Hockey East Monthly Recap: September 2025

Well everyone, the first month of the season is behind us in Hockey East, and boy is there a lot to talk about. 

Okay, I’m only half joking there. Sure, only a few teams were in action to close out September, but there really is a lot to talk about following the lone weekend of games that opened the 2025-26 season. 

Man, I'm excited to be back. So let’s jump into it without any further delay. 

Featured Series: Merrimack Defeats Nationally Ranked Clarkson in Opening Weekend Thriller 

Ok, I’ll put my hands up and admit it. 

I did not believe Merrimack had a shot in hell to keep up with Clarkson, let alone beat them to round out opening weekend. 

They found a way to do both this past weekend, as they started their season with a hard fought series against the Clarkson Golden Knights. After dropping their first game of the season 6-3, Merrimack rebounded in a big way, and wound up defeating the Golden Knights 5-3 in Saturday’s matchup between the two teams. 

Friday saw the debut of more than a handful of Merrimack’s fresh faces, including sophomore netminder Adreanna Doucette — who herself transferred from Clarkson this past off season. While the Warriors dropped the contest, Doucette still made 30 saves in her first appearance in North Andover, and overall was fairly solid considering the final score.

On Saturday, coach Erin Hamlen pivoted in a different direction, and put freshman goaltender Lauren Lyons in the cage to face the offensive power of the Golden Knights.

And Lyons delivered, handedly. 

The 5 foot 10 inch freshman stopped 43 of 46 shots she faced en route to her first win in the NCAA, and the first win of the season for Merrimack — over the No. 7 ranked team in the country to boot. 

This wasn’t a game Merrimack should have won, if we’re being completely honest. They went just 19-62 in the faceoff dot, were outshot 46 to 17, and they had to block an additional 29 attempts from Clarkson in order to secure the victory. 

And yet, they still found a way to sneak out the win over one of the top contenders in the entire NCAA. 

Goals from Maggie Kime and McKenzie Cerrato set the tone early for MC, followed by a third goal off the stick of Neely Hawn in the middle of the second period. Two power play tallies from Clarkson brought the score within one, before Stina Sandberg and Jenna Chaplain put Merrimack ahead by three once more with two goals within 1:04 of one another in the third period. 

Clarkson pushed late, and a goal from Rhea Hicks with under three minutes to play made things a bit more dangerous for the Warriors. The home team hung on, however, as Merrimack skated away with the victory. 

Two defenders had big weekends for the Warriors. Hailey Eikos had a solid debut in the blue and gold, finishing with three assists, including one on Saturday’s game winner. Fellow blueliner Kime, one of the few returning faces on the Merrimack team this year, also had a superb weekend. With three points — a goal and two assists — Kime is one point shy of matching her total points in 25 games played last season. With any productivity even in this upcoming month, she should cruise past that without issue. 

Lyons was also superb, and if she can continue to perform the same way for Merrimack then the Warriors could outperform everyone’s expectations. It’s a small sample size, and definitely a lot of pressure for a freshman, so I’m not resting all of my hopes on her. But if this weekend was anything to go by, then MC may have found an answer they’ve been looking for in net for quite some time. 

Up next in October is a variety of contests for the Warriors. They’ll play a two game slate against Union on the 3rd and 4th, before traveling to Missouri to take on Lindenwood the following weekend. A one-off Sunday game against Brown closes out this portion of the non-conference schedule, before games against Boston College (25th) and UNH (31st, Nov. 1st) open up their Hockey East action. 

Milestones: 

Holy Cross starts their season 2-0-0 for the first time in eight years after taking down RPI in back-to-back games over the weekend. Brooke Loranger was the goaltender of record on Saturday, as she led the Crusaders to a 3-0 victory, just the second shutout of her career. 

Ella Malloy, a defender on the same HC squad, scored her first collegiate goal in the aforementioned win. Not only was it the first of her career, the goal ended up as the game winner over the Engineers, and it came in her first NCAA appearance. 

Fellow freshman Mackenzie Podewell also scored her first collegiate goal over opening weekend. The Maine forward found the back of the net in the Black Bears Saturday contest against Quinnipiac, and then got in the way of four shots over the course of the weekend as well. 

Netminder Lauren Lyons’ first career win came over the weekend in the previously mentioned victory against Clarkson on Saturday for Merrimack. Look for her to get more game action as the Warriors progress into October. 

Lyons' teammates Neely Hawn and Stina Sandberg also registered firsts in their NCAA careers, as the two freshmen scored for the first time in a Merrimack uniform in Saturday's win.

ICYMI: Making the Jump to DI

If you looked closely in my Hockey East preview (I wouldn’t blame you if you didn't because that one was pretty long), you may have noticed that Vermont added a forward by the name Darci Matson. The graduate student from Wasilla, Alaska, isn’t a name many DI fans may know — mainly because she played her undergraduate years in Division III with the Aurora University Spartans. 

Across 76 games over three seasons, Matson put up 139 points, was named an All-American her sophomore year, and was even the Laura Hurd Award Winner in 2023, which is given to DIII Women’s Player of the Year. 

Not too shabby. 

While the jump from one level to the next can sometimes be complicated, Matson could very well play a role for the Catamounts this year. In UVM’s exhibition against St. Michael’s, the forward registered a single shot on goal in limited ice time. I’m interested to see how the rest of her season goes, especially if she gets into the lineup and contributes to what UVM is putting together. 

Another name making a switch into DI is a later addition to her team’s roster. Brigitte Aube, a sophomore forward from Avon, Connecticut, was added early this week to Northeastern’s active roster, after playing one year with the university's club team. 

In that one season, Aube had 19 points in 15 games, including 10 goals — tied for the most on the squad in the ACHA. While it’s unclear what exactly her role will be on the Huskies, it’s still an intriguing storyline to keep an eye on, especially considering where she was playing this time last year. 

Looking Forward: The ECAC Matchups are good… like, really good

BU at Colgate – Friday, Oct. 10th at 6 PM EST | Saturday Oct. 11th at 6 PM EST

UConn vs. Princeton – Friday Oct. 17th at 3 PM EST | Saturday Oct. 18th at 1 PM EST

There are a lot of ECAC/Hockey East matchups this year, as there usually are thanks to how close in proximity the two leagues are with another — I mean BU is closer to Harvard than they are to BC for god’s sake. But we can’t get into that too much right now. 

This year, when it comes to non-conference scheduling, there are some incredibly tough matchups for all of the teams in Hockey East, including back-to-back weekends in which BU and UConn take on two of the top programs in the ECAC. 

On the second weekend of October, the Terriers will travel to Northern New York to take on the Raiders, who seem poised to have another incredible year close to the top of the table. Though they’ve lost some key pieces up front, including last year’s leading scorer Kristýna Kaltounková, they’re still a force to be reckoned with. 

Considering this is on the heels of a weekend set against the Minnesota Gophers (who just… absolutely demolished Boston College 7-1 and 11-0 to close out September), the opening few games for BU are challenging to another level. The two games against Colgate will be another showing of how the two conferences are stacking up, and could very well demonstrate the steps the Terriers have taken over the last few seasons. 

That is, if this set against the Gophers doesn’t demolish them the way it did the Eagles. 

The following weekend, we see the reigning regular season champions take on another top-15 team in the Princeton Tigers. With new head coach Courtney Kessel at the helm, Princeton will open their season with the matchups against the Huskies as they travel to Storrs on the 17th and 18th. 

Coming into the season, Princeton finds themselves back in the national rankings, though they are below the Huskies as of the USCHO poll released on Sept. 29th in the 15th spot to UConn’s 12. 

I do think these teams are fairly well matched. Princeton has a bit more of a scoring touch than UConn does. However, the Tigers are now without forward Sarah Paul, a key contributor from last season, who transferred to Minnesota for her senior season. 

And, on the other hand, the Huskies have a more solid foundation in net in the form of Tia Chan. However, they have lost some of their top defenders from a season ago which could make her life, and everyone on UConn's life, more complicated. 

What will be interesting to see is how well the new systems Kessel has put into place match up against the tried-and-true formulas of Chris MacKenzie and his coaching staff. UConn will have the benefit of a few more games under their belt heading into the matchup, but Princeton has the leg up when it comes to rest.

All of this makes me think that these two squads are going to put on a show — one that none of us are going to want to miss. 

Important Upcoming Dates: 

Full Hockey East Schedule for 2025-26

Reigning tournament champions BU open their season vs Minnesota — Friday, Oct. 3rd at 6 PM EST | Saturday Oct. 4th at 4 PM EST

Maine travels to Madison to take on reigning national champions Wisconsin — Friday, Oct. 3rd at 8 PM EST | Saturday Oct. 4th at 3 PM EST 

Holy Cross will become the first Hockey East team to take on the newest team in DI, the Delaware Blue Hens — Saturday, Oct. 4th at 2 PM EST | Sunday, Oct. 5th at 2 PM EST

The first conference game of the season will be a rematch of one of the 2025 quarterfinal matchups as Providence travels to Northeastern — Friday, Oct. 10th, at 1:30 PM EST 

Vermont heads to Schenectady, New York to take part in the annual Ice Breaker tournament the weekend of October 17th and 18th. The Catamounts will first take on the Wisconsin Badgers in the opening round — Friday, the 17th at 12:07 PM EST

They’ll then play either Saint Anselm or Union to close out the weekend on Saturday, Time TBD 

To close out the month we’ll have a tournament championship rematch as BU plays host to Northeastern for the first time since the Terriers’ win in March before heading to Matthews Arena for the second game of the set — Friday, Oct. 31st at 6 PM | Saturday Nov. 2nd at 3 PM EST