Northeastern wins Hockey East tournament (again), fifth time is quite a charm

For the first time ever a team has won five consecutive Hockey East title. The Northeastern Huskies women’s team extended an incredible run with a comeback victory over the Connecticut Huskies. It was the third time these teams met, second in Matthews Arena, in this streak. Only Boston University had previously won the tournament five times but they were not in a row. The graduating class also will end their careers a perfect 18-0 in HEA tournament play.

The first period saw Northeastern as the superior team for most of it, shots were heavily in favor of NU and they had long sequences of sustained pressure that led to no goals. Then UConn caught a break as NU couldn’t escape their D zone effectively and handed Connecticut a golden opportunity that they finished to take an early lead.

The second period saw the southern Huskies pick it the pace with a major narrowing of the shot margin. Northeastern still had a lot of good opportunities but were unable to capitalize until Alina Mueller showed why she is a top ten player in the country as she was able to put one in from near the goal line to even the game near the end of the period.

Opening the third period with a goal left Northeastern and their fans breathing sighs of relief as Mueller once again made magic, beating multiple defenders before firing a shot that just squeezed through the legs of the UConn goalie. NU would not relinquish lead the rest of the way and Chloe Aurard added a late insurance goal to put the game out of reach. While Connecticut fought hard at the end a late penalty doomed any chance for them to pull the goalie and add an extra attacker as NU was able to maintain possession and run out the clock on yet another trophy.