Maine 5, BU 4 (OT)

 

Well, that sucks - No. 12 Maine just upset No. 5 BU in overtime up in Orono.

With an injured Cole Eiserman out of the game, BU's Cole Hutson scored first, but Maine tied it up within four seconds. Ryder Ritchie gave BU the lead back on a power play late in the first, but Maine tied it up again midway through the second. 

And so the game went - BU scored, and Maine answered each time. Ben Merrill scored in the second and Sascha Boumedienne scored in the third, but regulation ended with a 4-4 tie. Maine scored early in the sudden-death OT, and that was it for Halloween night in Orono. 

BU drops to 3-4-1 overall and 1-2-0 in Hockey East. The only consolation is this was Maine's first conference win, and they only get two points for an OT win, while BU picks up one point for an OT loss.  

The teams will stay in Maine and play again tomorrow night, same time, same arena.  

Celtics 109, 76ers 108

 

First game of the season: Sixers 117, Celtics 116. Tonight's game: Celtics 109, Sixers 108. If that's doesn't rhyme enough for you, here's some more poetry: the Celtics start the season 0-3, and then go 3-0 the next three games.

It wasn't a pretty win, but the further it recedes in the rearview mirror, the less ugly it seems. A win's a win, even if we did blow a 24-point first-half lead. But I don't think the Celtics ever trailed in the game - if they did, it wasn't for more than a point or two or more than a few seconds. And in the very end, in the last three seconds with the game on the line, the Celtics held on and kept the Sixers from scoring when it mattered the most.

Jaylen Brown had 32 points and was firmly in the leadership role that Tatum used to hold. Simons had 19 poinbts and White and Pritchard both had 15. Defensively, Minott had 8 rebounds, Hauser 6, and González and Harza both had 5. 

The Celtics advance to 3-3 while Philly suffers its first loss of the season. This was also an NBA Cup game, and the Celtics are now 1-0 in the cup's East Group B.    

No rest for the weary: tomorrow, the Celtic host Kevin Durant and the Houston Rockets (2-2). 

Northeastern 3, BU 1

Yikes. The unranked BU Terriers women's hockey team fall to 1-6 overall, 1-1 in Hockey East. Clara Yuhn scored an even strength goal in the first, but that was it for the Terriers. The No. 12 ranked Northeastern Huskies dominated the rest of the game with three unanswered goals. This, mind you, on BU's home ice.

The weekend series moves to Northeastern tomorrow. Chance for the Terriers to avenge the home loss, even the series, and pick up some points in the Hockey East standings, but it will take more that one win to get back into the top 15 poll.  

Bruins 4, Sabres 3 (OT)

 

Two in a row! The mighty, mighty Bruins are back and they're here to stay!

Boston jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the first on goals by Geekie and Pastrnak, their 9th and 7th of the season, respectively. Buffalo came back with a power-play goal in the second, but Mark Kastelic made the score 3-1, Boston, with a goal late in the period. The Sabres tied the game up in the third with an unanswered pair of goals, but Marat Khusnutdinov scored a goal in the OT period to win the game for the Bruins before the Sabres could even get a shot off on goal.

The Bruins improve to 6-7-0 on the season. Their 12 points put them above Florida (!), Toronto, and Buffalo in the Atlantic standings, and tied with Tampa Bay. Detroit and Montreal lead the division with 16 points each, and Ottawa has 13.

Saturday afternoon (1:00), the Bruins host the Carolina Hurricanes (7-3-0). Very savvy of the Bruins to get their game out of the way before the Georgia-Florida football game starts at 3:30.        

Celtics 125, Cleveland 105

 

Woo-hoo! Back-to-back wins (after opening the season with three straight losses) and the Celtics finally have the kind of game we fans have been waiting for all of this short season. 

Mr. Brown drops 30 and Mr. White hits 19. Sam Hauser has a career game with 21 points off the bench including 7 of 13 shooting on threes; he was 4-4 on threes at the end of the first period. Three Celtics had double doubles: Josh Minott (11 points and 15 rebounds), Neemias Queta (10 points and 13 rebounds), and Payton Pritchard (10 points and 10 assists). Anfernee Simons had 14 points and was four-of-six on three-point shooting.

The game was tied at 57 with 3:34 left in the first half until Mr. Brown made a 27-foot three-pointer from the left wing assisted by Queta. That shot seemed to trigger an 18-3 Celtics run with Cleveland's only points coming from free throws, and the first half ended with a 15-point Celtic lead, 75-60.

The Celtics hit the 100-point milestone early in the fourth (11:18) and held on to finish the game up by 20, 125-105  

Cleveland's Donovan Mitchell went four-of four on three in the first quarter, but was held to three points in the second and didn't score at all in the second half.  Defensively, the Celtics finished the evening with 42 rebounds, 11 on offense, to the Cavs' 53 and 18. If we continue to improve on rebounding, this team could reach its true potential.        

I told you so: after Tuesday's first win of the season, I said that it finally had all come together, and there'd be nothing but net, threes dropping like rain, from here on in. Looks like I was correct.

The Celtics are off to Philadelphia next for a Halloween-night game against the 76ers (4-0),  who beat us 117-116 last week in the season opener. Tomorrow's game will be a good barometer by which to judge the C's improvement since the start of the season.   

We're No. 5!

The Boston University Terriers men's hockey team (7-3-3-1) split a home-and-away series with UConn last weekend and fell from No. 4 in the USCHO ranking to No. 5. The Michigan teams (the Spartans, the Wolverines, and the Western Michigan Broncos) are 1, 2, and 3, respectively, and Penn State is the new No. 4. The Terriers are 1-1-0 in Hockey East play and in second place in the conference standings. They have two road games against No. 12 Maine this weekend. 

The No. 15 women's team finally won their first game of the season, a 4-2 victory over New Hampshire, and fell off the rankings. Go figure. They go 0-5 and remain in the top 15. They improve to 1-5-0 and are now unranked (although they did receive five votes in the poll). The women have a home-and-away this weekend with No. 12 Northeastern (4-2-0), and a pair of wins should definitely improve the Terrier's rankings. At 1-0-0 in Hockey East play, the women are in second place.

Both the men and the women  are No. 2 in their conference standings and are both playing Hockey East opponents ranked No. 12 in the national polls. What do you think are the odds of that?

Bruins 5, Islanders 2

 

. . . and then, in the second frame, the Boston mojo returned, and the Bruins were once again the mightiest warriors on ice.  

The bad mojo that's darkened the early season was still very much present in the first, when the Bruins got off only four shots, all saved by the Islanders, and fell behind, 0-2. But then everything changed in the second, when Lindholm, Pastrnak, and Eyssimont all scored, and then Geekie scored a goal, his eighth, in the third on a power play and Minten hit an empty-netter. Korpisalo kept the Islanders scoreless in the last two periods and the Bruins won the game, 5-2, their second win in the last three. 

We're back, baby! Sorry about all those mean things I said yesterday - no hard feelings. The Bruins (5-7-0) are still in last place with 10 points, tied with Buffalo and Tampa Bay, but tiebreakers. However, 10 points is still only one OT loss back from Ottawa and Florida, four points back from Detroit, and six back from Montreal. We got this!

Thursday night, the Buffalo Sabres (4-4-2) visit the Garden. We beat them back on October 11, 3-1, and we'll beat them again tomorrow as we skate our way back up to NHL domination. 

Go, Bruins!    

  

Celtics 122, Pelicans 90

 

After three games, the Celtics get their first win of the season. And what a win! A 32-point blowout of the Pelicans down in New Orleans, capped by a 35-12 fourth quarter!

Anfernee Simons had his Celtics break-out game, leading the team with 25 points and shooting 6-of-13 on threes. Payton Pritchard had 18 points,  Luka Garza had 16, and Josh Minott and Jaylen Brown each had 15. In one of the games most remarkable stats, Minott's plus/minus was +42 with only 28:04 minutes of play, and he finished only one rebound away from a double double.

It finally all came together last night. Nothing but net, threes dropping like rain, from here on in.

The Celts are off to Cleveland next for a game against Donovan Mitchell and the Cavs (3-1).   

Senators 7, Bruins 2

 

Seven losses in the last eight games. At what point do you just admit that the 2025-2026 Boston Bruins (4-7-0) simply suck?  When do you decide that it's time for Coach Marco to move on? 

More importantly, can we find a better team for David Pastrnak? Pasta deserves better than this.

I'm not going to even bother going over the game or the stats.  What does it matter? We were embarrassed and humiliated. Exposed.   

With this loss, the Bruins drop to last place in the Atlantic Division. Their 8 points are tied with Tampa Bay, but the 4-3 loss to the Lightning back on October 13 that started this losing streak is the tiebreaker that puts Boston dead last.   

If you have begrudged, forgive. If you have torn down, repair. If you have injured, heal. If you have judged, pardon. If you have grasped, let go. "You either buy in or not," Coach Marco said after the game. Maybe if you won more games, little Marco, you'd have more buy in.

We're (Still) No. 5!

The University of Georgia Bulldogs (6-1) were idle this week and remain ranked No. 5 in the AP Poll. Overall, it was a pretty uneventful weekend in college football, with the teams that were supposed to win winning their games, although No. 4 Alabama added some suspense by needing a last minute TD to break a tie and beat unranked South Carolina, 29-22.

The top six teams in this week's AP Poll remained the same as last week, from No. 1 Ohio State down through Indiana, A&M, 'Bama, and Georgia to No. 6 Oregon. One-loss Ole Miss (go, Georgia!) beat No. 13 Oklahoma by eight and were moved up from No. 8 to 7, and No. 7 Georgia Tech, although they beat unranked Syracuse by over three TDs and remain undefeated, were dropped from 7 to No. 8. Go figure.

Other than that, the rest of the poll was pretty boring. No. 10 Vanderbilt beat No. 15 Missouri and were moved up to No. 9. Carson Beck managed not to throw any interceptions for Miami last weekend and beat unranked Stanford, but despite the win, the Hurricanes were dropped from 9 down to No.10 because fuck those guys, that's why. .

No. 19 Louisville (6-1), current holders of the lineal championship belt and Georgia's 2021 and 2022 championship rings, beat unranked Boston College and moved up to No. 16. No way the BC Eagles were getting the belt and rings. 

The No. 5 Georgia Bulldogs play the unranked Florida Gators (3-5) this weekend in Jacksonville, the annual rivalry game and "the world's largest outdoor cocktail party." The Gators had the belt and rings at the start of the season and in a better world, would have hung on to them so that Georgia could win them this weekend, but we don't live in that better world, do we? Georgia is favorites by 7½ points.

Pistons 119, Celtics 113

 

The Celtics start the season 0-3 for the first time since 2013. This afternoon, they dropped a road game in Detroit, 118-113, a loss all the more frustrating because they came back from a 15-point, fourth quarter deficit to within three with 3:21 remaining. All the more frustrating because we had a 17-point lead in the first period. The last three games, we played well at some times and played terribly at others. 

Mr. Brown finally woke up and scored 41 points in this game, including 5-of-9 shooting for threes. OTOH, he also threw the ball away again in the closing minute to seal the other team's win. Pritchard got a double double with 21 points and 10 rebounds. I had my personal wish granted when they put Hugo González in as a starter, but he scored zero points in 18:23 minutes of play, one rebound, one steal, and two blocks. 

The key issue seems to be rebounding. The Celtics only got 28 rebounds all game, including a paltry 12 offensive rebounds, as opposed to the Pistons' 54 total and 18 on offense. If we pick up on the rebounds, get some more second shots and prevent the opponent from getting so many second shots, we're back in the W column, IMHO.

The 0-3 Celtics are tied with winless Brooklyn for last place in the Atlantic Division. From Detroit, the Celtics will travel all the south to New Orleans for a game tomorrow night against the winless Pelicans, so at least no matter what happens, one team or the other will finally get a win.

Patriots 32, Browns 10

 

Five in a row! Your 2025 New England Patriots with Drake Maye and coach Mike Vrabel are 6-2! 

Maye passed for 282 yards on 18 for 24 attempts, including three touchdown passes. He rushed for an additional 50 yards. TreVeyon Henderson rushed for 75 and Mack Hollins had 89 receiving yards on 7 catches.

The Pats were limited to a bunch of field goals in the first half and took a 9-7 lead into halftime. It was in the third quarter, though, that they really came alive. Maye connected with Henry Hunter for a 7-yard TD, with Stefon Diggs for a 1-yard TD, and with Kayshon Boutte for a spectacular 39-yarder, all in the one quarter. They capped the game off with a Brown's safety in the fourth.

The Browns fall to 2-5. 

At 6-2. the Pats have sole possession of first place in the AFC East, no tie-breaker needed for the 5-2 Bills. Next week, they host the 3-3 Atlanta Falcons and I'm sure that during the game, at least one commentator will mention "25-3."

With the Celtics and Bruins both off to shaky starts, who would have guessed that the Pats would turn out to be the one dependable New England sports team this year? 

BU 3, UConn 1

 

The No. 4-ranked BU Terriers bounce back from last night's home loss in Boston to beat No. 11 UConn, 3-1, on their home ice in Storrs. Jack Harvey scored twice, once in the first period and once in the third. Owen McLaughlin scored BU's goal in the second. Yegorov was much improved form last night and averaged ,960 in goal with 24 saves.

Cole Eiserman took a hit in the first period and was out for all of the second and third. No word yet on the extent of his injury.

With this series split, the Terriers are 1-1 in Hockey East play, 3-3-1 overall. Their 3 points trail Merrimack's 6 to put them in a three-way tie for second place with UConn and Northeastern. 

This week's rankings will be interesting. No. 2 and 3 Western Michigan and Michigan split their series this week, while No. 4 BU and No. 11 UConn also split a series. No. 5 Penn State beat unranked Stonehill (1-5-0), whoever they are, so the Nittany Lions won't have much swagger in the poll. Personally, if I were voting, I'd keep Nos. 1 through 5 exactly the same as they are now, but what do I know?   

Next weekend's going to be another tough one. The Terriers head up to Orono for a pair of games against No. 10 Maine (2-2-1 overall, 0-0 in conference play).

Bruins 3, Avalanche 2

 

BRUINS WIN! Boston snaps its six-game losing streak and bounces back with a win over the Colorado Avalanche, the team that beat them, 4-1, last week. We're back, baby! Nothing but W's and Bruin goals from here on in!

Viktor Arvidsson got his first goal as a Bruin in the first period, and within a minute Michael Eyssimont got the Bruins' second goal. Geekie scored again, his 6th of the season, in the second.  The Avalanche scored a cheap-ass goal after pulling their goalie in the closing seconds of the game, so the final score makes the game look closer than it was. Swayman averaged .935 in the net with 29 saves.  

Colorado (5-1-3) hasn't won a game since beating the Bruins last weekend. Don't poke the bear, boys!  

Boston (4-6-0) has eight points on the season, which moves them up to fifth place in the Atlantic, four points back from Montreal (6-3-0). Their next game is at Ottawa on Monday (7:30 pm) against the Senators (3-4-1).   

Knicks 105, Celtics 95

 

Q: Can you lose the second quarter of a regulation NBA game, 42-14, and still win the game?

A: No.

Part of me wants to leave it at that, but part of me has some more to say. The Celtics outscored the Knicks three of the four quarters, starting 30-22 in the first quarter. They went 21-18 in the third and 30-23 in the fourth. But the wheels came completely off the cart in that second quarter, where they were outscored by 28 points, and there ain't no coming back from that.

Mr. Brown led the Celtics with 23 points. Mr. White was disappointing most of the game, but rallied late and finished the game with 15 points. Sam Houser had the hot hand with 18 points, including 6-of-10 on three-point shots. 

The breakout star of the game was Spain's Hugo González, playing in his first NBA game and scoring six points, snagging four rebounds, one assist, and two steals. But even beyond his numbers, his hustle was impressive - the dude was everywhere on the court. Watch González turn out to be the break-out star of the season.

The Knicks played well and with confidence - after all, they were the team that knocked the Celts out of the playoffs last season.  Kudos to the Celtics, though, for cutting a 20-plus deficit to finish the game back by ten. We were even at single digits at times in the fourth.

So Boston starts the season 0-2, but all's not lost (yet). First, an 0-2 start can easily be overcome, and second, if we can play like we did for three of the quarters and not that shitshow of a second quarter, we can still be competitive in this league.

Two lessons learned after two games: something's off with Mr. Brown. He's played listlessly and seems adrift, unfocused. He threw the ball away into the front row of seats late in the fourth and basically sealed New York's victory. Something's wrong. Second, play more González! He might be the spark plug Brown and the rest of the team need to get fired up. 

The Celtics travel to Detroit, that crown jewel of any vacation, for a game Sunday afternoon (3:30 pm).  

UConn 8, BU 4

 

Ouch! The No. 11 UConn Huskies upset the No. 4 BU Terriers, 8-4, on the Terriers' home ice. 

BU's Owen McLaughlin scored twice, the first goals of the first and second period. Eiserman also scored in the first and Murtagh in the second. The third period, though, was all UConn, with the Huskies scoring three times, all even strength (no open net goals), to the Terriers' none.  Yegorov was a disappointing .813 in the game with six goals allowed and Max Lacroix allowed another goal on .857 goaltending.

The series goes to Storrs tomorrow for a game on UConn's home ice. Time for the Terriers to return the favor. 

BU 4, New Hampshire 2

 

The Boston University Terriers, the best 0-5 team in any sport, pro or college, men or women, have finally won their first game.

Kaileigh Quigg hit a short-handed goal in the first and Lucy Thiessen a power-play goal in the second. Sydney Healey scored twice in the third - an even strength goal early in the period and a short-handed goal after New Hampshire pulled their goalie in the closing minutes of play. Michelle Pasiechnyk made 27 saves on 29 shots for a .931 percentage.

After losing twice to the No. 3 team in the country to start the season, and then twice again to the No. 8 team, and finally a loss to unranked Brown, the Terriers remained in the college hockey rankings as the No. 15 team. With their first win of the season tonight, the Terriers are about to start their rise back up to the higher ranks of the polls. 

Congrats, Terriers. You've got this!  

Ducks 7, Bruins 5

 

In their race to the bottom, the Boston Bruins now have only one team between them and last place. After nine games this season, the Bruins have only six points for their wins in their first three games. The next six were all consecutive losses. 

But the Tampa Bay Lightning have only four points - two for their sole win, and two for a pair of OT losses. Funny thing, though - that sole win was against the Boston Bruins. One more Tampa Bay win would tie the Bruins in the standings, and their win over Boston would put the Bruins into dead last place in the Atlantic Division.

Geekie scored twice for the Bruins last night, his fourth and fifth goals of the season. Pastrnak got his fifth goal of the season, too.  Mittelstadt and Lohrei scored as well, but what difference does it make? This is a team that loses games twice as often as it wins, and is on a six-game losing streak. 

Marco Strum may not be head coach for long. It's hard to beat the shortest NHL coaching record set by Mike Babcock of the Columbus Blue Jackets, who was hired and then fired within 2½ months in 2023 without coaching a single game. In 2008, Barry Melrose coached just 16 games with the Lightning, so that may be the benchmark by which to measure Strum's career. In any event, I don't thing we'll ever be talking about a "Marco Strum era" any time in the future. 

The Bruins host the Avalanche (5-0-3) on Saturday (5:00 pm). Colorado beat the Bruins, 4-1, last Saturday in Denver but haven't won a game since.   

76ers 117, Celtics 116

 

We lost the first game of the season but I'm not freaking out. The Celtics played well, battling back from a 6-point halftime deficit with a 16-0 third-quarter run. Trouble is, the Sixers played very well, with Tyrese Maxey dropping 40 and going 7-for-8 on threes, and rookie VJ Edgecombe, in an astonishing NBA debut, scoring 34 points and snagging seven rebounds. The Sixers went on a 15-2 run in the last 3:47 of the game, but the Celtics still managed to get off the potential game-tying shot as the clock expired.

Mr. Brown and Mr. White led the Celtics with 25 points each. Neemias Queta made a statement that he deserves to be in the starting lineup by scoring 17, including 7-for-8 field goal shooting and a team-leading eight rebounds. If the Celtics play like this all season, they'll win many more than half their games, but the Sixers and VJ Edgecombe weren't going to be denied this evening, TD Garden or not.

For whatever its worth, the Sixers Joel Embiid scored only four points all game, and was benched for the fourth quarter. 

Friday night, the 0-1 Celtics will travel into the grimy bowels of NYC and play the 1-0 Knicks in Madison Square Garden. Yep, Karl-Anthony Towns, OG Anunoby, Jalen Brunson, and company. Those guys. Time for the C's to make a season statement of our own.

Celtics Preview

Okay, no one's expecting much from the Boston Celtics this year. They might be mediocre, they might outright stink. With Jayson Tatum out for much (most? all?) of the season with a torn Achilles tendon, and with the loss of  Holiday, Porziņģis, Horford, and Kornet, it certainly won't be the same team as the past several seasons. The Celtics front office kept the nucleus of the team that won the 2024 championship team together for as long as they could, but that strategy didn't produce a winner in '25, and now the team is without much in the way of new talent. 

The burden of carrying the team will fall squarely on the shoulders of Jaylen Brown and Derrick White. Payton Pritchard was spectacular off the bench last season and should be another leader as a starter this season. 

Chris Boucher, who joined the team this year from the Raptors, plays hard and may become a fans' favorite in the Marcus Smart/Rajon Rondo mold. Anfernee Simons, who came to Boston from the Trailblazers in the trade for Jrue Holiday, could be an asset on defense.  

As is our way here, we threw the I Ching for consultation on this year's team. Our hexagram, the 31st, is Hsien (Attraction). The lake above, the mountain below.  The joyous lake cradled by the tranquil mountain. The oracle interprets the hexagram to indicate that the superior person takes great satisfaction in encouraging others along their journey. He draws them to him with his welcoming nature and genuine interest. It's an auspicious prophesy of supreme success.

I'm not buying that last part. The 2025-26 Celtics may have their successes this season, but I highly doubt people will look back at this coming season - which starts tonight with a game against Philly - as "supreme success." Let's look a little deeper.

There is no greater natural law in the cosmos than attraction. From the electronic pull of an atom's nucleus to the gravitational forces that holds galaxies together, the whole universe is governed by attraction. On a human scale, attraction is what fuels procreation and perpetuates our species. Yet attraction can also spawn greed and covetousness, threatening us with extinction.  

Attraction will be the underlying force of this year's team. They will succeed or fail on the basis of attraction. What gravitational forces will guide them this season? Around what sphere of influence will they orbit?  The key to success, the I Ching is suggesting, is for the veterans, Mr. Brown and Mr. White, to lead the team not by hogging the ball or stealing all the oxygen on the court, but by encouraging their teammates throughout the season, drawing them in with a welcoming nature and genuine interest. Leadership by attraction, not intimidation. 

The moving line in the hexagram, the first, provides a cryptic warning: "He skillfully hides his excitement, but is betrayed by the twitching of his big toe."

Panthers 4, Bruins 3

 

Fifth straight loss but hold that thought, we'll get back to it in a minute.

The Bruins could have beat their kryptonite team last night, but didn't. The Florida Panthers had a two-goal lead going into the third, but two quick goals by Zacha and Lindholm tied the game up in the first five minutes of the final period. Florida went back up by one midway through the period on a goal assisted by Brad Marchand, the honorary guest of the evening, but then Geekie tied it up again with a goal in the last minute and a half of the game. Ninety seconds until overtime, but Florida went ahead again in the last half-minute with another goal and won the game.   

The Bruins are 3-5-0 - three straight wins followed by five consecutive losses. Their six points put them fifth in the Atlantic, four points back from Detroit and Montreal. They need to start winning these close games if they're going to strive for even mediocrity. On their current trajectory, our best hope would be to not finish in dead last place.

The Bruins host the 3-2-1 Anaheim Ducks on Thursday night. Good luck.

We're No. 4!

 

To no one's surprise, after beating BU twice last weekend, once in regulation and once in OT, Michigan State in the nation's new No. 1 team, knocking the Terriers off of the throne. 

BU (2-2-1) falls to No. 4 in the rankings. To be honest, that's not bad for a two-loss team, a team one tie away from .500. But talk about regional dominance: Michigan State is No. 1, Western Michigan is No. 2, and Michigan is No. 3. You can say that BU is the top-ranked team that's not in the State of Michigan. Other Hockey East teams that made the top twenty are BC (9), Maine (10), UConn (11), UMass (13), and Providence (15).

The BU women's team, although 0-5-0, are ranked No. 15. Wisconsin (8-0-0), who handed the Terriers two of those five losses, is the unanimous No. 1.  

Next up for the BU men is a weekend two-game, home-and-away series with No. 11 UConn. The women have a Friday-night home match against New Hampshire.  

We're No. 5 (Again)!

 

The 6-1 University of Georgia Bulldogs are ranked No. 5 in the week's AP Poll. That's the same ranking they had when they started the season, before they played a single game, and the same rank they held in Weeks 4 and 5, when they were 3-0 (i.e., before they played Alabama). But since that 'Bama loss, which knocked them down to No 12, they kept on winning and slowly rose back up in the rankings, moving to No. 10, then 9, and this week, after beating then-No 5 Ole Miss, 43-35, and now they're back to their original No. 5 slot like nothing ever happened.

Undefeated Ohio State, Indiana, and Texas A&M are Nos. 1, 2, and 3, respectively. Alabama (6-1) is No. 4, right above Georgia. Oregon (6-1) is No. 6,  and unbelievably, Georgia Tech is undefeated and ranked No. 7. This year's Georgia-Georgia Tech game could be interesting.  

Ole Miss, Georgia's victim last weekend, fell from No. 5 to No. 8.

Speaking of unbelievable, Miami lost to unranked Louisville, 24-21, on Saturday and fell from No. 2 to No. 9. Ex-Georgia QB Carson Beck, who fell out of favor with Bulldogs fans last year for a tendency to throw interceptions, got picked off four times in the loss. But an overrated ACC team losing to another ACC team isn't even the story here. Miami, as I'm sure you know, is - or was - the holder of the lineal college football championship, that imaginary title going all the way back to 1869, as well as Georgia's 2021 and 2022 championship rings. 

The belt and the rings are now in Louisville, Kentucky, in the hands (wings?) of the Cardinals. Those prizes have already been on quite the ride this season - Florida had them at the start of this season and then lost them to South Florida. Miami won them from South Florida, and now Louisville won them from Miami. 

I want Georgia to get their rings back, and it would be nice for them to hold the lineal championship belt, too, but the Bulldogs don't play Louisville this year (or hardly ever, for that matter) and Louisville's not going to the playoffs (sorry, Cardinals fans, but it's true). They won't play another ranked team again this season, but will have plenty of opportunities to lose the belt and the rings to unranked Boston College, or Clemson, or their in-state rivals, Kentucky, none of whom are going to the playoffs, either. It might take several seasons for those prizes to work their way back to where the Bulldogs could claim them. Thanks for nothing, Beck!

The other big upset last weekend was No. 10 LSU losing to No. 17 Vanderbilt, 31-24. Vandy moves up to become the new No. 10 (funny how teams claim their victim's ranking) and LSU falls all the way down to No. 20.

Georgia's off this weekend and then plays unranked Florida in the annual party down in Jacksonville. Can you imagine the excitement if Florida had somehow managed to hold onto the belt and rings all season, and the prizes were on the line? 

Mammoth 3, Bruins 2

 

Fourth straight loss. The Bruins won their first three games, then lost their next four, including all three on this road trip. They drop to fifth in the Atlantic and have the Panthers coming up on Tuesday.

David Pastrnak got the only two goals for the Boston, his fourth and fifth of the season. Korpisalo made 24 saves. There's really nothing else to report on here.

Play better, boys.

Patriots 31, Titans 13

 

Twenty-one completions today on 23 attempts. Two touchdowns and no interceptions. 222 total yards. QB rating of 135.9, second in the NFL. In the NFL top 10 in touchdowns, total yards, first downs, completions and percent completions on the season.  Sixty-two yards rushing. Drake Maye is officially an elite QB, and suddenly it's fun to watch Patriots games again.

Today, the New England Patriots (5-2, first in the AFC East) beat Cam Ward and the Tennessee Titans (1-6, last in the AFC South) by a score of 31-13. Is there a term for when one team's score is the reverse of the other team's score?  Is it a palindrome (the score's the same when read backward as forward)? The Patriots beat the Titans by the palindrome score of 31-13.

The game started fairly evenly and late in the second quarter, the Titans kicked a FG to take a brief, 13-10 lead. They never scored again. The Pats came back in the last minute of the half and scored a TD on a 39-yard Maye pass down the middle to Kayshon Boutte to lead 17-13 at the half. New England scored twice in the third, once on a  four-yard Rhamondre Stevenson run and once on a returned Cam Ward fumble. That's all that was needed to complete three straight wins on the road.

The Patriots finally get to return to their New England home. Next week, they host the Cleveland Browns (2-5, third in the AFC North) in Foxborough. 

We're going to the playoffs, baby!

Avalanche 4, Bruins 1

 

Third consecutive loss - sure, tough schedule, I get it (Colorado's 5-0-1 for a reason), but is it time to start worrying about this year's team? 

The Bruins' John Beecher got the first goal of the game some three minutes into play, but that was it for Boston on the night. They were shut out for the next 57 minutes. Swayman, for his part, made 34 saves on 37 shots for a .919 average.

We lost to Tampa Bay on home ice, and then to Vegas and Colorado on the road. Tonight, we have Utah (3-2-0) and then back home to face our kryptonite, the Florida Panthers (3-4-0). To top it all off, we have to face the Avalanche again next Saturday.   

The Bruins are 3-3-0 and in fourth place in the Atlantic with six points, trailing first-place Detroit by two points. But a win over Utah tonight and a Red Wings loss to Edmonton this afternoon would put us right back into the thick of things.  

It's been a brutal weekend on the ice. Two Bruins' losses, two losses by the BU men's team, and one loss by the BU women. 0-5 on the weekend. If it wasn't for Georgia Bulldogs' football, I'd be totally despondent. 

Michigan State 4, BU 3 (OT)

 

Well, THAT'S some bullshit right there!

BU was robbed - robbed I tell you - of an OT goal with 1:15 left in OT. Cole Eiserman took a shot at the Michigan State goal that appeared to go in before it got stopped by Spartan goalie Trey Augustine. But the officials called it a save, and MSU immediately took the puck down the ice and scored a goal at 1:10. There was an official review of the Terrier's previous shot to see if it was actually a goal or not. I couldn't see - the game was on ESPNU and I only get ESPN and ESPN2 - but the radio guys said it was close but to them it looked like a goal. Granted, they're biased, but after watching several replays they said the puck crossed the line "by an eighth on an inch." The officials, though, said "nope," it didn't, and gave the winning score to Michigan State. 

It's all the more frustrating because of how it got to that point. MSU took a 2-0 lead into the third period, but BU's Gavin McCarthy finally ended the drought by scoring early in the third. Michigan State came right back and scored again within a minute to take a 3-1 lead. BU's Kamil Bednarik scored a short-handed goal midway through the third, and then Terrier Conrad Fondrk added another a few minutes later to tie the score up.  Mikhail Yegorov made 30 saves in the course of the game, and it went into OT with the teams tied at 3.

And then that bullshit up above happened.

BU doesn't get a point in the Hockey East standings for the OT loss because it wasn't a conference game, but by NCAA rules they get 40% of the win for taking it to overtime. BU won't be No. 1 next week, but with the solid effort tonight (and last night, too, to be sure) against an elite opponent, they shouldn't fall too far. 

We'll know Monday.  

Georgia 43, Ole Miss 35

 

That was one exciting game!

Uncharacteristically, the No. 9 Georgia Bulldogs scored first in this game, although due to offensive pass interference, had to settle for a field goal even though they had advanced the ball all the way to the Rebels' 24-yard line. After that, it was time to buckle up and tighten your seat belt, because both teams swapped TDs on the next five possessions, with Georgia scoring two and No. 5 Ole Miss, three. After another Georgia FG as the clock expired, the Rebels led, 21-20, at the half.

Everyone knows Georgia's pattern by now and expected Coach Smart to make his halftime adjustments and the Dawgs to come out in the second half with guns blazing. But Ole Miss knocked the wind out of our sails by starting the half by scoring a TD in two plays, including a 75-yard pass. The Dawgs scored a TD on their next possession, an 11-play drive, but failed to make the two-point conversion and had to settle for six points. Ole Miss scored another TD on their next drive and took a 35-26 lead. Things weren't looking good for the Bulldogs.

That's when fortune turned around for Georgia. On their next possession, a 13-play drive, Georgia gambled on a 4th-and-one and got the first down and then the subsequent TD. Then, in the fourth quarter and for the first time in the entire game, Georgia prevented Ole Miss from scoring on a drive and forced the first punt of the game. Georgia scored a TD again, forced another Ole Miss punt, only the second by either team in the whole game, and got a field goal. Georgia then held the Rebels to 22 yards on their final possession and forced a turnover on downs. The Bulldogs ran out the clock and the game ended, 43-35, Georgia.

During the regular season last year, the Dawgs lost two games, one to Alabama and one to Ole Miss. This year, we had already lost to Alabama again and for a while there, it looked like we were going to lose to Ole Miss again, too. But history did not repeat itself, and Georgia is now 6-1 and Ole Miss took their first loss of the season and are 6-1 as well.      

Georgia is 4-1 in the SEC, second to A&M and Alabama (3-0). Ole Miss is 3-1. 

Mercifully, Georgia has a bye week next weekend, and then the annual rivalry game against unranked Florida (3-4).

What a game! What a thrilling Bulldog win!

Michigan State 4, BU 2

 

Well, being No. 1 was fun while it lasted. 

Tonight, the No. 1-ranked Boston University Terriers were soundly beaten by the No. 3 Michigan State Spartans. The Spartans scored first and then barely 90 seconds later, scored a second, short-handed goal while BU was on a power play. BU's Sascha Boumedienne scored on a power play to pull the Terriers to within one goal, 2-1, but MSU scored a third goal and the first period ended 3-1.

No one scored in the second, and while it seemed like the momentum might be shirting to BU, the Spartans scored a fourth goal to make it 4-1. We finally scored again in the closing minute (thank you Ryder Ritchie) on a power play and with an open net to get a 6-4 advantage but that was it. Goalkeeper Mikhail Yegorov made 30 saves for an .882 average.

Michigan State's good, I'll admit it, and their goalie, Trey Augustine, is fantastic, going .900 with 18 saves. It's hard to imagine how New Hampshire beat them last weekend (they split the series) The two teams play again tomorrow, and the Terriers will have to dig deep and play ferociously to salvage a split of our own in this series.

Tough 24 hours on ice: the Bruins lost last night, the Terriers' women's team lost earlier this evening, and the men's team lost this game on national tv (I watched it on ESPN). Time to tun this frozen mojo around.  

.  

Brown 2, BU 1

 

The BU women's hockey team must be the best 0-5 team in all of sports. They opened their season with two losses against Wisconsin, the No. 3 team in the country, and them lost two more games to Colgate, the No. 8 team, by a combined three points.

Tonight, the No. 13 Terriers finally caught a break in the schedule and hosted unranked Brown, but lost by one. Luisa Welcke scored the sole BU goal, and goalie Mari Pietersen made 16 saves. But the frustration continues as the Terriers keep coming close, but seem to always have one or two fewer goals by the end of the third than their opponent.

You know who I feel sorry for? New Hampshire. They're up against BU next Friday, and the Terriers are going to be hungry for a much deserved win. 

Golden Knights 6, Bruins 5

 

What the hell happened in the NHL? The Bruins (3-2-0), tied with Florida for first place in the Atlantic, are off for three days, then suffer a loss to Vegas, their second consecutive drop, and are suddenly in fourth place behind Montreal, Detroit, and Toronto, and one ahead of Florida.

Tanner Jeannot and Nikita Zadorov scored in the first period, which ended in a 2-2 tie, and Pastrnak got a power-play goal in the second, the only score in that period, which ended with a 5-3 Vegas lead. In the third period, Mark Kastelic and Michael Eyssimont scored within 1:07 of each other in a furious Boston comeback, but it wasn't enough and the Bruins lost, 6-5.  

Jeremy Swayman was in the net last night and made 31 saves (.838). 

The Bruins' mountain-west road trip will continue with a Friday night (9:00) game against Colorado (4-0-1), the first-place team in the Central Division and the one with the most points (9) in the NHL. They'll play Utah on Sunday before returning home to host Florida in the Garden on Tuesday (ESPN).   

We're No. 1!

 

The latest U.S. College Hockey Organization poll came out yesterday, and the 2-0-1 Boston University men's hockey team is ranked No. 1 in the nation! The Terriers move up from last week's No. 3 ranking.

The Terriers got 27 first-place votes. Also receiving votes were Michigan (8), Western Michigan (6), Michigan State (5), Maine (3), and Penn State (1).   

Previous No. 1 Western Michigan lost to Ferris State last week and fell to the No. 2 spot. Last week's No. 2, and the Terriers' opponent this weekend, Michigan State lost to New Hampshire last week and are now No. 3. 

The BU women's team are 0-4 due to a brutal schedule that had them starting their season against No. 1 Wisconsin and No. 8 Colgate.  However, they played those games tough, and the poll actually moved them up from No. 14 to No. 13 despite the losses.

Lightning 4, Bruins 3

 

What? I'm used to losing to the Florida Panthers, but now we're losing to any random Florida Man team?

The Tampa Bay Lightning hand the Bruins their first loss of the season, 4-1. To add insult to injury, it was the Lightning's first win of the season. They're now 1-2-0. 

Tampa Bay's Anthony Cirelli's two goals gave the Lightning a 2-0 lead in the first period. Casey Mittelstadt, Morgan Geekie, and defenseman Jordan Harris scored goals for the Bruins in the second period, but Tampa scored two more goals of their own that period. Both sides were shut out in the third and the game ended in a 4-3 Bruins' loss. Joonas Korpisalo made 19 saves in the net.

The Panthers lost as well yesterday, 5-2, to the Philadelphia Flyers, so Boston and Florida are both tied for first in the Atlantic at 3-1-0 and 6 points.

The Bruins are off until Thursday night when they travel to Las Vegas to play the Golden Knights (1-0-2).

We're No. 9!

 

Clap your hands if you're glad to see Georgia move up in the polls!

With their 20-10 win over unranked Auburn on Saturday, the Georgia Bulldogs move up in the latest poll from No. 10 to No. 9. Thank you, No. 6 Chokelahoma for losing to unranked Texas, 23-6, and falling out of the top ten to No. 14 and making room for Georgia to move up. Also, fuck you, Chokelahoma, because their win over you allowed Texas to weasel their way back back into the Top 25, coming in at No. 21. 

Ohio State (6-0) is still No. 1, and No. 2 Miami (5-0), current holder of the lineal championship belt and Georgia's two championship rings, was idle on another bye week. Really, Miami? You needed bye weeks both before and after your game against Florida State?  Everything okay down there? 

The big winner of the week was No. 7 Indiana (6-0), who knocked off No. 3 Oregon, 30-20, and moved up into the Duck's No. 3 spot. Oregon fell to No. 8, one place above Georgia. For the record, LSU is now No. 10, one place below Georgia.

No. 4 Ole Miss and No. 5 Texas A&M both won their games, but switched rankings in this week's poll for some reason. Alabama and Texas Tech were the biggest beneficiaries of Chokelahoma and Oregon's  losses and moved up two spots to Nos. 6 and 7, respectively.

All of this sets the stage for this weekend's big SEC showdown in Athens. Now No. 5, Ole Miss (6-0 overall, 3-0 in the SEC) will play the ninth-ranked Bulldogs (5-1, 3-1) in a game with obvious implications for both the conference and national title races. 

As painful as it is to remember, Georgia lost, 28-10, to Ole Miss in Oxford last year, one of two regular-season losses for the Bulldogs that year. Alabama, last year's other regular-season loss, already beat the Bulldogs this season, so if we want to avoid repeating last season, we need to beat Ole Miss. Last year, we were largely undone by Rebels QB Jaxson Dart's 199 yards passing and 50 yards rushing. Jaxson is with the NY Giants now, but Trinidad Chambliss, Ole Miss' current QB, has 1,286 yards rushing and a 65.4 completion percentage, comparable to Gunner Stockton's 1,264 and 68.0%. 

One thing's for certain: if we're going to beat Ole Miss this year, we're going to have to play better that we did at Auburn last weekend, especially in the first half.           

Patriots 25, Saints 19

 

Former Gamecock QB Spencer Rattler threw a pretty good game - 20 of 26 for 227 yards. But you know what? New England's Drake Maye threw an even better game - 18 of 26 for 261 yards and three touchdowns. With 1,261 yards on the season, Maye is now fifth overall in the NFL in total yards. With 113 completions on 153 attempts, his 73.9 percentage is second best in the league.

In the first half, Drake threw two TD passes to Kayshon Boutte and one to DeMario Douglas, while all New Orleans could do was kick some field goals and get a rushing TD. The second half was basically a defensive struggle - not between the two teams but between the teams and the awful officiating. All either team could manage in the second half against the zebra crew was one FG each.  

The Patriots win their third straight game and improve to 4-2 overall. The Bills don't play until a Monday Night Football game tomorrow, so New England is officially a half game back from first place until Buffalo deals with the Atlanta Falcons. The Bills are four-point favorites, but a Falcons win would put the Pats into a tie for first place in the AFC East.   

Next week, the Patriots pay a visit to the Tennessee Titans (1-4, at least until the end of their game with the Raiders). For the whole rest of the season, New England only has two games on its schedule against teams currently above .500. The NFL may have given us an easy route to the playoffs, but you know what?, I'll take it!  

BU 2, Colgate 2

 

You win some, you lose some, and then there's Colgate. More than just an effective decay-preventing dentifrice, they're also a university somewhere in upstate New York and an unranked college hockey team.

In game two of their weekend series in Boston, Colgate traded goals with the BU Terriers throughout the game. Colgate scored first, and then BU's Cole Eiserman tied it up in the second period. Colgate scored again, and then BU freshman Jack Murtagh scored his first collegiate goal to tie it back up a second time and that's how the regulation time ended.

No one scored in the two OT periods, so the game officially ended in a tie. However, Eiserman and Jack Harvey scored goals for BU in the ensuing shoot-out and goaltender Mikhail Yegorov stopped both of Colgate's shots, so BU gets the extra point in the conference standings. Overall, Yegorov provided a conscientiously applied program of 23 saves on 24 shots (.958), including key saves in the overtime period. 

The No. 3-ranked Terriers are now 2-0-1 on the season, and things will get tougher next weekend when the No. 2 Michigan State Spartans come to Boston's Agganis Arena in probably the biggest NCAA hockey game so far this season. 

  

Colgate 4, BU 3

 

Remember Emma Pais, the toothpaste queen who scored twice against BU on Friday night? Well, she scored twice again in the second period on Saturday night to give No. 8 Colgate a 2-0 lead over over No. 14 BU in game two of the Terriers' weekend road series. 

The Terriers responded and tied the game back up on goals by Kaileigh Quigg and Clara Yuhn in the third. Colgate pulled back ahead with a goal midway through the final period, but BU's Sydney Healey wasn't having any of that shit and tied the game back up within the next minute.  However, Colgate wasn't having any of that shit either, and retook the lead a minute after Healey's score. Three goals within a little over two minutes. Exciting stuff and an indicator of the intensity of this game, but that was it for the scoring and BU lost, 4-3.

Michelle Pasiechnyk was in the net for BU last night and saved 38 of 42 shots (.905) in her second start of the season.

So the Terriers, with their brutal schedule that has them playing two sets of games against the No. 3- and No. 8-ranked teams in the country, start their season 0-4-0. However, it should be noted that the two games agaisnt Colgate were particularly close  - both losses were by a single score - and with just a little luck, the Terriers might have, could have, won either, or both.

Next Friday, things will get a little easier as the Terriers play a non-conference game at home against unranked Brown University ("What color is horse shit? Brown, brown, brown!") before starting their Hockey East conference schedule.  

Bruins 3, Sabres 1

 

The Bruins are undefeated! The Bruins are 3-0! The Bruins beat the Buffalo Sabres tonight, 3-1, in the Garden for their third straight win in four nights.

Pavel Zacha scored the first goal late in the first period and Mark Kastelic scored in the second.  Sean Kuraly, a native of Niagara Falls (the American side) who the Bruins acquired from the Columbus Blue Jackets, scored his first goal as a Bruin on an open-net play in the third. Goalie Jeremy Swayman went 21-on-22 (,955). 

The Panthers also won tonight because of course they did, and Florida and Boston remain tied for first in the Atlantic Division at 3-0-0 because the fucking Panthers can't even let us enjoy this one little moment of early-season glory without sticking their stinking feline butts all up into our business. 

Next game is on Monday, an afternoon (1:00 pm) game for some reason, against the Tampa Bay Lightning (0-2-0).   

Georgia 20, Auburn 10

Look, I don't care for Auburn so before I can even talk about tonight's game, I have to get something off my chest. Auburn head coach Hugh Freeze says he is a born-again Christian and has been outspoken about his faith throughout his entire coaching career. If you think what that actually means is that he's a cheating, lying, philandering hypocrite, well, then you'd be exactly right. 

After Mr. Freeze coached at Ole Miss (2012-2016), the NCAA punished the football team for his many  recruiting and academic violations, finding that Mr. Freeze failed to monitor the program, allowing his staff to knowingly commit a series of recruiting violations, submit false information on recruiting paperwork, and not report known violations. The punishments included a two-year postseason ban, three years of probation, and a four-year ban on some scholarships. Ole Miss was forced to vacate 33 wins from 2010 to 2016, including 27 of Mr. Freeze's wins.

That's the cheating part. During the investigation, it was also discovered that Mr. Freeze had made multiple cell phone calls to an escort service. That's the philandering part. Mr. Freeze claimed the number had been misdialed, but Ole Miss discovered a "concerning pattern" of similar calls dating back to when he first arrived at Oxford. At least a dozen calls were made over 33 months, often while Mr. Freeze was traveling on business trips using an Ole Miss private plane. 

Mr. Freeze was forced to resign, but Jerry Falwell, Jr. and Liberty University looked at his pattern of recruiting violations and hiring of escorts and said, "that's our kind of guy" and made him their new head coach. While at Liberty (2019-2022), Mr. Freeze sent multiple unsolicited DMs to a former student who was a sexual assault survivor and had sued Liberty over the handling of her case. She was also critical of Liberty's decision to hire athletic director Ian McCaw, who had resigned from his previous job at Baylor University after the university sanctioned him for failing to identify and respond to a pattern of sexual violence by student-athletes. In his DMs to the former student, Mr. Freeze defended McCaw, calling him "the most Jesus-like leader I have ever seen or been around." Mr. Freeze later told ESPN that he was "sorry" for sending the messages.

Now Mr. Freeze is at Auburn (2023-present). So fuck those Tigers or War Eagles or whatever they're calling themselves.

Okay, on to tonight's game. It was ugly. The Georgia Bulldogs sucked at the game of football in the first half and fell behind Auburn, 10-0. I seriously considered turning the game off and doing something, anything, else other than watching my Bulldogs embarrass themselves on prime-time national television. 

The big play that turned the game, though, the game that will be all over the norts spews for the next several days, was a goal-line fumble by Auburn. It was initially called a fumble on the field, but video replay was, at the very least, equivocal. To my eye, and my eye is extremely biased in Georgia's favor I'll be the first to admit, it looked like a TD with the ball just barely crossing the line a nanosecond before it got fumbled. A matter of millimeters and microseconds. But after a long-ass review by the officials, it call on the field stood, it was ruled a fumble, and Georgia got the ball, and Auburn never recovered. 

Trailing 10-0, Georgia got the ball down the field on a series of Auburn miscues, mistakes, and penalties, including a roughing the passer and a deliberate targeting. The Bulldogs kicked a field goal as the first half ended to move to 10-3.  Then the Georgia defense, which played like ass in the first half, shut out the Auburn Tigers in the second half, and finally, leading 13-10 in the fourth quarter, Georgia QB Gunner Stockton led an epic, 8:45, 16-play, 78-yard drive down the field to take the final 20-10 lead.    

As I said, it was ugly, but a win's still a win, and an ugly win isn't as ugly as an ugly loss. What matters is that Georgia improves to 5-1 on the season and returns to Athens to host the 6-0 Ole Miss Rebels (Mr. Freeze's old team) next weekend. If Georgia plays next Saturday like they did in the first half tonight, we'll get blown out of the game. If Georgia plays like we did in the third quarter, we'll still lose. If we play like we did on that final, fourth-quarter drive, we might, maybe, have a chance.

BU 6, Colgate 2

While the BU Terrier's women's hockey team was in the town of Hamilton, New York playing the Raiders of Madison County, BU's No. 3-ranked men's hockey team was hosting the unranked men's team of Colgate University (formerly known as Madison College, Hamilton College, Hamilton Theological and Literary Institution, and the Baptist Education Society of the State of New York) for a pair of games. BU won the first match, 6-2.

Cole Hutson scored the first goal of the game in the closing minute of the first period, and then the Terriers erupted for three goals in the second, when Mick Frechette and freshman Ryder Ritchie scored their first collegiate goals, and Cole Eiserman scored on a power play. Eiserman scored again in the third and freshman Jonathan Morello capped the game off with an unassisted goal at 16:33.

Goalkeeper Mikhail Yegorov made 24 saves on 26 shots (.923). 

The 2-0-0 Terriers play Colgate again at 6:00 pm today.