With less than 15 minutes left against No. 3 U. Denver Saturday night, Kieran Millan was closing in on history.

Thanks to a healthy 4-0 Boston U. men’s hockey team lead and Millan’s perfect 24 saves through two periods, the senior goaltender looked like he was on his way to winning his 63rd game as a Terrier, a new school record.

But 11 minutes and three Denver goals – of the wraparound (6:01), bouncer (13:09) and rebound (17:39) variety – later, the record-breaking win was suddenly in jeopardy.

“At that point [the Pioneers] were bringing it pretty hard,” Millan said. “I know I let in kind of a soft second goal, so the onus was on me to help us pull through.”

Lucky for the Terriers (2-1, 1-1 Hockey East), the defense buckled down for the last 2:21 to top the Pioneers (1-1), 4-3, and get Millan the win to pass former BU goalie Sean Fields, who collected 62 wins from 2000-2004.

“It’s definitely an honor,” Millan said of breaking the record. “I know a lot of great goalies have come through here.”

BU’s ability to hold on might have been inadvertently assisted by a Denver timeout at 19:37.8, giving BU a chance to regroup. Immediately after the following faceoff in BU’s defensive zone, Denver forward Beau Bennett was charged with a holding penalty, bringing the next faceoff to the other side of the ice and effectively ending the game.

Both coaches reacted exactly how one would expect given how it affected their respective teams. While BU coach Jack Parker said it was “absolutely the right call,” Denver coach George Gwozdecky had to check himself before speaking in generalities.

“Can I get fined for making comments on referees outside-of-conference?” Gwozdecky asked. “When you look over the 60 minutes, there were many things, many mistakes that everybody involved in the game made. You focus on [the holding call] for about a minute, you whine and complain a little bit, but the bottom line was we could have made some plays earlier.

“It was an interesting finish, that’s for sure.”

But the third-period dramatics would have been all for naught had BU not controlled the game for most of the first two periods.

The Terriers got off to a quick 1-0 lead thanks to a goal by junior assistant captain Alex Chiasson. Freshman forward Cason Hohmann fed the puck to his fellow forward, who promptly scooted around Denver captain Dustin Jackson and rocketed the puck over Pioneer goaltender Adam Murray’s left shoulder at 10:54 in the first.

“Our defenseman completely misread it, thought the backside was covered, it wasn’t, they made a great play to spring [Chiasson] loose on the back side and he made a great shot to beat Adam,” Gwozdecky said.

The score stayed that way until shortly into the second, despite Denver gaining some momentum in the second half of the first stanza. Denver won the period-opening faceoff, but Millan cleared the puck all the way across the ice, leading to Murray misplaying it behind his own net. Senior forward Corey Trivino capitalized, grabbing the puck for the wrap-around, short-handed goal at 0:19 before Murray got back in the net.

It was the third goal in as many games for the player that Parker called the best “up and down the lineup.”

Just 42 seconds later, a pair of sophomore forwards got in on the action. Charlie Coyle sent the puck to Matt Nieto for a backhanded goal, again with BU playing four-on-five, to make it 3-0.

But the super sophomores weren’t done there. Forward Sahir Gill and defenseman Adam Clendening chipped in on senior forward Wade Megan’s backhander at 2:58 to make it 4-0, ending the three-minute flurry of BU offense.

BU seemed to slow down in the second half of both periods, giving Denver multiple opportunities to get on the board. Millan was in top form though, and stopped all 24 Denver shots, including seven grade-A chances, in the first two periods.

Then, the Terriers took their lead for granted.

“We got stupid,” Parker said. “We got real stupid and selfish to try to get an empty net goal instead of making sure they didn’t score.”

That set up the late-game excitement and eventual history-making win for Millan.

“I know 63 is a great number,” Millan said, “but I think this year we can make it a lot higher. I’m not going to predict anything but hopefully quite a few more.”