“I know people think we are short-handed,” UMass head coach Greg Carvel noted during his Wednesday pre-Frozen Four press conference in Pittsburgh. “We’ve lost a couple good players for this game, but that’s all right. We like our depth.”
He’s not wrong. But UMass is short-handed heading into this game. The Hockey East champions will not have leading scorer Carson Gicewicz (17 goals) or top goaltender Filip Lindberg for the semifinals, and possibly beyond if UMass advances.
Does it mean the Minutemen can’t dethrone the two-time defending champion UMD Bulldogs Thursday night (8pm on KDAL)? Absolutely not.
“They’re here for a reason,” UMD head coach Scott Sandelin said of his team’s semifinal adversary. His message won’t change. The Bulldogs’ mission doesn’t change.
“We’ve got to be prepared,” Sandelin said this week. “Looking at this game, certainly from a couple years ago, it’s a matchup they’re probably looking forward to. Greg’s done a great job with their program, they’ll be ready to go.”
But neither does UMass’. This has been the goal since UMD closed out a 3-0 win over the Minutemen for the 2019 title. Yeah, the pandemic altered a lot of things, but it didn’t make UMass any less determined to get back to the Frozen Four.
“In Hockey East, everyone is ‘UMass, you’ve done well, but you’ve never won a league championship,’ so we went and did that,” Carvel said last week. “We had a chip on our shoulder for that.
‘You guys are only Cale Makar’ two years ago. We bring in kids with a chip on their shoulder.”
Makar, who won the Hobey Baker Award in 2019, is now terrorizing NHL teams. But the Minutemen are still quite formidable.
“Their back end and their goaltending are the strength of the team,” Sandelin said. “I think their back end this year is better than it was when they had Makar. They have some dangerous guys (on defense), some guys that can contribute offensively. They’re very mobile, involved in the offense a lot. They don’t play much different than they did two years ago, but I think they’re older, they’re more mature. They’ve had a lot of success in the last couple years, so I think it’s maybe a better team, from the experience side and maybe the maturity side as well.”
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With Makar in 2018-19, UMass went 31-10 and scored 3.68 goals per game, conceding 2.02. Without Makar this season, UMass is 18-5-4 and has a slightly better same scoring margin, scoring 3.52 goals per game while giving up just 1.70.
Yes, Lindberg is a big part of that, and the Minutemen will miss his .946 save percentage, a number that led the country by a lot. But this team is more than just Lindberg defensively. UMass only allows 24.1 shots on goal per game, and the Minutemen are 96-for-105 on the penalty kill this season. UMass carries a special teams net of plus-16 into the Frozen Four, while UMD sits at minus-five. Every goalie’s save percentage takes a hit when on the penalty kill, but UMass has an .893 save percentage while short-handed this season. UMD is just .841. The even-strength save percentages are almost identical, with UMD at .936 and UMass at .934.
Sandelin is generally pleased with the progress his penalty kill has made. Part of that is goaltending for sure. In three postseason games, Zach Stejskal and Ryan Fanti have combined for a .900 save percentage while the team has been short-handed.
“Numbers are numbers, but I think our guys, against North Dakota, came up big against a pretty dynamic power play, at crucial times. That’s a big confidence-builder for them. But I think they’ve done a lot of good things. We’ve had some bad luck, and there are some detail things we’re trying to be better at.”
The Minutemen have 95 goals in 27 games, and while life won’t be easy without Gicewicz’s 17 markers, this team has scoring balance. Ten players who will be in the lineup Thursday have hit double digits in points. Forward Bobby Trevigno, who famously missed the 2019 title game on an NCAA suspension after a hit to the head in UMass’ semifinal win over Denver, leads with 31 points (ten goals). Defensemen Zac Jones (eight) and Matthew Kessel (nine) have 17 goals between them (44 points). Freshman forward Josh Lopina has nine goals, and Minnesota transfer Garrett Wait has chipped in eight goals.
It’s hard to argue a team that loses a generational college talent like Makar and another future NHLer in John Leonard is actually better. But this team, while it might play a similar style, is a different team. It’s a team that looks to have a better makeup for winning on a stage like this, something that has certainly grabbed Sandelin’s attention (and the rest of his staff and players to boot).
If UMD appeared unfazed by the COVID news that broke with UMass on Tuesday, it’s because 1) that simply isn’t and never will be Sandelin’s style, and 2) there’s still plenty here to keep him up at night preparing.
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On the other side, UMD’s balance and depth should scare UMass a little bit. The Bulldogs have four players — Nick Swaney, Cole Koepke, Jackson Cates, and Kobe Roth — in double digits in goals. The third line, with Jesse Jacques, Tanner Laderoute, and Quinn Olson, have combined for 121 shots on goal but have scored just seven times. There’s been some rotten luck along the way for each of them, and they will provide the Bulldogs with quality shifts in the offensive zone. It’s just a matter of time before someone pops a big one for this team.
An area of concern has been blue line production, and it’s an area we’ve seen real improvement in recent weeks. Connor Kelley has two huge goals in recent weeks, Hunter Lellig got a puck through to set up UMD’s first goal against North Dakota, and Matt Anderson has been playing with increased confidence with the puck as of late, with five of his seven points (all assists) coming since Feb. 5.
And there’s real competition in goal with Stejskal and Fanti. If I was forced to guess, I’d say Stejskal starts against UMass, but frankly there are strong arguments for both guys at this point of the season, which is just amazing to think about after UMD rode three different legit No. 1 goalies — Kasimir Kaskisuo, Hunter Miska, and Hunter Shepard — to NCAA Tournament runs.
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7:30pm pregame on KDAL, following the Twins’ hopefully-not-washed-out home opener against Seattle. Live outside of the area? Great! We’ve got you covered, too. Listen to UMD vs UMass for FREE here.
Back pregame with the lines.
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