rivalry matchup, this is where you’d expect her to stand out.

Newhook, co-captain of the Eagles, is another one who has just always been the team’s rock. She led the team in goals as a freshman and has since been one of BC’s strongest and most clutch players, scoring many a memorable late goal over her four years. But she’s also just like Bochna in that she plays a physical game and isn’t afraid to muscle through defenders. She’s matched Bochna’s 20 penalty minutes — which is tops on the BC roster — in the 2024-25 season, and plays a lot of the most important minutes for Coach Crowley.

Both players fill the roll of the Thunder to their team’s younger Lightning. You can be sure they will be featured in the box score when all is said and done… and I don’t mean by sitting on the penalty bench: This is the type of game where you want players like this letting their physicality loose, as all too often it’s what leads to the greasy goal you need to win the game.

PROJECTIONS

KRACH (used for odds) has BU ranked 13th and BC right on their heels in 14th. Running the numbers with the two teams’ ratings puts the Eagles at a 48.63% chance of winning, or BC +106 with your local bookie — not far off from a true pick ‘em, as you’d expect with the teams ranked so closely.

The GRaNT rankings (used for point spread) actually has the two teams flipped, with BC 18th and the Terriers just behind in 19th. That gives us a close score projection as well, with the GRaNT Rankings expecting the final to be somewhere in the range of 2.43 to 2.28 in favor of the Eagles, but really a virtual tie.

GAME TIME SONG OF THE WEEK

My Chemical Romance — Party Poison

This ain’t a party, get off the dance floor
You want the get-down, here comes the gang war

HATE WEEK against BU is always fun, but when there’s a trophy in the distance the bad blood is cranked to 11. This game will probably get pretty chippy. It’s going to be a battle.

PREDICTION

The GRaNT rankings have the over/under in this one at 4.7 goals, but I like the under on that. I do think the game becomes a scrappy, grind-it-out, physical affair between rivals. Expect special teams to be very involved with the referees trying to keep tempers under control from the beginning. The two programs are at the top of the league in penalty killing percentage, but the Eagles have a little bit of an edge on the power play with the top scoring rate in the league at 23.5%.

You’d be a fool not to expect the game to stay close to the end, but I won’t go quite so far as to predict overtime. BC gets the game’s lone power play goal sometime in the second period to take a 2-1 lead which will stand for the rest of the game, sending the Eagles to the Hockey East championship game with a 2-1 regulation victory.