The Shootout that Cost Boston’s Famed Beanpot Title

By BRIDGET T. SANDS CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

It was a difference of one shot.

In the highly-anticipated, annual duel of Boston’s best collegiate hockey teams, the No. 9 Harvard Crimson fell to the No. 16 Northeastern Huskies in a shootout.

The heartbreak took place on the second Monday of February, at Boston’s iconic TD Garden, in the final of the 2023 Beanpot Tournament — the 70th edition of the historic competition — and the first time Harvard faced Northeastern in the finals. The Crimson had fought hard to earn their spot in the championship, with first-year forward Marek Hejduk playing hero in the first round with two goals, including the overtime winner that gave Harvard the victory over the Boston College Eagles.

The title match, of which Harvard had not returned to since its last victory in 2017, was a hard-fought battle, one in which both Harvard’s former senior goalkeeper Mitchell Gibson and the Huskies’ Devon Levi played instrumental roles in the game. Both allowed only two goals in regulation and none in overtime, with Gibson recording 27 saves while Levi chalked 32.

Levi was eager to revisit the Crimson, with Harvard having scored eight goals against the top-10 Hobey Baker finalist in a 8-4 New Year’s Day win earlier in the season.

“They put on a clinic against me,” Levi said at the post-game press conference. “I wanted revenge.”

And revenge was just what Levi led the Huskies in serving. After former sophomore forward Matthew Coronato got by him twice in the second period to give the Crimson the lead, Levi stopped all 14 of the Crimson’s shots on goal in the third period. His teammate Gunnarwolfe Fontaine scored his second of the game to tie the score five minutes into the third period, sending the game to overtime.

After an action-packed 3-on-3 overtime — the first of its kind in Beanpot Championship game history —the game was sent to a shootout. With the entirety of TD Garden on its feet and silenced with anticipation, Harvard’s own top-10 Hobey Baker finalist, former junior forward Sean Farrell, skated in on Levi but was stopped by the Canadian, as was Northeastern’s first shooter Jack Hughes by Gibson. In the second round, Levi refused to allow Coronato to get past him a third time, stopping the Crimson’s second attempt.

However, the Huskies’ tallied a mark with captain Aidan McDonough getting a wrister by Gibson. With the game on the line, Harvard’s choice was junior forward Alex Laferriere, who, like his teammates, could not get past Levi. The Beanpot trophy went home with the Huskies for the eighth time in program history, and the Crimson were sent packing with their tails down.

“I think it’s an incredible opportunity to [have] play[ed], in that environment,” Harvard head coach Ted Donato