Women’s Beanpot Championship 2023: Preview

The Basics:

• What: The 2023 Beanpot Championship

• Where: Conte Forum, Chestnut Hill, MA

• Who: Northeastern University and Boston College

• When: 7:30 PM February 14, 2023

• How to watch: TV: NESN Plus (in New England), ESPN+ (outside New England)

Season Series: NU 3-0

BC @ NU (0:4), NU @ BC (2:0), BC @ NU (0:1 OT)

The Huskies have once again completed a season shut out of BC in Hockey East play something Aerin Frankel led them to a few years ago but the last time out the Eagles took NU to OT and almost won it there.

Beanpot Championship History: NU 4-3

1979: NU 3 : BC 1

1985: NU 7: BC 0

1996: NU 4 : BC 3 OT

2013: NU 4 : BC 3

2014: BC 3: NU 0

2016: BC 7: NU 0

2017: BC 2: NU 1

Northeastern has the historic results winning the first Beanpot against BC and three other times after that. Recent history belongs to the Eagles though, from 2013-2017 the two teams met every year that they did did not meet in the first round, 2012, 2015 and 2018 were first round meetings, where the Eagles took three meetings of the four, two of them shutouts.

All Time Beanpot Results: NU Leads series 14-11-1

Outlook

Northeastern is the favorite, no two ways to say it. That being said it is the Beanpot where favorites don’t seem to matter. The season results say NU is better as do the metrics. Problem for them is the game is in Newton borderlands and BC is hungry to get back at Northeastern. At stake is more than just the usual trophy and bragging rights, as the Huskies are in a fight to try and either get a home NCAA QF or at least not have to play a first round game. Boston College is almost certainly at the win the tournament or stay home stage but would love to play the spoiler.

Predictions

KRACH: NU 86.7% : BC 13.3%

GRaNT: NU 74.04% (3.33) : BC 25.96% (1.17)

Our friends over at BCInterruption have kindly provided us with the odds calculators. Per KRACH NU should win this game almost 87% of the time. And resident math whiz over there has his own rankings that try to predict the final score. In that metric NU scores almost 3/4 of all goals and the metric predicts a 3-1 NU victory.

NU 3 BC 1

Who am I to argue with the math. Northeastern is favored by everyone including the unbiased math, it was even verified by BC partisans. The game will likely be a nail biter that is way closer than Coach Flint would like as the Eagles are too talented and have way too good of a goalie to go away quietly. In the end Huntington Avenue should once again hold both Beanpot trophies at the same time. That feat has only happened five other times, four by NU and once by BC.