No. 2 Lakers sweep weekend

The Boston University women's hockey team is still winless this season after having its hands full against nationally ranked No. 2 Mercyhurst College twice in two days in Erie, Pa.

In Friday's game, the Terriers (0-3-1) scored five goals against a stingy Mercyhurst defense that hadn't let up one before this weekend, but it wasn't enough to edge out a prolific offense that racked up six goals. After knotting the score in the third, Valerie Chouinard completed a hat trick with 3:43 remaining. The Terriers had all sorts of trouble against Mercyhurst on Saturday, losing 4-1 as they went 0-for-10 on the power play and allowed three power-play goals.

BU scored first Friday on a goal by sophomore Melissa Anderson, assisted by juniors Amanda Shaw and Erin Seman before the Lakers answered back two minutes later. Ironically for the Terriers, it was their power play -- the very thing that failed them in the second game that worked perfectly in the first contest.

"We showed a lot of poise and a lot of patience on the power play reading some good plays, and ultimately we made some good shots," said BU coach Brian Durocher.

Mercyhurst (5-0-0) came out storming in the second period, scoring two goals at 2:58 and 4:10. But the Terrier snipers came alive on the power play again in the second with goals from Seman at 12:04, sophomore Sarah Appleton at 13:11 and junior Amanda Shaw at 19:35. BU had tied the game at four but only attempted seven shots in the period.

"We got good shots that ended up in the back of the net," Durocher said. "Clearly the power play was the start of it and against a top team we managed to get close to 25 shots. That wasn't necessarily our M.O. last year, so there's definitely some heightened offense on the team, but the power play gets a lot of credit."

Junior co-captain Gina Kerns kept up the momentum and scored early in the third period off assists from Appleton and Seman -- her third of the game -- for the fourth unanswered BU goal. But the Terriers started to look sluggish, yielding two more power-play goals to Chouinard.

"We look at the game as part of a journey and we make sure we put that one behind us," Durocher said. "Maybe we'll look at a little film and talk about the things we did but we obviously want to be resilient. Our job is to focus on what's ahead. These back-to-back games are a challenge, especially because of Mercyhurst's status, but there will be others like it."

On Saturday, the Terriers' woes on the penalty kill only got worse, as they gave up three power play goals in addition to a shorthanded goal. Mercyhurst fired 15 shots on net in the first period alone, scoring twice against sophomore goalie Melissa Haber, who started both games this weekend.

Even though she started both contests, BU will still use the goalie tandem of Haber and junior Allyse Wilcox, who will probably play next weekend, according to Durocher. Even though Haber had a rough weekend, Durocher saw some silver lining in the two defeats.

"I think Melissa would probably like to get one or two back from that first game but she continued to compete all the way through and play hard," Durocher said.

"[Playing against a top team] indicates to us how hard we have to play, how error free we have to play," he added. "We're not the favorite in these games but a bounce here and there and we could all of a sudden have three to six points against Minnesota or Mercyhurst twice. Right now we have zero, but we're gaining confidence. We can play with these teams and challenge the top clubs."