C.C. vs. UW: winner to the NCAA tourney

The University of Wisconsin Badgers (21-12-7) and Colorado College (18-18-5) faceoff tonight in the championship game of the Red Baron WCHA Final Five at 7:00 pm. Central.

You can watch that game on DirecTV channel 668 FSN, if you don’t have cable.

This is an important game for both teams.

The winner goes the NCAA playoffs. The Tigers if they lose, they’re season is over. The same may happen for the Wisconsin Badgers if they don’t win tonight as well, it’s up to the Pairwise math.

Wisconsin is currently sitting at 17^th in the Pairwise so they’re definitely a bubble team.

After the win last night, Colorado College Tiger goalie Joe Howe summed it up with the quote of the weekend, “Rylan [Schwartz] put a quote on the board from Mike Babcock [Redwings head coach] you don’t have to win three games, you have to win one game three times.”

I have told people that the Tigers have one of the best lines in college hockey and the opposition has had a tuff time stopping Rylan Schwartz, Alexander Krushelnyski and the local boy Charlie Taft (Edina, Minnesota). Regardless of the record, the Tigers are a good hockey teams and are peaking at the right time. The Tigers have also won five of their last six games.

Last night, the Tigers looked as if they had watched some game film from the BSU and Minnesota series. At times, it looked like C.C. used some of the same offensive strategies. On one play, the Tigers chipped the puck up the glass and the forward from C.C. skated into the puck and got a quick shot on net that Adam Wilcox made a big save on. If Wilcox doesn’t make that save, it’s a 3-0 game.

You have to give credit, where credit is due. The Tigers beat DU (20-13-5) in games, they beat UND (21-12-7) and Minnesota (26-8-5).

Colorado College Tigers: Rylan Schwartz (19g-32a—51pts), Alexander Krushelnyski (15g-27a—42pts), William Rupuzzi (15g-20a—35pts), Scott Winkler (13g-15a—28pts), Archie Skalbeck (12g-11a—23pts)Defense: Mike Boivin (14g-14a—28pts) Eamonn McDermott (3g-20a—23pts), Peter Stoykewych (2g-9a—11pts). Goalies: Joe Howe 14-11-4, 2.97 GAA, .915 save percentage, Josh Thorimbert 4-7-1, 3.73 GAA, .873 save percentage.

Wisconsin Badgers: Forwards: Michael Mersch (23g-13a—36pts), Mark Zengerle (9g-21a—31pts), Nic Kerdiles (9g-21a—30pts), Joseph Labate (9g-13a—22pts),  Tyler Barnes (14g-15a—21pts), Defense:  Jake McCabe (3g-17a—20pts) John Ramage (8g-10a—18pts). Goalies: Landon Peterson 6-4-3, 2.01 GAA, .926 save percentage, Joel Rumpel 15-8-4, 2.21 GAA, .921 save percentage.

Cross-posted at the Hockey Writes Combine

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Day two reflections from the WCHA Final Five

SAINT PAUL, Minnesota – After winning three consecutive Broadmoor Trophies in a row, UND saw their hopes of winning a fourth come crashing down when they lost in 4-3 overtime yesterday to the upstart Colorado College Tigers.

This isn’t how the UND hockey team had planned it, according to senior forward Danny Kristo.

“I have never felt like this before,” Kristo said. “Obviously we won the last three [Final Fives]. That was our goal coming in this year. Obviously, we wanted to four peat, or what not. You just go day-by-day. I thought we took about 20 minutes off there, between the second and third period and kind of got lulled to sleep, maybe we deserved to win the game, but we didn’t play to our potential, so at this time of the year you’re not going to win games. You can’t leave the game to a bounce of the puck.”

In college hockey, much like other sports, you have to have a short memory. UND Coach Dave Hakstol agreed, “Tough ending tonight, that’s our fate, we’ll regroup and get back to Grand Forks and work on our next project.”

No matter how you slice it, UND had a good season, however, UND is going to have to tighten it up defensively a little bit if they want to advance in the NCAA tourney. There have been times when UND’s been a bit shaky on defense, but most of their miscues appear to be ones that are easy to fix.

One area that I think they’re are lacking in; they need to have forwards that are going hard to the net and getting to the blue paint. More greasy goals and forwards getting to the greasy areas.

“We kind wanted to wear out their D; we found out that they weren’t the fastest, Tiger forwardRylan Schwartz said.

I found these comments by Tiger forward Rylan Schwartz to be interesting, but not shocking. The Tigers have given UND fits this season. UND has a record of 2-3 in five games against the Tigers this season.

Second half surge?

UND is a team that is traditionally known for its second half surges, this year has been a little different. This season, UND’s record before Christmas was 10-5-3 (.639) and so far, after Christmas UND’s record has been 11-7-4 (.590). UND has somewhere between 1-4 more games.

Badgers advance to the Championship game

Wisconsin wins 4-1, advances to the WCHA Final Five Championship game. What’s even more remarkable is that the Badger “were” averaging 2.55 goals per game coming into the tourney and have scored 11 goals in two games.

That’s not a typo.

In the last 10 games, the Badgers have scored 40 goals for an average of 4 goals per game. During the same time period, the Badgers have a 8-2-0 record.

Surging Badgers

After starting out the season 1-7-3 (.227), the Badgers have gone 20-5-4 (.758). That’s an impressive run in anyone’s book. The weird part is that it might not be enough for the Badgers to make the NCAA tourney. They might have to win the NCAA tourney to get in.

SCSU Huskies are not in the NCAA tourney yet

The SCSU Huskies are in dire straits and could end up missing the NCAA tourney, this goes back to their non-conference record. The Huskies are an NCAA bubble team and they don’t need there to be any more surprises this weekend in the other conference tourneys. The Huskies are going to be at home watching the results of the other conference tourneys that are taking place this weekend, and holding their breath.

When asked about his teams prospects for making the NCAA tourney, “Bubble Trouble, Saint Cloud State head coach Bob Motzko said.

Cross-posted at the Hockey Writers Combine

UND women torches RIT Tigers 8-2.

Grand Forks, ND – After last night’s win, University of North Dakota women’s head coach Brian Idalski wasn’t happy with his teams play. Words like lethargic and sloppy were uttered by the head coach. You would have thought he was the head coach of the team that had lost 3-2 to the RIT Tigers.

What a difference 22 hours make.

UND game out of the gates like a team possessed. From the drop of the first puck UND came out and put a lot of pressure on the Tiger goal.  During the opening period, the Green and White managed to put 26 shots on the Tigers net. Four of the 26 shots found the back of twine to give UND a 4-1 lead after one period of play. UND would win the game 8-2. 

After not being very pleased with his team play the night before, UND head coach Brian Idalski was much more complimentary of his team tonight.

“I thought we played with a lot more energy – we did a good job getting pucks to the net – a lot more traffic in front of the net, screens, tips, over-all a lot better performance,” Idalski said.

UND’s 26 shots was the most shots that RIT has faced in a period since November 15, 2008 when RIT tied Potsdam 3-3.

The RIT Tigers sophomore goalie Ali Binnington was under siege during the first period and if it wasn’t for her stellar play the score would have been way worse.

The Tigers would pulled Binnington after the first period and replaced her with Laura Chamberlain who stopped 28 of 32 shots.

One of the story lines coming into tonight’s game was UND sophomore forward Josefine Jakobsen. The sophomore forward has been on a torrid streak and with two goals in the first period, she has scored (5g-4a—9 pts) in the last five games. Jakobsen missed a few opportunities in the third period to bury a third goal but couldn’t get another marker.

The second period lacked the drama of the first period and there was no scoring as UND outshot RIT 12-3.  UND did have to kill of a five minute major when Samantha Hanson was given a five and game for checking from behind. UND stood tall on the penalty kill and RIT wasn't able to dent the twine on the power play.

After the game UND, head coach Brian Idalski thought the penalty on Hanson was a little harsh.

“That call has been two minutes for the last couple of weeks,” Idalski said. “There was no intent on her part.”

The third period saw a goal from all world Michelle Karvinen and two power play goals for UND from Jocelyn and Monique Lamoureux as both scored on the man advantage. UND freshman forward Shannon Kaiser would end the scoring for the Green and White by burying her first career goal.

Having big night for UND were Michelle Karvinen (1a-4a—5pts), Monique Lamoureux (1g-3a—4pts) and Jocelyn Lamoureux (2g-2a—4pts) would end the night with four points each.  Monique Lamoureux with her four points tonight moved into the top 10 in scoring all time in the NCAA.

Michelle Karvinen who missed the first 10 games with an undisclosed injury has scored (4g-13a—17pts) in six games.

UND played with an edge tonight that they didn’t have last night and Jocelyne Lamoureux talked about that after the game.

“Yeah I don’t think that anyone was too happy with their performance yesterday,” Lamoureux said.  “Kept it a little too close and just we were too lackadaisical. Not taking care of the puck. We have to be better to be good down the stretch we just flat out have to better. I think there was some meeting today. Things got laid out pretty bluntly and I think people were ready to go today.”

Related articles

• UND Women Battle to Beat RIT (insidehockey.com)
• Michelle Karvinen Returning to UND Lineup (insidehockey.com)
• Minnesota State Slips Past North Dakota (insidehockey.com)
• North Dakota Women Outlast St. Cloud (insidehockey.com)