ST. CLOUD, Minn. — Looking more and more like we’re going to be spending an awful lot of time in this fair city over the next nine-ish days.
After losing a 2-0 lead at what felt like the snap of a finger in the second period, UMD regained some semblance of control, got two in the third, and held off a frantic rally to beat St. Cloud State 4-3 Friday night.
There’s a lot of ground to cover here, so let’s just jump right in.
8 THOUGHTS
1. Quinn Olson occasionally gets beaked because he doesn’t shoot enough. He really isn’t the only one who hears about that, but it merits a mention after watching Olson score the goals he scored in the first period Friday. He has a lethal shot. It would be fantastic if we saw it more often than we do.
Pass➡️Shoot➡️Score🚨 https://t.co/KQT9TK0l8N pic.twitter.com/WLr1cMNUoB
— UMD Men's Hockey (@UMDMensHockey) March 4, 2023
And if that wasn’t sweet enough, check out this snipe at the end of the first period.
The play started behind UMD's goal and ended in SCSU's net🎯 https://t.co/6cXMrz9kMS pic.twitter.com/CfAz2omBOV
— UMD Men's Hockey (@UMDMensHockey) March 4, 2023
Olson, by the way, has 250 shots on goal and 23 goals in his UMD career. He has seven on 64 shots this season.
Those goals staked UMD to a 2-0 lead after one. Olson finished the game with four shots on goal and the two markers to his credit, his first career two-goal performance.
2. St. Cloud State pushed back in the second, taking advantage of a couple UMD mistakes. Kyler Kupka scored twice for the Huskies, the first coming off an errant UMD clearing pass, which allowed Kupka to step into a snapshot from the high slot that he wired by UMD goalie Zach Stejskal. Then a couple minutes later, during an SCSU power play, UMD won a faceoff but failed on a clear, which allowed the Huskies to work the puck from the point to the half-wall, where Adam Ingram snapped a pass across the face of goal, finding Kupka alone on the backdoor with an open net to tie the game.
The Bulldogs got a five-minute power play not long after SCSU tied the game, but not much was accomplished, and Isaac Howard took a holding penalty that nuked two of the five minutes. It came just as it appeared UMD was starting to get its footing on the man advantage, when Howard lost control of the puck and grabbed at a Huskies player to negate a potential rush.
3. UMD never really lost its footing at five-on-five. Carter Loney stole a puck in the neutral zone and drove down the right wing, scoring on a nifty backhand to break the 2-2 tie not four minutes into the third. UMD’s so-called Kid Line of Howard, Cole Spicer, and Jack Smith (Luke Johnson and Smith were rotating at wing) provided some much-needed insurance when Smith flipped a puck to center, won the race to it, and then Howard fed Spicer for a sweet goal before the midpoint of the period that made the lead 4-2.
Big time goal by Loney, who has been lauded by UMD coaches for his 200 foot game, stick positioning, smarts, and skill level. I compared him to Noah Cates last weekend, which I stand by. Cates has a size advantage and plays differently as a result, but they’re similar in that you watch them play and you’re convinced they have more offense in their game than they show. But you don’t ever want them to sacrifice everything else they do on the ice in order to pop a couple more goals here and there.
Most of the last six or so minutes were played in the UMD zone. St. Cloud pulled Jaxon Castor just inside of four minutes and poured on the pressure, but Stejskal and the shot-blockers (bad punk rock band name, but a hell of a hockey back line on this night) held the house until Mason Salquist had a blocked shot bounce right to him with an open net to shoot at. St. Cloud had a couple offensive zone faceoffs in the final seconds, but UMD escaped with the win.
Shots on goal ended up 37-25 SCSU, including 17-6 in a third period where shot attempts were THIRTY SEVEN TO SIX for the home team.
Chew on that one for a second.
37-6.
4. When I chatted with St. Cloud State coach Brett Larson this week, he mentioned something that had eluded my mind. He talked about how his team had gotten points out of every weekend this season, except the one in Duluth in late January.
Larson knows as well as anyone. To finish in the upper division of this league, you have to get something out of pretty much every weekend.
And entering the final day of the regular season, St. Cloud State has taken at least two points from every team in the NCHC. Except UMD, from which the Huskies have zero and UMD has nine.
And take a look at this: Against St. Cloud State, UMD has scored 15 times in three games, an average of five goals per game. Against everyone else, UMD has scored 70 times in 30 games, an average of 2.3 per game. Against everyone else, St. Cloud State has conceded 64 goals in 30 games, an average of 2.1 per game.
Bulldogs coach Scott Sandelin likely wishes he could bottle up whatever his group has been able to do against SCSU. If only it were that easy.
5. Friday was a weird game. Not because of the two video reviews, which appeared to both lead to correct calls being made (including the major on SCSU), but because there were multiple stoppages for goalies knocking the nets off the pegs.
Mick Hatten of The Rink Live noted after the first period — which saw Stejskal knock his goal off twice, once by hitting the right post and once on the left post — that this has been an issue at the Herb Brooks National Hockey Center this season.
There's been issues with that net coming off throughout the season
— Mick Hatten (@MickHatten) March 4, 2023
So it wasn’t a major surprise when Castor kicked the same net off during the second period. What may have caught people off guard was Stejskal having it happen to him twice at the other end. It is not ridiculous hyperbole to suggest fans were on the verge of setting the seats on fire after the second one. Their reaction was much milder when Castor did it, for some strange reason. 😉
Anyway, it’s a known problem in the arena this season, and hopefully we can get through what might be four more games between these teams at this venue without a major calamity resulting from it.
6. The NCHC playoff seedings will be decided on Saturday. We know Denver will host Miami next week, but we know nothing else.
Here are the standings:
DU 53pt
Omaha 42pt (UNO wins tie-breaker by virtue of 3-1 record vs WMU)
WMU 42pt
SCSU 39pt
UMD 32pt
UND 30pt
CC 25pt
Miami 13pt
We can lock Colorado College into seventh. And I think UMD is locked into a return trip here next weekend for a best of three series. If SCSU wins in regulation Saturday, while Western and Omaha lose in regulation, the three will be tied at 42 points. WMU has more regulation wins in league (13) and would be the No. 2 seed, leaving Omaha and St. Cloud State to decide a tie-breaker. I have confirmed with NCHC associate commissioner Michael Weisman that SCSU would win this tie-breaker, which goes all the way to the league’s fifth tie-breaker, regulation winning percentages of the teams tied in the standings against the remaining highest ranked NCHC teams, one by one. Denver won the league, so the Pioneers are the first comparison. St. Cloud State is 2-1-1 against Denver, while Omaha is 1-1, so St. Cloud State finishes third and Omaha fourth.
But by beating Omaha in regulation, UND goes to 33 points and passes UMD for fifth, meaning the Bulldogs are still paired with St. Cloud State next weekend, just in the 3/6 instead of the 4/5 matchup.
I can’t find a scenario that sends UMD anywhere but here (if you can see anything I’m missing, send me a tweet or an email to bruce (dot) ciskie (at) mwcradio (dot) com). But to be safe, I’m going to go ahead and not cancel any of my hotel reservations for next weekend until we know for sure.
7. Along those lines, here’s an idea that I just thought of tonight. How’s about the NCHC do a “Decision Day” type of scheduling format on the last day of the regular season?
On Saturday, Western Michigan plays at Miami (4pm CT), UMD is here in St. Cloud (6pm), Omaha is at North Dakota (6pm), and Denver plays at Colorado College (7pm).
Why not start every game at the same time? 8pm ET/7pm CT/6pm MT would work well, but perhaps you go 7pm ET/6pm CT/5pm MT. Either way, by starting every game at the same time, you create some additional intrigue on a weekend like this where so much is on the line (and no one gets any kind of advantage if they need a separate result to break their way). It won’t always do that, but there’s no penalty in trying.
Think of it like this: Imagine an alternate universe where Western sweeps Denver last weekend and Friday night’s results stay the same. Western would have a one-point lead on Denver, and WMU plays THREE HOURS before DU does Saturday, meaning Western could clinch the Penrose and lock Denver into second before Denver is even done warming up. What fun is that? Make them play simultaneously.
The downside is that the teams in the Eastern time zone — Miami and Western — would get home a little later than they do now. Miami plays a bunch of its Saturday home games, including this one, at 5pm ET, while Western starts Saturday home games at 6pm ET (a bus from rink to rink takes a little less than four and a half hours). So you might get a bit of pushback from them.
Might be a fun tradition. Might be a terrible idea. But I’ll send it up the flagpole at some point. Worst thing they can call me is an idiot, and I get called worse all the time.
8. The UMD women will find out their NCAA destination on Sunday (11am on ESPNEWS). UMD fell to Ohio State 2-1 in Friday’s first WCHA Final Faceoff semifinal. OSU advances to meet Minnesota for the league title Saturday afternoon (should be an absolute banger of a game), and UMD will sit and wait for the selection committee to set the field Sunday.
As of now, UMD is seventh in the PairWise, which would likely mean the Bulldogs play in Minnesota’s regional next weekend. Yale’s double overtime ECAC semifinal loss to Clarkson appears to have locked Minnesota into second.
(I have found one scenario where Minnesota falls to third and UMD goes to Yale, via the BCInterruption PairWise tool. It involves Mercyhurst beating Penn State for the CHA title, while Northeastern (Hockey East), Ohio State (WCHA), and Clarkson (ECAC) win autobids. The NEWHA title game (St. Anselm vs LIU) result is irrelevant, as both produce the same final rankings and UMD goes to Yale.)
No matter how Saturday’s league title games shake out, UMD needs two wins to make the Frozen Four, being held at Amsoil Arena.
We’ll hit the air Saturday at 5:30 in St. Cloud. No, I am not staying here all week if we end up returning.
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