Sixth-ranked Northeastern had much to celebrate on Tuesday, beginning with a 2-1 win over host Boston College in the final of the Women’s Beanpot.

The Huskies have now won a record 18 Women’s Beanpot titles. 

The victory came with the in-person backing of the DogHouse, the Northeastern band, President Joseph E. Aoun and members of the Northeastern men’s team. They engineered a noisy takeover of Conte Forum, making the Huskies feel as though they were on home ice.

The players of the men’s team were carrying the Beanpot trophy they’d won Monday night at TD Garden. And so the celebrating intermingled as the women clinched a Northeastern sweep of the Beanpots for the second time since 2020.

Overall this is Northeastern’s sixth sweep of the Beanpot trophies, which is another record.

Goals by Mia Brown and tournament MVP Maureen Murphy enabled the Huskies to overcome a slow start and take charge over the first two periods. Gwyneth Philips, honored as top goaltender of the Women’s Beanpot, made 27 saves for Northeastern, including 11 in the closing period as BC (18-13-1) amped up its attack and her Northeastern fans roared their support from the stands behind her.

BC pulled its goalie with more than two minutes to go and the move paid off when Hannah Bilka scored for the Eagles with 1:34 remaining. But a short time later the Huskies were flinging away their helmets and sticks in a celebration reminiscent of TD Garden one night earlier.

The evening rendered a bit of revenge for the Huskies, who were upset last year by BC and its goalie Abigail Levy in a Beanpot semifinal at Matthews Arena. Levy had another strong Beanpot showing with 34 saves against Northeastern, but overall it’s been a different story this season: The Beanpot victory makes Northeastern 4-0 against No. 16 BC by a combined 9-1. 

“It gave us the motivation that we needed,” Murphy said of last year’s defeat.

The Huskies (28-2-1) have now won 16 straight since their last loss on Nov. 15. Once they’re done celebrating this one, they’ll turn to focusing on the Hockey East tournament. As the No. 1 seed, their next aim will be to win that trophy for a record sixth straight year—which will propel them to a third straight NCAA Frozen Four, they hope.

In spite of the success of their program, Beanpot victories have been hard for the Huskies to come by in recent years. Their 2020 championship is the Huskies’ only Women’s Beanpot title dating back to 2013.

“To beat a team like BC four times isn’t easy,” Northeastern coach Dave Flint said. “This is a tough tournament. We’ve had more success in the Hockey East tournament than in the Beanpot.”

The Huskies found themselves on their heels in the opening minutes, despite a surprise pregame locker room appearance by former All-American defenseman Skylar Fontaine, a star of the two Frozen Four teams (and sister to Gunnarwolfe Fontaine, scorer of two Northeastern goals in the men’s final).

“I could tell there were some nerves,” Flint acknowledged, while crediting his star graduate students—Alina Mueller, Chloé Aurard and Murphy—for helping to settle the Huskies.

Only two schools have swept both Beanpots in the same year. Northeastern is the leader in this rare category with a half-dozen sweeps dating back to 1980—the year of their initial men’s Beanpot championship.

The Huskies also earned Beanpot sweeps in 1984, 1985, 1988 and 2020.

Boston College is the other school to sweep both trophies, having done so in 2011, 2014 and 2016.

The Huskies opened the scoring with a power-play goal in the 10th minute. Sophomore wing Skylar Irving skated behind goal before sending a pass into the left circle, where approaching senior defender Megan Carter one-timed a shot that was redirected in front of goal by Mia Brown.

It was Brown’s seventh goal of the season. And it came at the end of a strong power play by the Huskies, who had pelted Levy with several credible efforts before Carter broke through with 9:20 remaining in the opening period.

After going scoreless on a subsequent power play and watching Philips make a couple of spectacular saves, the Huskies doubled their lead on Murphy’s goal in the eighth minute. The sequence began with a Mueller pass to freshman defender Jules Constantinople, who threw in a heavily-screened lefty shot that Murphy redirected for her 18th goal of the season.

Murphy was characteristically humble about winning the MVP.

“I think it could have gone to a couple of other people,” Murphy said. “It’s not that I don’t think I deserve it. But I think other people deserve it more.”

Flint smiled at the humility of a player who last year led the nation with 30 goals.

“You look at those three top players on that line: None of them love the spotlight,” Flint said of Murphy, Mueller and Aurard. “As good as they are, they’d just as soon have somebody else in the spotlight. Especially in this day and age, it’s a really great quality to have, and very selfless, and I think that’s one reason they’re so successful.”

The anchor to this championship was the play of Philips, who repeatedly made Northeastern’s relatively small lead feel safe. Murphy’s goal was preceded by a BC two-on-one early in the second period culminating in a sweet centering pass from Katie Pyne to Abby Newhook, whose point-blank shot was snuffed out by the nation’s leading goalie.

“We don’t win this game without Gwyn and our leadership,” Murphy said. “Gwyn is really the backbone of this team.”

Ian Thomsen is a Northeastern Global News reporter. Email him at i.thomsen@northeastern.edu. Follow him on Twitter @IanatNU.