LOWELL — The UMass Lowell River Hawks punched their ticket Saturday night to the Hockey East championships with a convincing 5-0 win over Boston University to close out the quarterfinal round before a sellout crowd of 5,987 at Tsongas Center.

Faster, grittier, and hungrier than the listless Terriers, Lowell rolled up a 3-0 lead by midway through the second period on goals by Jake Kamrass, Joe Gambardella, and CJ Smith and barreled along to their fourth consecutive championship round (opponent to be determined) at TD Garden next weekend.

“Obviously, we are very excited we could get it done,’’ said Lowell coach Norm Bazin, whose 23-8-5 squad swept the Terriers, 2-0, in the best-of-three series. “They are an excellent hockey club and it’s a great effort by all involved. Obviously, Kevin [Boyle] had the shutout, but I think it was a team shutout — a great effort all around.’’

Boyle, who turned back 33 shots in a 3-2 win on Friday, only needed 24 stops against the tepid Terriers in Game 2. From start to finish, BU lacked both net drive and presence, while the River Hawks constantly won one-on-one battles in their offensive end and repeatedly found easy access to the net, where Terriers starter Sean Maguire yielded to backup Connor LaCouvee with the score at 2-0 early in the second.

LaCouvee gave up the 3-0 goal to Smith midway through the second, and then one more to Smith and the final goal to John Edwardh in the third. The shutout was the 10th of Boyle’s career. It was the first time all season the Terriers were held off the scoreboard.

“They certainly know how to play playoff hockey,’’ said BU coach David Quinn, whose 21-12-5 club will be off this week before learning its matchup for the upcoming NCAA regionals. “And they’re a better team than we are right now. Their goals came way too easy, and we obviously couldn’t get one — that was the story of the night.’’

In the series opener, the Terriers were let down by their penalty-killing units, who allowed the River Hawks two goals in four man-advantages. In Game 2, their malaise was much broader, especially in their own end. Right from the outset, when Kamrass fired in a 40-foot wrister on Maguire at 3:07 of the first, the Terriers looked unfocused and unready to fight for pucks and space.

When Quinn watched Gambardella score another softy at 6:26 of the second, he yanked Maguire in hopes that the switch to LaCouvee would spark his team. No spark, no sense of seizing the moment, the Terriers remained flatter and colder than the Green Line trolley tracks.

“I think we were on our heels from the get-go, after the first goal,’’ noted Quinn, later adding, “I thought they did a great job spinning off us in the defensive zone and when you are 90 percent committed to playing the body and 10 percent committed to fishing for the puck, then people are going to exploit you.’’

Five River Hawks each finished with two points, led by Smith’s pair of strikes. Smith also led the way with five shots on net, followed by Nick Master with four.

Ryan Cloonan was the only Terrier to land four shots on Boyle, and the ugliest part of the Terrier scoresheet was the roster’s collective minus-25 rating. Normally reliable defenseman Charlie McAvoy had the worst of it, logging a minus-4, followed by minus-3s from both captain Matt Grzelcyk and Bobo Carpenter.

“The team in front of me did a great job,’’ said Boyle, the River Hawks headliner in net. “They stopped a ton of shots tonight, made my job pretty easy.’’

Quinn will have the next 10 days to try to recover his team’s psyche. With star freshman Jack Eichel leading the way last season, the Terriers made it to the Frozen Four championship game before bowing out to Providence. No telling who they’ll face in the Regionals, but the first job is to regroup and try to build back the fragile confidence of a young team that took a whippin’ here.

“Sometimes with immaturity, kids get impatient,’’ said Quinn. “They want to try something different, even though if you do it the right way, it works. We’ve got to become a more mature hockey team before our next game.’’

Tough time of the year to catch a growth spurt.

Kevin Paul Dupont can be reached at kevin.dupont@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @GlobeKPD.