Clearing the Bases Blog Index
March 30, 2009
Headed to Washington

This morning, it's good to be Boston U., Vermont, Miami of Ohio and Bemidji State. Not so good to be Jerry Pollastrone.

BU, Vermont, Miami and Bemidji have two more weeks of hockey as they'll be playing in the Frozen Four, which begins April 9 at the Verizon Center in Washington, D.C. According to the Greater Washington Sports Alliance, BU will play Vermont in one semifinal and Bemidji will face Miami in the other.

Now about Pollastrone, New Hampshire's snake-bitten forward. BU defeated UNH 2-1 last night for the Northeast regional championship, on a power-play goal by Jason Lawrence with 14.4 seconds left in regulation, a goal ... that deflected off Pollastrone, who dove in an attempt to keep Lawrence from passing the puck to Colin Wilson.

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"I just heard the crowd erupt," UNH's Kevin Kapstad said. "That was probably the most disappointing feeling I've had, to be honest with you ... I really had no doubt we were going to win that game, but obviously we didn't."

***

On the topic of strange goals ... Vermont defeated Air Force for the East regional championship on a goal by Dan Lawson in the second overtime. Lawson's blast from the point packed a punch, going past Air Force goalie Andrew Volkening, through the net and off the glass as play continued.

Officials took more than 12 minutes to review the goal before awarding it to the Catamounts. (Click here for the video)

"There's nothing that anybody's going to do or say that's going to make you feel better, regardless of how you lose that game," Air Force Coach Frank Serratore told the Colorado Springs Gazette. "I don't want to equate it to a death in the family, but for an athlete and a competitor, it's like when you lose a loved one. There's nothing anyone can say that's going to make you feel any better.

"We'll never get over this. It'll never leave you. The sick feeling in the pit of your belly will never leave, knowing that the Air Force Academy was one overtime goal away from going to the Frozen Four."

***

Bemidji State's Frozen Four appearance will be, in all likelihood, the swan song for College Hockey America. Bemidji State has applied to join the WCHA, the conference that includes Minnesota, Denver, Colorado College and North Dakota.

Oh, and you might know of a famous Miami of Ohio name - Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger.

***

And if you were like me, you were stuck watching college lacrosse Saturday afternoon instead of UNH-North Dakota hockey. Maryland-Virginia lacrosse went into seven overtimes, cutting into ESPN2's ESPNU broadcast of UNH-UND.

"I understand we have gotten calls mostly from the local markets of the two teams -- UNH and UND -- understandably so," ESPN spokeswoman Jenny Zimmerman told the Manchester (N.H.) Union-Leader. "Our approach is to stay with a game to the end. We were aggressive in updating viewers who were awaiting hockey."

Posted at 11:07 AM

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Rachel is in her fifth year as a sports reporter at the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram. A former college soccer and softball player, she covered sports at newspapers in Pennsylvania, Texas and Colorado before joining the Press Herald/Sunday Telegram staff in June of 2004.

Rachel takes over coverage of the University of Maine hockey team and was introduced to Maine hockey as a seventh-grader in Annapolis, Maryland, after reading a 1988 Sports Illustrated story about Shawn Walsh's impact on the program. Nearly 20 years later, she still has the four-page article in her possession.

She and her husband, Tommy (who also works for MaineToday Media, Inc.) are avid sports fans who root for the Pittsburgh Steelers, Pittsburgh Penguins and Kansas Jayhawks. After a year of marriage, their next step in life is to find a bigger house!



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