And now the men’s basketball team waits. After a most-satisfying 68-65 win over Vermont in front of a season’s-best crowd of 1,853 in Lundholm Gymnasium on Thursday night, the Wildcats wait to see what team they draw in the America East playoffs. UNH is done for the regular season and is locked in as the No. 7 seed with a 6-10 league record. The Wildcats will play the No. 2 seed _ either Hartford, Albany or Boston University _ in the first round next Friday in Binghamton. Hartford will be No. 2 if it can win at Maryland, Baltimore County on Sunday afternoon. If Hartford loses, the winner of Sunday’s Albany at BU game will be No. 2. UNH split with Hartford and Albany in the regular season and lost twice to BU.
If the regular season ended today, Massachusetts would come to Durham for the Hockey East quarterfinals and a best-of-three series against UNH starting on Friday, March 14. But don’t count Maine out just yet. The Black Bears enter the weekend in ninth place, two points behind UMass. Maine is at Vermont for two games this weekend. UMass is at BU tonight and the teams meet again tomorrow night in Amherst. Merrimack, which is playing two games against UNH this weekend, is a point behind Maine.
UNH needed a power play goal by freshman Phil DeSimone halfway through the third period to knock off Merrimack 1-0 in North Andover, Mass., the last time the teams met on Jan. 4. UNH senior Kevin Regan had 34 saves for the shutout. Sophomore Andrew Brathwaite had 25 saves for the Warriors. Brathwaite led Merrimack to a pair of wins, 2-0 and 3-2, over Providence last weekend to get Merrimack back in the running for a Hockey East playoff berth. The Warriors are in 10th place, three points out of the eighth and final playoff spot.
The Hockey East standings tightened up over the weekend. Not counting first-place UNH. The Wildcats have secured the top seed for the tournament and will play a role over the last two weekends of the regular season only in regards to playing a pair of games with Merrimack and then Vermont. Merrimack sits three points behind Massachusetts and the eighth and final playoff spot. Vermont is in a two-way tie for second place with Boston University and gunning for home ice for the first round of the tournament. BC is in fourth place, a point behind Vermont and BU and Northeastern and Providence are two points behind BC. Should be quite a race. And UNH can sit and watch out below.
BC will send a couple of high-flying lines out against UNH this weekend. Nathan Gerbe (22 goals, 22 assists for 44 points), Brian Gibbons (9-13-22) and Ben Smith (17-18-35) are one unit. Joe Whitney (7-32-39), Benn Ferriero (11-20-31) and Dan Bertram (7-18-25) are another. Gerbe leads the nation in points per game and Whitney leads the country in assists. . . . Gibbons and Whitney are freshman, Smith’s a sophomore, Gerbe and Ferriero are juniors and only Bertram is a senior. . . . UNH’s top two lines have Mike Radja (18-17-35) between Danny Dries (7-14-21) and Matt Fornataro (12-23-35) and James vanRiemsdyk (10-13-23) between Jerry Pollastrone (8-11-19) and Bobby Butler (9-9-18). . . . UNH coach Dick Umile doesn’t mind sticking his checking line of Thomas Fortney, Greg Collins and Mike Sislo out against anybody and he’ll match his fourth line of Phil DeSimone, Peter LeBlanc and Paul Thompson up against a lot of other lines, too.
UNH senior goalie Kevin Regan has had his problems with Boston College. Regan is 2-3-2 in his career against BC with a 3.13 goals against average and a .907 save percentage. For his career overall, Regan has a 2.29 goals against average and .928 save percentage. He made 24 saves to beat the Eagles 5-2 at the Whittemore Center on Nov. 10. And Regan has been on a tear of late: Since Dec. 1, he and the Wildcats are 10-0-1 against Hockey East teams. Regan’s league numbers for that stretch: 1.63 goals against and a .952 save percentage.
Men’s hockey coach Dick Umile said Wednesday at his weekly press conference that one of two freshmen, Matt Campanale or Mike Beck, will get the call to replace defenseman Jamie Fritsch in the lineup for Friday night’s game at Boston College. Fritsch must sit out one game as a result of picking up a fighting penalty and game disqualification with two seconds left in Saturday’s 4-3 win over Providence. Campanale has played in five games this season. Beck, who was sidelined early in the season as he recuperated from knee surgery, has played just once.
