Big weekend series ahead for the UMD women to finish up the regular season. The UMD men look to take another step forward in a tough venue. Meanwhile, a cool story has been authored over the bridge, and the writers hope the best chapter has yet to be penned.
It’s go time.
9 THOUGHTS
1. “The longest we’ve ever been anywhere is out here.” The coaching life can be a nomadic one, especially for coaches working through the ranks of junior hockey and trying to find the right place in Division I or III college. For New York native Rich McKenna and his young family (he and his wife have three boys), it turns out that right place was Superior.
Now in his ninth year as head coach of the UWS men, McKenna and his staff have overseen an impressive transformation, one that has brought the Yellowjackets back to the top of their conference.
In the program’s glory years, that conference was the NCHA. Steve Nelson led the Yellowjackets to the top of that league in the 1990s, and Dan Stauber kept them there into the 2000s, culminating in the program’s major moment, an NCAA Division III title in 2002.
Times were a bit lean when McKenna was hired in 2016. Outside of a WIAC playoff title won under COVID protocols in 2021 — with no NCAA Tournament to play in — it’s been a slow build for UWS to what happened Saturday.
In front of what McKenna estimated as the largest crowd they’ve drawn during his time in the program, Carson Riddle scored the decisive goal in a shootout to give UWS the point it needed to push past UW-Stevens Point and claim the WIAC regular season title. Outside of the 2021 bubble title, it’s the first league title the Yellowjackets have won or shared since 2011.
2. McKenna credits his players for what he called a “mental flip.” UWS went 11-15-1 last year, with two-thirds of those 15 losses (ten, to be precise) coming by one or two goals.
“It’s not like miraculously I became a good coach,” McKenna said this week. “The buy-in has been more than it’s ever been. And our leadership is better than it’s ever been. That determination is better than it’s ever been. The hard work Monday through Thursday is better than it’s ever been. Everything just felt like it was ramped up a little bit more.
“Last year, we were a good team, we just couldn’t win. We would beat you analytically, but we couldn’t beat you on the scoreboard where it counted. That left a sour taste. And the guys thought about it every time they went for a lift in July.”
A hardened group of older Yellowjackets reported for preseason in September, determined to not let that rash of agonizing losses happen again.
So far, so good.
UWS is 18-4-3, with a 10-4 record in games decided by one or two goals.
3. McKenna recalled a conversation with forward Chris Ishmael after last season ended.
“He sat down with me before going home and we were doing exit interviews and all that stuff,” McKenna said. “And he was just like, ‘I’ve been here two years and we haven’t won yet. That doesn’t sit right with me. We should have won by now.'”
Captains were named quickly as the offseason started, something McKenna said was a departure from their past norms. Led by captain Gavin Rasmussen, a senior forward from Cloquet, McKenna said it allowed the leadership group to work with the returners right away. Then when the freshmen arrived, “it became their team.”
McKenna said the staff gave players some time off this week after the regular season wrapped up. They have that luxury after the Yellowjackets earned a bye in the first round of the conference tournament this week. UWS will host either UW-Stout or UW-River Falls next Friday and Saturday at Wessman Arena.
“Take the foot off the gas for a few days, let them get back to neutral. And we’ve practiced, this is our second practice of the week was (Thursday). And we were able to, we’ve had great practices, guys are humming along here. There’s still things to clean up, there’s still things to teach right now, but we have the foundation down and that’s the biggest difference I would say this year compared to years prior. The foundation, it’s solid, and now we can add tools to the toolbox, not still work on things.”
McKenna said he was told when he took the job that the people would show up if the team started winning. If last weekend is any indication, fun times are head at the place we used to call The Hive.
4. Across the bridge, one regular season is wrapping up this weekend, while another starts to head down the stretch. The UMD women finish up the regular season at Minnesota, a team that the Bulldogs have really struggled against in recent years.
Since a 2-1 regional final win at Minnesota in 2022 that got the Bulldogs to the Frozen Four at Penn State, UMD is 0-10-1 against the Gophers, outscored 36-16.
Head coach Laura Schuler wants nothing to do with conversations about what’s gone wrong since that regional win. She’s laser-focused on what lies ahead for her team, which can bump up to third in the WCHA with a sweep (as long as at least one of the wins comes in regulation).
“I’m not thinking at all about that,” Schuler said, “and about the past. It’s just about focus (on) right now on us. And if we stick to our game plan, I know that good things will happen.”
Senior Hanna Baskin was asked about the November series in Duluth, which ended with the Gophers earning six points.
“Obviously, we were still trying to work some things out, lines, all that, systems,” she said, “and I think now we’ve had a lot of time and a lot of tests to figure out what works for us and what we need to do. So it’s an exciting opportunity this weekend, that’s for sure. And I think we’re more than ready.”
5. UMD might be more than ready. The Bulldogs have played six pretty good games since the St. Thomas sweep. A pair of 2-1 losses to Wisconsin, followed by four straight wins and only three goals conceded in those games.
The Bulldogs are bought in to a defense-first mentality, and it’s working.
“100 percent and it doesn’t matter who we’re playing against,” Schuler said. “In the WCHA, anybody can take a game from anybody on any given night. Ever since our week leading into Wisconsin, that was a step that we took in the right direction.”
Baskin agrees.
“It just seems like everybody’s locked in to what they have to do in the defensive zone, and then you worry about anything else.”
I’ve said it already, but this is how this UMD team needs to play to have a chance to win. They haven’t broken through against the top teams since September, but they’ve been right there as of late and there’s no reason to think the Bulldogs can’t beat one of these teams when it matters most.
6. As for playoff scenarios for the women, it’s certainly more than likely that UMD will host St. Cloud State for a best-of-three series next weekend (2pm on Feb. 28, then 1pm that Saturday and Sunday, if necessary).
SCSU is locked into fifth place, and given the Huskies’ success against Minnesota in the regular season, one has to assume they are big Bulldog fans this weekend. St. Cloud State has two goals in its last ten games in Duluth.
Minnesota State has a two-point edge on St. Thomas for sixth place, so there’s a small chance UMD will match up with one of them next weekend, depending on what happens this week. MSU and St. Thomas meet home and home this weekend. If the Tommies get at least four points in the series, they’ll finish sixth and play whoever ends up in third.
The PairWise shows UMD in sixth, paired with No. 3 Cornell for a regional in New York. It doesn’t seem likely that UMD will move up unless it does well against the Gophers this weekend and goes on to win the WCHA playoff title.
7. A big, heavy North Dakota team awaits UMD this weekend in Grand Forks. The Fighting Hawks took two from UMD to kick off the NCHC season in November, but UND hasn’t been the same really since that weekend.
Senior Cameron Berg was lost for two months after those games, and North Dakota has struggled to put everything together on a nightly basis, led by a young defensive core and a good amount of youth up front.
UND has split its last two series (home vs Colorado College and last weekend at Denver), both by losing Friday and winning Saturday. It hasn’t swept a series since December.
“There are spurts during our year,” longtime North Dakota coach Brad Berry said. “I think we have a lot of good players, but they’re young. We’re trying to find consistency in our game. We’ve had really good spurts of playing consistent, North Dakota-style hockey, and we’ve had lapses.”
The North Dakota penalty kill struggled for a good chunk of the season, thanks in part to the inexperience they have on the back end. The goalies’ numbers suffered as a result, but TJ Semptimphelter appears to be putting it together. Berry thought he was good in a 4-0 defeat at Denver last Friday, then with a short-handed roster in front of him on Saturday, Semptimphelter kept DU at bay as UND won 3-1 for a series split.
Sandelin was quick to note that North Dakota plays a much different style than last weekend’s opponent, Arizona State.
“I think our two teams (UMD and UND) play very similar,” he said. “Tough building, gotta get off to a good start there, try and keep the crowd out of it because they really get energized off that.
“They’re good defensively, they’re hard at the net. They just play North Dakota hockey, right? And if you’re not ready to battle from the drop of the puck, it can be a long weekend. So we’ve got to be ready mentally, to go into a tough building, try and play our game. win the tough areas.
“We’ve gotta be good along the walls and we have to win battles along the walls. We gotta win battles at the net fronts. That’s kind of the series, right? It’s kind of that every time you play them. You’re fighting for inches on the rink and it can get physical and there’s just not a lot of room.”
8. UMD has switched up its lines again this week, hoping to find more consistency through the lineup. The Bulldogs are also hoping to unlock some more offense from gentlemen who are not named “Plante,” “Shaugabay,” or “Arnott.”
“It’s not like none of them are working, they’re all working hard,” Sandelin said, “and they’re also bringing other things. Hopefully they can find a goal or two down the stretch. It’s like I told you last week, we need more secondary scoring, we need more balanced scoring.
“We tweaked up the lines and we’re just trying to keep finding a little better balance throughout our lineup. And hopefully this weekend, what we’ve done will stay that way and we can find that.”
There’s no doubt that UMD would love to see more offense from some of its reliable veterans up front. We’ll see if they can take a step toward finding that, because relying on young guys for the offense — even at this point in the season — is a tough ask in a league like this.
9. The NCHC lead is again on the line this weekend, as the wagon known as Western Michigan heads to Tempe to battle Arizona State. The Sun Devils need a big weekend to have a shot at the Penrose, as they enter the weekend five points back of Western, and the Broncos still have two games in hand on ASU. The Sun Devils’ bye isn’t until the final weekend of the regular season.
Third-place Omaha has this weekend off.
Elsewhere, St. Cloud State returns from bye to host Colorado College. The Tigers settled for five points against Miami last weekend after blowing a three-goal lead in the final minutes against the RedHawks on Saturday night in Colorado Springs. CC picked up an overtime win for the sweep, but that point could prove costly to a team fighting for everything it can get in the second half.
Miami plays a two-game series at home against Denver. After Saturday’s postgame scuffle, Denver’s Zeev Buium and UND’s EJ Emery will both sit out Friday night on one-game suspensions handed down by the conference Monday. The point the RedHawks got from the Tigers Saturday was just their second of the season, and Miami is still searching for its first league win of the season.
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The radio caravan heads west on Highway 2 Friday morning. 6:30pm pregame Friday, 5:30pm Saturday.
Back pregame with the lines.
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