Outer Worlds 2, II

The Celtics are off this week for the All-Star break along with the rest of the NBA and the Bruins are off for the Winter Olympics along with the rest of the NHL. The CFB and Georgia Bulldog's seasons have ended and it's curtains for the Patriots and the NFL until next autumn. Red Sox pitchers and catchers have already reported, but Boston's first Grapefruit League spring training game is still a full week away. And the Boston University hockey teams only play on weekends, at least most of the time.  

So, friendly reminder during this sports interbellum that video games are e-sports. This is as good a time as any to report that I finished a second playthrough of The Outer Worlds 2, a first-person sci-fi RPG by Obsidian Entertainment. 

My first playthrough took me 83 hours to complete, but even though I did more exploration and found several new quests that I missed during my first run, I completed the second playthrough in 75 hours. I spent less time trying to figure out some puzzles and problems that vexed me my first time through, and as I had a firmer understanding of the combat mechanisms, fewer times dying and having to repeat things all over again. I played this second time on "Normal" difficulty the whole way through, although I had to switch over to "Story" mode a couple of times on my first playthrough during some of the more challenging boss fights.

According to Steam, I completed 18 of 48 possible achievements the first time, and on this second run I picked up only two more - SA Quarterlies Quantified (found all volumes of Science Adventures Quarterly on Paradise Island) and Everything Must Go (earned 50,000 bits by selling items to vendors). A total of 20 out of 48 achievements is low (41.7%), but many of the unearned achievements are based on  multiple playthroughs or are rewards for negative behavior (e.g., "all companions are killed"). I didn't lose a single companion on either playthrough, except for the death-cult fanatic Ava, who insisted on joining a suicide mission at the very end of the game. 

The first time through, I played as a male Renegade and my primary trait was Brilliant. This time, I was a female Professor and my primary trait was Brawny. I was impressed by how different those changes made the game. That's the point of an RPG for sure, but in many games you'd need a redlined script comparison to find the differences.  Add to this the consequence of some in-game decisions (i.e., spare or kill an antagonist, side with one character or another, etc.) and the second playthrough not only didn't feel repetitive, it was downright revelatory. 

But not fresh enough to warrant a third playthrough, at least not immediately. Eventually, as Groucho once supposedly said, you have to take the cigar out of your mouth. Time to move on. I've downloaded a new game (new to me at least, although it is a fairly recent), Assassin's Creed Shadows. We'll see how that goes.

BU 5, New Hampshire 3

 

The BU Terriers' men's team took the ice last evening following six straight losses between the men's and women's teams, two straight for the men alone. But they weren't having any of that losing shit last night, and beat the UNH Wildcats, 5-3, to end the skid.

Brandon Svoboda scored in the first period for the Terriers, and Cole Hutson and Jack Murtagh scored in the second. Jack Harvey scored at the start of the third period and Cole Eiserman knocked in an empty-netter at the end of the period.

The Terriers are nearing a return to .500 overall (14-15-2) and in conference play (10-11-0). They are tied with UMass for fourth in Hockey East, five points back from fourth-place BC. They  have a pair of games next weekend against the Eagles (17-10-1) and could potentially pick up six points with a sweep. They may be 0-1 against No. 14 BC this season, but anything can happen in The Battle of Comm Ave. 

They'll end the regular season the following weekend with a game at UMass Lowell. 

UConn 2, BU 0

 

Not to sound like copium, but it's a victory of sorts for the unranked BU Terriers women's team to hold the No. 6 UConn Huskies scoreless in the first period, and then limit them to only one goal in each the second and third periods.

But it's also the fourth straight loss for the Terriers, who've lost to four different teams in that stretch.

The Terriers fall to 9-19-3 overall and are tied for eighth place with Providence at 25 points in Hockey East action. They play Providence (11-19-2) next Saturday to sort that out, and then will end the regular season with a Saturday afternoon game against BC. 

All teams make the Hockey East post-season tournament, so the Terriers will have at least one more game after that. Given their low standing in the conference, they'll be seeded against a top team, probably UConn or No. 14 Holy Cross, so I don't expect too many more games after BC.

  

New Hampshire 4, BU 1

 

With the NBA and the Celtics off on the All-Star break and the NHL and the Bruins off for the Winter Olympics, with the Super Bowl and the Patriots' season now in the read-view mirror and the baseball season not yet begun, in this odd crease in time, Boston University hockey has the spotlight all to themselves. 

And what do the Terriers do with this rare opportunity, solo on center stage as it were? Lose both a women's home game and a men's road game.

Last night, the men lost, 4-1,  in the wintery chill of Durham, New Hampshire. BU freshman Ryder Ritchie scored a goal in the first period, but only after UNH took a 2-0 lead in the first 1:23 of the game. And that was it for the Terriers, scoring-wise, while the Wildcats added a power-play goal and the inevitable open-netter to end the game.

BU falls to a disappointing 13-15-2 overall and 9-11-0 in conference play. They are currently tied for fifth place in Hockey East with Merrimack and Northeastern. With only four games left to the season, including a pair against BC, the Terriers will be lucky to end the season at .500.

The weekend series with the Wildcats moves to Boston, where BU and UNH will go at it starting at 6:00 pm today in BU's home Agganis Arena.

Northeastern 5, BU 2

The BU Terrier women lost their straight game, this time to No.5 Northeastern. 

Northeastern took a 2-0 lead in the first period before Clara Yuhn made it 2-1 early in the second. Northeastern struck back with two more goals before Anezka Cabelova gave the Terriers their second goal late in the third, less than 30 seconds after the Huskies fourth goal. Northeastern's Stryker Zablocki (now there's a hockey name for you) hit an empty netter with less than a second left in regulation for the final score.

Hey, the Terriers are still the 2025 Friendship Series champions of Belfast, North Ireland, so there's that. The Terriers fall to 9-18-3 overall, 7-12-2 and eighth place in Hockey East. 

Good news/bad news: The good news is we've seen the last of No. 5 Northeastern, at least for the regular season. The bad news is tomorrow we play No. 6 UConn (22-7-2).

Celtics 124, Bulls 105

 

At my darkest hour, deep in my deepest funk, who comes to rescue me, to bring light to my darkness, but the Boston Celtics. They trounced the Chicago Bulls last night, 124-105, and I can see clearly now, the clouds are gone.

Pritchard led the team with 26 points and Brown was right behind him with 24. Nikola Vučević, playing against his former team, went 4-for-5 on threes, scored 19 points, and grabbed 11 rebounds for the night's double double. He also had three assists, two blocks, and one steal. The guy may still have that new-car smell on him, but I think he's going to fit into this team just fine.

Overall, the Celtics outrebounded the Bulls, 48-24, and made 18 three-point buckets to Chicago's 12. Hugo González got nine minutes playing time and frankly didn't do much with them (two rebounds, no points, and one turnover). 

We may have to substitute Vučević for González in the Celtics' success formula (rebounds + threes + González minutes = success) as the team was +26 when Nikola was off the bench, while they were only +5 with Hugo. True, González had only 9:02 minutes to Vučević's 26:23 but that's 0.72 points per minute for Victor but only 0.55 ppm for Hugo. It's not a competition, but . . . wait a minute - it is a competition. That's exactly what it is. What's not fair is comparing a big-man center off the bench on a team that sorely needed a big-man center with a backup shooting guard on a team that already has Derrick White and Baylor Scheierman. 

Despite losing to the Knicks on Sunday, the Celtics are in first place in the Atlantic, up a half game on New York.

The Celtics will have a week off. Most of the Celtics, anyway, except for Jaylen Brown, who will play in Sunday's All Star games. After that's all over, the Celtics will go on a West Coast road trip against a killer lineup of Golden State (Thursday), the Lakers (Sunday), Phoenix (Tuesday), and Denver (Wednesday). Collectively, those four teams are 128-90 (.587), and when the Warriors are the easiest team, you know that's one tough stretch of schedule.

Beanpot Final: BC 6, BU2

These are terrible times, my friends. Terrible. There might be brief, fleeting moments of joy or happiness left in life, but the great American experiment in participatory democracy has come to an end. Our government is corrupt, blatantly racist, and hostile to the very nation is purportedly governs. The climate has gone haywire, regulations protecting the environment from industrial discharges are being dismantled, new diseases are emerging and old one are reemerging, popular music is shit, movies have become comic books, and comic books have become our new sacred texts. 

Sports, once the true opiate of the masses, offer no relief. The Georgia Bulldogs were eliminated from the Playoffs in their first game, the mighty Boston Bruins are a fifth-place team, Jayson Tatum can't dance, the New England Patriots lost the Super Bowl on Sunday, and last night, Boston University, the defending Beanpot champions, lost to the No. 14 Boston College Eagles, 6-2, in the 2026 Beanpot final game. The fucking Eagles, man! I hate the fucking Eagles!

For the record, it was the 73rd annual Beanpot tournament and the 300th hockey game between BU and BC. Svoboda and Eiserman both scored goals in last night's game, but does it matter? Does anything matter? Life is a formless, empty black void which we can try to fill with alcohol, drugs, and sex, only to find ourselves staring back into the infinite abyss again. 

The unranked Terriers, the No. 1 team in the country earlier this season, fall to 13-14-2 overall. They trail Providence by 13 points in the Hockey East standings at 9-10-0 in conference play, with only five games left to the regular season. If there's a god, he, she, or it is staring back at us in astonishment, trying to figure where and how their creation's gone so horribly wrong. We're staring into the void, the void is staring back at us, and the first person to blink losses their testicles.

This cursed month of February, dead in the lifeless cold of mid-winter, will offer us a Friday the 13th, so there's that. On that inauspicious date, the Terriers will try to regroup, and in an act of near-heroic self will, get up out of bed that morning, at some point lace up their skates, and despite the overwhelming meaninglessness  of human existence, play an ice-hockey game in the frigid state of New Hampshire against the pitiful Wildcats (11-14-1), the last-place team in Hockey East, where they're 5-10-1. 

The Terriers will probably lose the game because it's that kind of year. 

Seahawks 29, Patriots 13

I'm not going to talk about the Halftime Show (loved it) or the ads (meh); I'm not even going to talk that much about the game itself (disappointing). This post is an unapologetic tribute to the 2025 New England Patriots and an appreciation of the progress the team's made. 

The team that went 4-13 in 2024 turned it around and went 14-3 in 2025. If they can improve that much in one year, just imagine what the team could be like by the end of next season. 

Yes, they lost the Super Bowl. Were blown out, even - dominated. But they made it to The Big Game, which is more than 30 other teams can say. Yes, they had an easy schedule this year to get there, arguably the easiest in the NFL, but beating the Chargers, the Texans, and the Broncos in the post-season was no cakewalk and for three quarters last night they played strong against the Seahawks before things finally collapsed on them. Seattle's a damn good team with an amazing defense, and the Patriots couldn't come up with a winning answer to the challenge posed to them. 

So congratulations to the Seahawks for a good season (14-3) and a commanding Super Bowl LX win. Y'all earned it. But as a Patriots fan, it's time to look forward and not back. We need to improve the offensive line, but we still have an effective defense and a world-class QB, even if his best wasn't on display last night. But if the NFL were Wall Street (and it's often not very far removed), I'd be betting on futures of Drake Maye (62.8% last night for 295 yards) over Sam Darnold (50%, 202 yards). 

I've been a fan of the Patriots since the late 1970s, and have survived some pretty awful seasons as well as some incredibly rewarding ones. One loss in a good year does nothing to change my loyalty.

So yes, I'll even repeat my congratulations to the Seahawks for their well-deserved win, but I'll also congratulate the Patriots for a remarkable turnaround and a terrific season, thank them for such a fun and gratifying season this year, and wish them the best for a highly successful 2026. 

See y'all in Superb Owl LXI!

   

Knicks 111, Celtics 89

 

Embarrassing. The Boston Celtics were simply blown out, 111-89, by the New York Knicks by 22 points. What is there even to say? Boston was 7-41 on three-point shots, with Brown, Garza, González, and Harper a combined 0-13 from downtown. 

This isn't exactly an auspicious omen for the Patriots' chances in the Super Bowl tonight. Did this loss set the tone for a disappointing day, or did we just simply get all the bad juju out of our system early before the Big Game begins?   

24 Hours Until the Super Bowl

Twenty-four hours from now, we'll all be watching the Super Bowl, and we'll have watched the first-place Celtics play the second-place Knicks earlier in the day. 

Forty-eight hours from now we'll be watching BU and BC go at it for the Beanpot title.

Exciting times, my friend. Exciting times. 

BU 3, Maine 2 (OT)

 

The unranked (for now) BU Terriers beat No. 18 Maine, 3-2, when Ryder Ritchie hit a goal 1:42 minutes into overtime tonight. 

Maine took an early lead, but BU's Jack Murtagh's tied the game at 1-1 in the second period. Maine scored again late in the period, but Cole Eiserman tied the game again in the third with his 11th goal of the season to force the overtime. Mikhail Yegorov finished the game with 28 saves in the net.

The Terriers are 13-13-2 on the season and 9-10-0 in conference play. Their 26 points ties them with UMass for fourth place in Hockey East. 

The Terriers are off tomorrow in order to prep for Monday night's Beanpot championship game against the No. 11 Boston College Eagles (15-9-1).  

Celtics 98, Heat 96

 

The Celtics debuted new center Nikola Vučević off the bench last night, but gave him over twice as many minutes playing time as starting center Luka Garca. Vučević responded to the generosity with an 11-point, 12-reboiund double double, the most rebounds in a Celtics debut since Kevin Garnett in 2007.

Even more importantly, the Celtics came back from a 22-point deficit to win tonight's game. After rallying back with a 36-15 third quarter, Boston trailed by one point with a minute and a half left in the game. Derrick White then made a 24-foot three-pointer, his fourth of the night on a dozen attempts, assisted by Vučević to give the Celtics a 98-96 lead. The Celtics held on to that razor-thin lead with three steals (Brown, White, and Vučević) a Jaylen Brown defensive rebound, a Baylor Scheierman defensive rebound, and a Derrick White blocked shot.   

Brown scored 29 points, but Pritchard had the hot hand in three-point shooting, going four-for-six on threes and scoring 24 total points. White contributed 21. Overall, the Heat led the game in three-point shooting but the Celtics had more rebounds, 50-42.

The Knicks finally lost a game last night, so the Celtics are all alone in first place in the Atlantic Division at 34-18. Unfortunately, the Knicks lost that game to the Eastern Conference leading Pistons, so the Celtics trail Detroit by 4½ in the Eastern Conference.

Sunday afternoon (12:30 pm), well before the Super Bowl, the Celtics will host the Knicks (33-19) on a nationally-televised game on ABC to settle this whole who's-the-best-in-the-Atlantic business. Watch it, and then watch the Patriots in the Super Bowl.