BOSTON -- Northeastern University won the right to have home-ice advantage in the final of the 63rd Beanpot tournament at TD Garden on Monday. After that, though, it was Boston University's night.
The No. 4 Terriers (20-6-5) raced out to a 3-1 lead, then withstood a furious Northeastern comeback to capture a 4-3 victory on BU captain Matt Grzelcyk's power-play strike just 51 seconds into overtime for the program's 30th Beanpot title and first in six years.
"It's obviously a childhood dream, living so close to the Garden, my dad working here," said Grzelcyk, a Charlestown, Massachusetts, native and Boston Bruins draft pick who was tournament MVP. "It still hasn't really set in.
"Although [Northeastern] scored the last two goals [in regulation], we were still really confident. We just wanted to make sure we had fun because you never know when you're going to come back here. So you just want to make the most of it, and I'm glad we did."
It was the Terriers' second overtime victory in this year's Beanpot, after BU ousted Harvard, 3-2 in double overtime on Feb. 3. It was the first Beanpot crown for BU seniors Cason Hohmann and Evan Rodrigues.
"After the third period ended, Cason and I actually talked to each other. Our freshman year, we lost to BC in overtime, with six seconds left," said Rodrigues, who assisted on both Grzelcyk's championship-winning goal and Danny O'Regan's overtime winner against Harvard. "We just told ourselves were weren't going to lose.
"BU hasn't won a Beanpot in way too long, and we weren't going out without a Beanpot in our career," he said, smiling broadly. "We just told ourselves we were going to make it happen, no matter what it took. We rallied the guys in the room and got it done. It feels good."
The loss was the third straight Beanpot final defeat for Northeastern (15-13-4), extending the Huskies' record of Beanpot futility to 27 years. It was particularly painful, said NU coach Jim Madigan, because the game ended on a power play that resulted from what he thought was a dubious call.
"I think we deserved better, but we can't go there," Madigan said. "Don't ask questions about the officials or the penalty. We're censored. We can't say things about the league or the officials. The referee made a call. We didn't agree with it. BU won the game on a power play."
Just nine seconds into overtime, BU's Jack Eichel sprung down the right side with a burst of speed, and when O'Regan and NU's Matt Benning got tangled in front of the net, the Huskies defenseman was sent off for hooking.
With Northeastern a man down, BU's Ahti Iksanen won a battle along the right board and pushed the puck to Rodrigues. The senior sent it cross-ice to his captain, who calmly waited for an NU defender to set a screen before firing a low, hard shot that beat Huskies goaltender Clay Witt stick side.
"At the end of the day, you've got to play hockey," BU coach Dave Quinn said. "You have to win battles, and you have to shoot pucks quickly."
The Terriers opened the scoring just 2:19 after the opening faceoff. Junior Mike Moran blew past NU's Trevor Owens on the right boards by his own blueline and broke in alone on Witt. With two Huskies in hot pursuit, Moran calmly rifled the puck over Witt's blocker into the top left corner.
The Huskies answered immediately. NU's John Stevens picked up the puck by the right faceoff dot, but had his shot blocked by BU's John MacLeod. Collecting his own rebound, Stevens drifted across the slot before wrong-footing BU's Matt O'Connor, sending his shot across the grain and roofing the puck over the goalie's glove at 2:47.
Both goaltenders settled in after those early strikes, both recording double digit saves in the opening stanza. Although Witt gave up some soft rebounds, he kept the Terriers at bay with several solid stops and one spectacular save. With just less than a minute to go, Eichel sprinted down the left side and saucered a perfect pas to linemate Rodrigues. The senior caught the puck in stride and ripped a shot labeled for the top right corner, but was denied by Witt's catching glove to preserve the 1-1 tie going into the first intermission.
"That was a very flat first period for us," Quinn said. "Give Northeastern credit. I thought they came out with a little extra juice in their game, a little extra step in their game. I thought coming out of it 1-1, we were fortunate."
Another dangerous rebound lead to a 2-1 BU lead at 5:31 of the middle period. Hohmann, slipping into the high slot, took a shot that Witt dumped to his right. Before NU's Garret Cockerill could cover, BU's Robbie Baillargeon jumped on the puck and fired it past Witt.
The Terriers doubled their lead at 14:18. Grzelcyk took a feed from Nikolas Olsson at the left point, walked in to the top of the faceoff circle and lasered a slap shot past a pair of NU defenders and Witt's glove, just inside the right post, for his sixth of the season.
"Grizzy's been working on his shot an awful lot over the two years, and I couldn't be happier for him, because his two goals were a direct result of a lot of hard work," Quinn said.
The Huskies clawed back within one at 9:18 on a terrific individual effort by junior Kevin Roy, the MVP of the 2013 Beanpot. Picking up the puck in his own zone, Roy chugged up the right side until he reached the top of the right circle. He then slashed into the middle of the slot and snapped a shot that squeezed underneath O'Connor's blocker to cut the BU lead to 3-2.
The Huskies knotted the game at 10:53, when defenseman Dustin Darou, the hero of Northeastern's white-knuckle 3-2 opening round win over Boston College, struck again. With the puck pinballing among a scrum of players in front of the BU crease, Darou slapped it past O'Connor for only his third career goal.
"I thought we showed a lot of character coming back to tie that game," NU senior captain Daz Lauwers said. "Obviously we wanted a different result."
Rodrigues said Northeastern's third goal ignited the Terriers.
"As soon as they scored the third goal, we just looked at each other and told each other it was our time," Rodrigues said of his line. "We've been hot as of late, and we weren't going a game without getting a goal. It was a tie game, and the next one was going to get it, and we just told each other that we had it in us, and we were going to get it done."
Get it done they did. And now Rodrigues and his teammates can call themselves Beanpot champions.