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Irving, who scored both goals in last year’s dramatic TD Garden triumph, enters her final season with a promising young team.
You could almost hear the gasping of 10,633 fans as the puck found Skylar Irving in the scoring zone.
It was overtime of the first Women’s Beanpot held at TD Garden before a record crowd last January. The pressure on the Northeastern star to fulfill her breakaway was enormous as she juggled the puck backhand to forehand while bearing down on the Boston University goal.
“The only thing that was going through my head when Katy Knoll slipped me that pass was: This puck is going in the net,” recalls Irving, who scored both goals in Northeastern’s 2-1 championship win to earn the tournament’s Most Valuable Player award. “There was no doubt. There was no hesitation. It was like I know this puck is going in the net.”
Months later, as Northeastern prepares for the home opener of a new season, memories of that night continue to feed the Huskies. When they host No. 10 Quinnipiac at 7 p.m. Friday (ESPN+), the No. 13 Huskies will be counting on the leadership of their senior center.
“That’s the biggest stage and a lot of kids wouldn’t handle that pressure well, but Skylar stepped up and buried that shot,” Northeastern coach Dave Flint says of Irving’s Beanpot winner, which rates among the greatest goals in program history. “That just gives you more and more confidence as a player, right?
“If that had happened in her freshman year, I don’t know if she would have put it in.”
Irving agrees. She has worked hard to earn the confidence and faith to turn crucial opportunities into goals.
“When I would get the puck my freshman or sophomore year, I’d just shoot it right into the goalie,” says Irving, who led Northeastern with 35 points last season (including a Hockey East-best 22 assists). “But having more patience now, I can slow the game down. That’s something that I’ve worked a lot on — my style is playing fast, but being able to slow the game down has made my game so much better.”
The Beanpot final showcased Irving’s excitement and ambition in ways that were beyond her control. In addition to scoring both of Northeastern’s goals, she also threw up twice in the closing stages.
“I love playing hockey and I also really love drinking Gatorade,” Irving says. “And maybe I drank a little bit too much, maybe I was excited. It was definitely a mix of everything.”
After netting the opening goal in the final minute of the second period, Irving returned to the bench and found herself in an adrenaline-fed panic.
“You’d think that there would be a trash can on an NHL bench,” Irving says. “I was running up and down the tunnel, couldn’t find one and then just threw up. That was the first time.
“The second time, there was a minute left in regulation and I was just excited. So I threw up again. That was a funny thing that happened and people won’t ever let me live that down, but it’s fine.”
Irving wears No. 88 for a number of reasons.
“When I was little I wore 8,” Irving says. “And then my dad and my brother, their hockey numbers were always 11, and I wore 11 when I was at Tabor Academy.”
So she multiplied those numbers — with an assist from NHL star Patrick Kane, who also wears No. 88.
“My middle name is Kane, and my brother’s middle name is Patrick,” Irving says. “So I love that number. It fits me.” Irving’s leadership is going to be crucial to her young team. Since 2022 Northeastern has graduated two national goalies of the year (Aerin Frankel and Gwyneth Phillips) along with three scorers who combined for more than 600 NCAA points (Alina Mueller, Chloé Aurard and Maureen Murphy). And yet the program is not rebuilding so much as it is reloading with a hungry rotation that split a pair of season-opening games last week at Penn State while following Irving’s example.
“That’s the hardest I’ve seen us play two back-to-back games in a while,” Flint says. “Penn State was big, they were physical, they came at us — and we didn’t back down at all. We went toe to toe and we competed.”
When Penn State scored the first goal midway through the opening period, Irving equalized things 45 seconds later to put Northeastern on track for a 3-1 comeback win Sept. 26. The next night Irving scored her team’s opening goal again.
“You want your best players to be your best players,” Flint says. “And it takes a little pressure off some of the younger kids who are just getting acclimated and trying to figure things out.”
As she embarks upon her final college season, Irving remembers what that was like in her first two years when she was the young player earning time on experienced teams that reached the NCAA Frozen Four. Her inspirational work ethic and ever-present joy for hockey may show her teammates how to thrive in challenging moments.
“I love pressure,” Irving says. “I think pressure is such a privilege and such an honor to have, because that means there are high expectations. It’s about finding a way: We need you to step up to do this, play your game and just own who you are and what you do.
“One of the things that I always say is, in anything that you do, just own it and do it with who you are and what you do best. Ever since I started doing that, good things have happened. If you’re doing it with your fully authentic and true self on the ice, that’s how it should be.”