March 3, 2012

The 2012 Hockey East playoffs will begin Thursday night at UMass Lowell

Wakefield, Mass. -- The Hockey East Association announced the pairings for the upcoming 28th annual Hockey East Tournament on Saturday night, which begins next weekend with the best-of-three quarterfinal round on campus sites of the top four seeds.

All series will start on Friday, March 9 with the exception of UMass-Lowell/Providence matchup, which will start its series on Thursday night due to a scheduling conflict at the Tsongas Center on Saturday. All games are 7pm, except for Friday's NBC Sports Network coverage at 7:30, Saturday's NESN game at 4pm and a potential Game 3 at UMass-Lowell on Sunday, which would begin at 4pm.

Hockey East Regular-Season Champion and top seed Boston College will entertain No. 8 seed Massachusetts beginning on Friday night at Conte Forum in Chestnut Hill. The Eagles clinched their 11th regular season title in school history on Saturday against Vermont at Conte Forum. BC has won four of the last five tournament championships. The Eagles own a 6-1-0 record in the Hockey East tournament vs. Massachusetts. All six of BC's win vs. the Minutemen have come in quarterfinal playoff, which includes series wins for the Eagles in each of the last two quarterfinals in 2010 and 2011. UMass won the season series this year, 2-1-0.

No. 2 seed UMass-Lowell will play host to No. 7 seed Providence College at the Tsongas Center. The River Hawks won the season series with the Friars. 2-1-0. UML is 4-1-1 all-time vs. PC in league tournament play and this marks the fourth meeting in the quarterfinals between the two schools with the last meeting coming in 1997, a two-game series sweep for UML.

No. 3 seed Boston University will faceoff with No. 6 seed New Hampshire at Agganis Arena. The Terriers swept the season series with UNH this year. The Terriers are 4-2-1 all-time vs. the Wildcats in the Hockey East playoffs. BU and UNH have only met once previously in the quarterfinals back in 1986, a series in which the Terriers were victorious.

No. 4 seeded Maine will host No. 5 seed Merrimack at Alfond Arena, in a rematch of last year's quarterfinal series at Merrimack, a series which the Warriors swept. The Warriors won in the season series with the Black Bears, 2-0- 1.

All quarterfinal games will by streamed live by Pack Network on www.hockeyeastonline.tv for $8.95 per game, with the exception of the NBC Sports Network game on Friday and the NESN game on Saturday afternoon, which will announced on Sunday night. Watch 10 of a possible 12 games by purchasing the tournament pass for $39.95 and watch all four games simultaneously in the same web browser.