UND’s Hakstol: “regionals pinnacle of our season and should be played in a great atmosphere.”

und v. usa (Photo credit: intersubjectiv)

This past weekend, UND played in the NCAAWest Regional tourney in Grand Rapids, Michigan.  If you watched the games you will see that the games were sparsely attended,just like I had predicted.

So the NCAA wants the teams to play in empty arena’s posing as quite mausoleums during prayer time.

Come to think of it, I have probably been to churches that are louder than last week’s West and Midwest regionals.

The announced attendance for Friday’s game between Niagara and UND was 2289 and for Saturday’s game, the announced attendance was 1918 fans.

Seriously!

If mathematically challenged, that’s a grand total for 4207 fans to see the NCAA West Regional hockey games for the weekend. My words, “that’s pathetic.” The NCAA should be ashamed. There are high school hockey tourneys in North Dakota that have more people attend them then this regional.

Today was the last press conference of the year for UND hockey head coach Dave Hakstol was asked about his thought on the NCAA tourney being played in building with atmospheres like last weekend’s regional in Grand Rapids, Michigan?

“The pinnacle of our season should be played in a great atmosphere,” Hakstol said. “I think the players that are involved in the national tournament deserve that. “I think It’s something that has garnered a fair amount of discussion over the last couple of year, but no action.” We have to fix things. We’re not doing this the right way at the regional level – to play in front of… I saw a stat within out program we had 5500 people on a live chat, and there was maybe 1500 people in a building watching a great hockey game between Yale and North Dakota on Saturday night. That’s not right. That’s the pinnacle and that’s the spotlight of our season. Yeah, we have to change things. Certainly, I would like to work towards doing that, sooner, rather than later. The best regionals that I have been involved in, that I can remember, atmosphere wise, was here, in 05-06, where we hosted, competitive environment. The regional in Minnesota; last year at the Xcel Energy Center; in front of 10,000 people, we came up one game short. Great atmosphere to play in, spotlight event, the way the national tournament game should feel. Third one would have been; at the Kohl Center, where the University of Wisconsin hosted. We had the good fortune of coming out of that regional. That was a tough game, there was about 15,000 people cheering against us and 1,000 of our fans with us, but that was atmosphere, and that’s the stage that our national tournament should be played on, we need to get back to one shape or form. “

It’s pretty clear that the UND’s head coach would rather play in a raucous, loud arena filled with passionate fans, even if they’re another fan bases’  than an empty arena, in a nameless town with empty seats posing as fans for the sake of having a regional championship at a neutral site, in an empty building on Saturday in March.  I agree.

Cross-posted at the Hockey Writers-Combine.

(Video) UND's No goal against Yale

When I first saw this goal, I had a feeling that it wouldn't count. I am not sure why it took seven-plus minutes to review this play, it's either there or it's not there. If you're a UND fan, you kind of feel bad for Connor Gaarder, because he went 15 games without scoring a goal and had four goals all season long, three in one game against the Boston University Terriers.

I would contend that this long review was a momentum killer, because going into the review, UND had the momentum as well.

When the review took seven-plus minutes, I had a bad feeling and I kind of knew that UND was not going to get the goal. I don't know, from past experience. If UND get's to a 2-0 lead over Yale, it's a different game. It's a tough ending to a pretty decent season.

UND Hockey: What Happened, day 2

Today, I have been thinking about this past season that ended at the West Region in Grand Rapids, Michigan with a 4-1 loss to Yale.

Like I mentioned in another article, this is most wonderful time of the year. It’s also very stressful. There is a finality, which surrounds the college hockey tourney. Seasons and careers end, with losses in the National tourney.

There are college players that will sit in the locker room with their jersey still on hours after a loss, and not want to take off their jersey, for the last time.

I like many others UND fans are trying to find answers, a day after UND’s season ended for a 13^th year in a row without winning an NCAA title.  Many in the UND fan base are getting restless.

Monitoring the twitterverse last night was interesting.

When that first national title finally comes, and I believe it’s a matter of time before that first one comes, that second one might not take as long to replicate.

After watching our favorite team get beat at their own game, by a gritty, hungrier Yale team, I don’t know if there are any short, quick answers.

Hockey is a funny game and things don’t always play out the way that you think that they should. If you would have told me that B.C. would have gotten beaten the past weekend by Union, I would have told you that you were nuts.

Think about this, UMass-Lowell, Saint Cloud State, Yale and Quinnipiac are going to the Frozen Four. Yale and Saint Cloud State barely made the NCAA tourney. I am pretty sure that there aren’t many people that predicted that bracket. If there is, I am that person picking my lottery numbers as well, because I have a new retirement plan.

Some might point their fingers at the season schedule, which was the 12^th toughest in the country, and say that the physical grind finally caught up with them and took it’s toll on them. I don’t know, maybe. The new NCHC isn’t going to be much better, if anything it’s going to be worse.

I do, find it interesting that some want to throw a head coach under the bus that has never had a losing season in nine years as head coach and has a record of 235-119-37 (.648).  Sure, this season record of 22-13-7 (.607) is the worst of Hakstol’s nine seasons, but let’s put things into perspective.

While UND night not have won an NCAA title, the season wasn’t a total loss, UND did make the NCAA tourney for the 11^th straight season in a row, that’s the longest current NCAA streak. Also, UND again, had home ice for the WCHA playoffs and advanced to the WCHA Final Five, where it has a chance to win a fourth straight Broadmoor Trophy.  This time falling short, in their bid for a fourth straight, after the quarter final game, senior forward Danny Kristo said, “I have never felt like this before,” Kristo continued. “Obviously we won the last three. 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.”

Looking back on that statement, we didn’t play to our potential, it kind of explains UND 2012-13 season, and they just didn’t, for whatever reason fire on all cylinders. For whatever reason, UND didn’t get any puck luck, and if four of five of Rocco Grimaldis pipes or crossbars goes in, UND might win a couple of more games over the course of a season.

The UND hockey teams also kind of fell asleep for periods of games and never really put together a string of games where they played really good after the Christmas break. For the first time a Dave Hakstol team didn’t go on the patented second half run, they played at a (.583) clip and yet they almost won the league title.

Lastly, UND made the NCAA West regional final before bowing out to Yale, but in the end they just didn’t seem to have it, when they needed to.

Traditionally Hakstol’s teams have been known for being a bear to play against after the first of the year going an impressive 95-30-13 went 9-5-2 (.625). Again, that’s not a bad record.

What I am trying to say here, is the man is a good hockey coach, no matter how you slice it.

This team was not your usual UND hockey team, they were more of a finesse team built for speed and the big ice and wasn’t built to blow a team out of the building like years past. This takes some getting used to from a fans perspective.

Down the stretch, at times it looked like teams were beating UND at its own game. They were beating UND by being tough to play against and limiting their time-and-space and capitalizing off of their turnovers.

Also, the game is changing and the on ice officials aren’t allowing the big hits anymore as we have seen with Andrew MacWilliam being assessed two major penalties, for what appears to be two legal shoulder-to-shoulder hits.

Looking at this year’s roster, there isn’t as many of the physical type players that UND has had in years past, that are going to check you out of the building.

What I am trying to say, is that I think that UND hockey is evolving and might have experienced some growing pains this season. This is just from what I have seen from covering the team this year.

Finally, the 2012-13 UND hockey team was a pleasure to cover and I will miss this year’s senior class. All of them are character people and amazing young men and I think that all of them will be successful in whatever they do in life.

 Cross-posted at the Hockey Writers Combine. 

Related articles

• UND 2012-13 hockey season post-mortem (thehockeywriters.com)
• Day 2 Reflections From WCHA Final Five (insidehockey.com)
• Day two reflections from the WCHA Final Five (thehockeywriters.com)
• UND 2012-13 hockey season post-mortem (getrealhockey.com)
• "Sweet Sixteen" Set: Who Will Meet In Frozen Four? (insidehockey.com)

UND 2012-13 hockey season post-mortem

For UND hockey fans, the end of every season is always tough, especially for the last 13 years.  UND hockey fans don’t take losing well and UND hockey is a way of life, much like football is in Nebraska or Texas.

But I digress.

If you would have asked me how I thought this year would have ended, I would have said anything is possible including this ending.  Although, I was thinking that the Green and White’s season would have ended in a trip to Pittsburgh, PA culminating in their eighth NCAA title.

I thought this team had the “potential” to take it all the way to Pittsburgh, but in the last month, those expectations were quietly dampened as they had trouble getting sweeps against the likes of Bemidji State and Michigan Tech.

This year’s team was hard to put a finger on.  They never really clicked defensively or offensively.

The coaching staff was still messing around with line combinations up until the end of the season. Some of that was a result of UND’s incredible depth this season. There was also, for the most part, no major injuries so there were many combinations to play with.

Players that played poorly on the ice found themselves sitting in the stands the next game.

There never seemed to be a lot of great chemistry among the forward lines except for the top line and the energy line.

A great hockey mind told me earlier in the season; that if your team is still screwing around with the forward lines in late January, your season wasn’t going last very long. Hum…those words of wisdom, now proved to be very true. It’s not really rocket science per see, but it’ makes a lot of sense. Just seems like there was no continuity to this hockey team.

This year’s team never really had that killer instinct, they never seemed to have to have ability to put a team away and they had a propensity to let bad teams hang around longer than they should have.

That being said, this team wasn’t a bunch of talentless hacks either.

The 2012-13 version of the UND hockey team was still a pretty decent hockey team that at times looked like they could beat the best teams in the country and played one of the toughest schedules in the country.  They didn’t rack up 22 wins playing the weak sisters of the poor.

On the negative side of things, UND had two league sweeps all season long, UNO and MTU and both of these sweeps were on the road. UND swept one team at home, and that was nonconference foe Holy Cross.

The 2012-13 UND hockey team finished with a 22-13-7 record and also finished one win away from sharing the McNaughton Cup with Minnesota and Saint Cloud State.

Let this one sink in for you, this is the first time in 10 years that the UND hockey team isn’t going to go to the Frozen Four or win a Broadmoor Trophy or McNaughton Cup.  I didn’t even realize this until I read Brad Schlossman’s post game report in the Grand Forks Herald.

There are going to be those that will say that this UND hockey team didn’t meet expectations. There will be others that will say that this team lacked grit and heart.

Secondary scoring was an issue with this team and after Danny Kristo (26-g-26a—52pts), Corban Knight (16g-33a—49pts) and Rocco Grimaldi (13g-23a—36pts), there was a drop off of in scoring after the top line.

Next season, the junior class of Mark MacMillan (13g-12a—25pts) and Michael Parks (7g-1a—8pts) along with Roco Grimaldi are going to be expected to lead the way for UND.  Michael Parks was slowed this season by an injury and he never really seemed to regain his rhythm that he had from the previous season.

Fire Hakstol

As always, expectations are pretty high, especially when your team resides in Grand Forks, North Dakota, almost to a point of fanaticism. When the season ends prematurely without a NCAA title, some in the fan base begin to call for the coach’s head.

I can tell you right now that there is zero chance that head coach Dave Hakstol gets fired, he’s not going anywhere.  Not going to happen, first-off Hakstol just signed a long term deal and you would require a very big buy out.  If I had to guess, a buyout it’s in the $800,000.00 – $1,000,000.00, so no, coach Hakstol is going anywhere, unless someone is going to step forward to write the University of North Dakota a huge check and I don’t see that happening.  Nor am I suggesting that this should it happen.  The next quesition would be, who do you replace him with? Replacing him doesn’t mean the program succeeds either.

Lastly, Dave Hakstol is a very good hockey coach and has done a good job with the UND hockey program.  UND just won 20 plus games for the ninth year in a row and I think it’s just a matter of time before he leads UND to a national title. Then the naysayers will be running to catch up with the Hakstol bandwagon.

Cross-Posted at the Hockey Writers Combine.

UND vs. C.C. lines Final Five

UND Forward Lines

21 Brendan O’Donnell–10 Corban Knight (A) –7 Danny Kristo (A)
19 Rocco Grimaldi–27 Carter Rowney (A)–15 Michael Parks
25 Mitch MacMillan–16 Mark MacMillan–13 Connor Gaarder

Drake Caggiula 9–28 Stephane Pattyn–17 Colten St. Clair

UND Defensive Parings

2 Andrew MacWilliam (C)–18 Dillon Simpson
4 Derek Forbort–24 Jordan Schmaltz
5 Nick Mattson –20 Joe Gleason

UND goalies

33 Clarke Saunders

31 Zane Gothberg
35 Tate Maris

Not In the lineup: 11 Derek Rodwell , Andrew Panzarella (22), Dan Senkbeil (8), Coltyln Sanderson (26),  Bryn Chyzyk (29).

Colorado College’s Tigers forward lines

16 Alexander Krushelnyski–13 Rylan Schwartz (A)–17 Charlie Taft
12 Archie Skalbeck–25 Scott Winkler–27 William Rapuzzin (C) 
11 Hunter Fejes–10 Cody Bradley–15 Andrew Hamburg
22 Peter Maric–21 Jeff Collett–24 Jared Hanson

Colorado College Tigers defense pairings

6 Peter Stoykewych–28 Mike Boivin
5 Aaron Harstad–7 Eamonn McDermott
20 Ian Young–4 Joe Marciano

Colorado College Tiger goalies

31 Joe Howe
39 Josh Thorimbert
29 Courtney Lockwood

Referees: Don Adam, Timm Walsh Linesmen: Nick Bradshaw (94), Sam Shikowsky (81)

UND Hockey makes the Final Five for a 11th year in a row with win over Tech

Seal of the University of North Dakota (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Grand Forks, ND – With the win tonight, the University of North Dakota (21-11-7) hockey team has made the WCHA Final Five in each of Dave Hakstol’s nine seasons.

What’s even more impressive with UND’s 6-0 win over Michigan Tech, UND has made the Final Five for the 11th-straight year in a row, that’s the longest current streak in the WCHA.

Since coach Hakstol took over the reins in 2004-05, the University of North Dakota hockey team has never lost a first round WCHA playoff series and currently holds 18-4 (.818) record.

Hakstol also holds an impressive 32-9 record in the WCHA playoff games.

After last night’s 2-1 loss to the Michigan Tech Huskies, that streak appeared to be in jeopardy.  In last night’s game, the Michigan Tech Huskies were a miserable team to play against; they clogged up the neutral zone up and gave North Dakota little time and space. Huskies also beat UND to the puck all night long.

Tonight was a different story, the Green and White left little doubt as they were the better team all night long and beat the Huskies to the puck all night long and the Huskies defenders had no answer for UND team speed as they entered the neutral zone with speed and when the Huskies got a chance on Clarke Saunders the UND defense was there to clear the puck.

In the end, UND blew out the Michigan Tech Huskies (13-20-4) and actually ended up pulling the  starting goalie Clarke Saunders with 4:02 left and inserted the backup goalie Tate Maris who’s a very popular third string goalie with his teammates and with the fans as well.

Think about this, Clarke Saunders had a 27 save shutout, when the ever popular Tate Maris entered the game to a standing ovation. That happened. It was a very classy move by the head coach Dave Hakstol.

“I thought the level of play was our most complete of the year, without a question,” Head coach Dave Hakstol said of his team’s 6-0 win over the Michigan Tech Huskies. “We played at a playoff level for three periods tonight and it started right from the drop of the puck.”

An emotional Tate Maris explained what it was like to finally get a taste of game action in the last home game of his college hockey career. “it’s kind of indescribable I guess,” Maris said. I don’t know. I guess I am kind of at a loss for words for it. It’s kind of four years pushed into one night in four minutes there at the end. Pretty surreal, to say the least, it’s just amazing to be out there with your fellow teammates. To be surrounded by those fans, it’s kind of indescribable, just amazing to say the least.”

According to senior forward Corban Knight, tonight was a statement game for the UND hockey team and the head coach challenged the team to be better for 60 minutes tonight.

“We set the bar pretty high tonight with the way we played,” senior forward Corban Knight said. “In order for us to be successful like you said, we need to keep that bar high and make sure we’re working hard to get to that every night, because we’re only going to be playing better teams from here on in.”

Up next for UND is Colorado College who beat DU 4-3. That game will be next Thursday night at 7:00 p.m. central time. UND and Colorado College split the season series 2-2.

Cross-posted at the Hockey Writers Combine.

UND finds tough sledding against Tech

“It was a hard fought playoff game and we came up one goal short,” head coach Dave Hakstol said. Well two if you believe the video replay that was shown on television monitors the Ralph Engelstad Arena press box.

We only got one look at “shot” in question and then it was gone from the screen, for some reason we didn’t get a second look at the no-goal in question.

USCHO Blogger Timothy Boger has a gif on his blog that proves otherwise, I guess that is up to you to decide.

We can discuss whether or not Michigan Tech (13-19-4) scored a goal on their first power play of the night, the fact remains that the officiating was equally poor all weekend long for both teams and wasn’t a factor in the game.

Both teams will have to play through it tomorrow night, obviously, and one teams is going to advance to the Final Five next week.

The crowd was barely seated when the Tech Huskies were able to dent the twine first at the 00:20 mark of the second period, with a goal from Tanner Kero.

UND came into the game with a 9-4-5 record when the opposition scores first, you can make that 9-5-5 with the 2-1 loss to the Michigan Tech Huskies.

This was UND’s first loss to the Michigan Tech Huskies since January 28, 2008, when UND lost 2-1 to Michigan Tech in the Great Lakes Invitational.

The game was a carbon copy of the Bemidji State series from a couple of weeks ago. The Huskies collapsed around their net and played a defensive style brand of hockey and made it tough for UND (20-11-7) to generate any offense whatsoever.

Finally, senior forward Danny Kristo was able to break through and got the equalizer at the 14:57 mark on a nice shot. “It was just a good play,” head coach Dave Hakstol said. “He came up with the puck; he got a quick shot to the net. I don’t know where it went in, it found a hole. We didn’t find a lot of holes on him [Phoenix Copley] tonight.”

As always, the electrifying, but recently snake bitten Rocco Grimaldi, had a breakaway and a glorious opportunity to take a lead in the game, but was hooked at the last second by a Tech defender, causing him to miss a glorious opportunity.

Michigan Tech Huskies turned a UND turnover into the game winning goal at the 17:58 mark of the third period when C.J. Eick scored the game winning goal sending the fans to the exits and spoiling the UND fans plans for Sunday evening.

Tonight’s game was summed up best by this frank statement. “Its playoff hockey and if you don’t bring your best you won’t like the outcome, senior defenseman Andrew MacWilliam said. We kind of lulled there in the second period and it came back to bite us. We have to regroup and be ready to play tomorrow.”

“It was a hard fought game,” senior defenseman Joe Gleason said. “We kind of shot ourselves in the foot in the second period; we didn’t have a very good period. We had a great response in the third period. Definitely our best period of the night, if we can play like that for 60 minutes tomorrow it should be a good outcome for us tomorrow night.”

Nonetheless, UND ended up losing a heart breaker to pesky Michigan Tech Huskies and pushed the series to a game three. The same two teams will face-off tomorrow night at 7:00 p.m. central, at the Ralph Engelstad Arena.

Cross-posted at the Hockey Writers Combine.

Related articles

• UND Hockey: Slugs out win against Tech (thehockeywriters.com)

UND Hockey: Slugs out win against Tech

Grand Forks, ND –What a difference a year makes, a year ago it was near 65 degrees sunny and devoid of snow.

Fast forward to March 15, 2013, 10,571 fans braved  near white out conditions to attend  tonight’s game and outside it looked more like a January 15 game; than a game being played in the middle of March.

UND is 14-1-2 when scoring four or more goals this season. Make that 15-1-2 with the 5-3 win tonight.  What is even more impressive, UND has also won 14 straight WCHA playoff game with the win tonight.

That being said, it wasn’t UND best effort tonight.  The win didn’t come easy.

“It was a tough hockey game to find any flow,” UND head coach Dave Hakstol said. “We need to play better and return our focus to doing that tomorrow night.”

UND was outshot 43-24 by the upstart Huskies and they gave the UND forwards fits by getting in the shooting lanes and taking away UND’s time and space.

At the 12:30 mark of the first period UND defenseman Andrew MacWilliam was assessed a five minute major and a game misconduct for contact to the head of Michigan Tech forward David Johnstone.  After further review of the play, it was apparent that the on ice official Marco Hunt had made the wrong call.  Johnston suffered a broken collar bone on the hit.

The five minute major to MacWilliam threw UND off of their rhythm and it took a while for the Green and White to regain the upper hand. UND coach Dave Hakstol expounded on it a little more after the game.

Michael Parks
Eric Classen, UND Sports

“The five minute major knocked us back,” Hakstol said. “We survived it and recovered. I guess it was the story of the night. We hit a few bumps in the road, but we found a way to win.”

The Tech Huskies took the game to UND until the 15:45 mark of the middle frame when fourth line forward junior forward Derek Rodwell scored his second goal of the year unassisted.

“The Rodwell goal was a big one for us,” Hakstol said.  When the head coach was asked where that goal came from? Hakstol continued, “Derek does that really well. He took the puck wide, drove wide little bit. Pulled it to the middle and snapped it hard at the net. It was well out from, 40-feet out – he put it bar down – it was good timing to get his second (goal) of the year.

Junior forward Derek Rodwell had this to say about his goal. “It was a just kind of a broke play down the center-ice,” Rodwell said. “I saw a little bit room and tried to shoot through the screen, just happened to get a good bounce that happened to go in.”

Senior forward Danny Kristo had a monstrous night on the ice for UND tonight recording (2g-1a—3pts) pushing his season point total to (23g-25a—48pts) three points off of the national leaders Ryan Walters and Greg Carey.

Dillon Simpson
Eric Classen, UND Sports

Danny Kristo was there to answer bell every time the Tech Huskies would score to tighten the game up.  The Senior forward didn’t seemed all that pleased with his team’s effort tonight.

“Friday night is the biggest game of the series,” Kristo said. “I think that we played very average tonight, we didn’t do the things we need to do to keep playing this time of year, but we’re going to move on, and forget this one. We’ll take the win and get ready for tomorrow, it’s going to be tough to end a team’s season, because Tech is playing good hockey – proud of the win – but we got to be better tomorrow.”

Kristo is right, UND is going to have to be better if UND wants to end Tech’s season tomorrow night. Game 2 is set for tomorrow night at the Ralph Engelstad Arena at 7:07 p.m. central.

Cross-posted at the Hockey Writers Combine. 

(Video) UND 4 - BSU 2

Here is the video of the goals from Friday's game. The McMillan boy's were on fire this weekend, and chipped in a lot offensively. Bemidji State did not have an answer for their speed.

I thought SCSU Fans said that Mitch MacMilllan couldn't play hockey. That's (2g-1a--3pts) in the last game and a half.
— Eric J. Burton (@goon48) March 3, 2013

CONFIRMED: UND has officially clinched home ice for the first round of the WCHA playoffs.
— North Dakota MHockey (@UNDMHockey) March 3, 2013

Related articles

• UND and BSU slug out a 2-2 tie (thehockeywriters.com)
• This Week in the WCHA: Series Previews (thehockeywriters.com)

UND and BSU slug out a 2-2 tie

Western Collegiate Hockey Association logo (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Grand Forks, ND – Tonight was senior night for six seniors and it’s an emotional time for all of them. Assistant captain Corban Knight showed up to the post-game press conference still wearing his home white and he was obviously choked up. When asked to explain his emotions, Corban Knight said this.

“Tough to explain – you know – putting something to a program for the last four years, it’s coming to an end, it’s tough to explain.

It was obvious; the tie didn’t sit well with the senior forward as he banged his stick on the ice as the clock ticked down the horn sounded, ending the game in a 2-2 tie. At times the Beavers kept the 12,117 fans (second most all-time) frustrated as well as the Beavers kept UND’s shots to the outside and protected their net blocking shot after shot.

When asked about his team’s tenacious shot blocking was a key to the game, Bemidji State Beavers head coach Tom Serratore said.

“You got to block shots,” Serratore said. “That’s hockey; that’s not a key, that’s automatic, that’s non-negotiable, that’s part of being a hockey player, that’s sacrifice.

The Bemidji State Beavers are a hard team to play against, they get in the shooting and they limit your time and space and they pack it in around their net. Tonight, was no different, throughout the game, the Beavers were in UND’s grill.

“It’s always tough to playing against those guys,” Corban Knight said. “The way they play, they really pack it in defensively. It’s a grind against those guys. That was definitely the case tonight. It was a hard fought 65 minutes; it was pretty low scoring hockey – not a lot of chances – it’s the way they play and it’s tough to play against.”

A late power play goal at the 08:37 mark of the third period by freshman defenseman Jordan Schmaltzhelped the University of North Dakota  (18-9-7, 13-6-7 WCHA)  salvage a 2-2 tie with the 11^th place Bemidji State Beavers (6-18-8, 5-14-7 WCHA).

After the game UND head coach Dave Hakstol seem pleased with the effort of his team.

“One point, great performance,” Hakstol said.  “High level of pride for our senior class”

Freshman defenseman Jordan Schmaltz scored at the 08:37 mark of the third period to force the extra session. Schmaltz has been very noticeable on the ice the last 4-5 series and coach Hakstol agreed.

“I think his game took a step about a month ago,” Hakstol said. He’s held it as a pretty good level. I think the challenge for him is no different than it is for the rest of our team, we want to take one more step yet in terms of our over-all performance.”

It was obvious from the replay in the press box that Jordan Schmaltz had scored the game tying goal but the on ice official Brad Shepherd waved the goal off on the ice. After a short review, the goal was confirmed. Tie game. 

“I got a pass from Carter Rowney and kind of made one quick move,” Schmaltz said. “Was lucky to get it on net, it went post and in”

Next weekend, UND travels to Mankato to play the Minnesota State Mavericks in an important two game series, that will go a long way in determining who UND plays during their first round of the WCHA playoffs.

CONFIRMED: UND has officially clinched home ice for the first round of the WCHA playoffs. — North Dakota MHockey (@UNDMHockey) March 3, 2013

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• MacMillian (X2) lead UND past BSU 4-2 (thehockeywriters.com)
• Lamoureux Twins Leave UND in Good Hands (insidehockey.com)
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MacMillan (X2) lead UND past BSU 4-2

Seal of the University of North Dakota (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Grand Forks, ND – Coming into tonight’s game, UND senior forward Danny Kristo had never scored a goal, or recorded a single point in six career games against the Bemidji State Beavers.

No, you don’t need to check your eyes.

During his four year career at the University of North Dakota, Kristo had racked up an impressive (62g-91a—153pts) in a 148 games, but had never scored a single point in his four year career against the Bemidji State Beavers.

Wait, what? Not a single one.

In his seventh game against the Bemidji State Beavers, Kristo finally was able to record a single assist on UND’s third goal that was scored by UND defenseman Joe Gleason.

Apparently, Kristo’s pointless streak against the Beavers was a point of discussion during this week in practice. 

Unlike Danny Kristo, Mark MacMillan has little trouble during his two seasons at UND scoring against the Bemidji State Beavers, coming into tonight’s game, MacMillan had recorded (1g-4a—5 pts) in four games against the Beavers.  Mark added (2g-1a—3pts) to his point total and was awarded the game’s first star of the game as he lead UND (18-9-6, 13-6-6 WCHA) to a 4-2 over the Bemidji State Beavers (6-17-7, 5-13-6 WCHA).

Mark’s brother Mitch MacMillan also chipped in a (1g-1a—2pts) as that line seemed to give BSU fits all night long. One has to wonder if the MacMillan boys are finding their magic they had when they played together in juniors back in Alberni Valley of the BCHL, in British Colombia.

“Hopefully, it seemed to work out well tonight,” Mark MacMillan said.  The chemistry between us is slowly starting to come back. Obviously the college game is little different than junior hockey.”

The University of North Dakota is 8-4-4 when the opposition scores the first goal. That is the second game in a row that the opposition has scored the first goal of the game that UND has come back to win.

The game was tired 1-1 going into the third period, before UND scored four straight goals. BSU head coach Tom Serratore seemed upbeat after the game, even though his team lost.

First off, I thought it was a good hockey game,” Serratore said.  “You know what, you go into third period in this building tied 1-1,  to me it was where we wanted them at that particular time.  Obviously, the second and third goals were killers. We probably could have prevented those goals.”

I don’t think it would be an understatement to say that tonight’s game wasn’t all that entertaining. It was a gut-it-out gritty style of game. The Beavers are a tough team to play against, they get in the shooting lanes and they play a high pressure game. Some like to incorrectly call the Beavers style of play a trap. The head coach of the Beavers agreed that it was tough sledding, out on the ice.

“Tonight, I thought the game was pretty much a turf war,” Serratore said.

When asked if he thought the game was a turf war, head coach Dave Hakstol was hesitant to use the term, he said, “you can call it what you want. It was a hard fought hockey game. At times there wasn't a lot of flow to it.”

 Cross-posted a the Hockey Writes Combine. 

(Video) Marvelous North Dakota Hockey

This is a nice video that was taken by Marv Leier, during last weekend's game between Wisconsin and North Dakota. Leier films the game footage for Midco from his perch between the players benches. I bet he could tell us a story or two about some of the things that he has seen and heard.

North Dakota stomps Wisconsin 4-1

Grand Forks, ND – The Wisconsin Badgers came into tonight’s game smoking hot, the Badgers had one loss (Miami) since November 24, 2012. During that same time frame, the Badgers had an impressive record of 10-1-4 (.800).

Coming into the game, North Dakota was a team going the other direction. The Green and White hadn’t won in five games (0-2-3), and they were looking for their first win since January 12, 2012.

Historically, North Dakota is known for their impressive second half records after the first of the year.  So far during the second half of this season, UND’s record is a mediocre 3-3-2.

With the win tonight, that streak would improve to 4-3-3. Also, with the win, UND was also able to stop a five game winless streak (0-2-3).

Tonight, North Dakota wasted no time getting on the board as freshman forward Rocco Grimaldi drew a penalty 30 second into the game.

UND would cash in on the power-play with a goal from Mark MacMillan 15 seconds later. That was MacMillan’s ninth goal of the season.  Assisting on MacMillan’s goal was Rocco Grimaldi and Jordan Schmaltz.

Twelve minutes later, North Dakota would push the lead to 2-0 with another power-play goal by Joe Gleason. Drawing the assists on Gleason’s goal were Danny Kristo and Corban Knight.  With the assist, Kristo scored his 144^th point of his career tying him with former fighting Sioux forward Jay Panzer, Jim Archibald and Jeff McLean.

After the game, UND Head coach Dave Hakstol talked about the importance of getting those two power play goals early in the game.

“I thought the first power play goal was key,” Hakstol said. “The second one was nice to get at as well. But bigger than that for me was the penalty kill that we had right back-to-back with our first power play goal.”

UND would push the score to 4-0, with two even strength goals, eight minutes apart from Sophomore Michael Parks.

After the game, Michael Parks’ line mate Carter Rowney, who assisted on both of Park’s goals, was excited to see him bury a few goals.

“I was really excited for Parks to get a couple few goals tonight,” Rowney said.  “Since we have been playing with each other we’ve been a little snake bitten. We’ve had our opportunities, but it wasn’t coming, but I think we tried to stick with it and tried to stay loose around the net. It was lucky enough to come in today.”

One Michael Parks’ goals came on a wraparound goal. This is what the sophomore forward had to say about his highlight goal.

“Oh finally,” Parks said. “A bit of a relief I think if anything – good play by Rowney – put it off the pad and it was really easy with the goalie being on the other side of the net.”

UW would great the shutout with a goal from Wisconsin junior forward Mark Zengerle at the 13:30 mark of the third period.

That was all of the scoring the rest of the way.

UND was strong defensively all weekend long, as the UND back end only give up two goals all weekend long. UND has only give up

“I would give us defensively, I would give us a B-plus,” Hakstol said. “I thought we were pretty responsible. Last night we created some of our own problems. On two or three occasions in a tight game like that, two or three opportunities against is a big deal. I thought we did little things well. I thought it was a weekend where we blocked shots well, which is something that we have been working to be better at. I liked that area of our game. I liked our over-all commitment to the defensive side“

Cross Posted at the Hockey Writers - Combine... 

UND vs. UW lines game two

North Dakota Forward Lines

19 Rocco Grimaldi–10 Corban Knight (A) –7 Danny Kristo (A)

9 Drake Caggiula  –27 Carter Rowney (A)–15 Michael Parks
25 Mitch MacMillan – 16 Mark MacMillan - 17 Colten St. Clair

8 Dan Senkbeil–28 Stephane Pattyn– Derek Rodwell

North Dakota Defense Pairings

2 Andrew MacWilliam (C) – 18 Dillon Simpson

4 Derek Forbort – 24 Jordan Schmaltz

Nick Mattson – 20 Joe Gleason

North Dakota Goalies

31 Zane Gothberg

33 Clarke Saunders

35 Tate Maris

Not in the lineup: 13 Connor Gaarder, 29 Bryn Chyzyk, 22 Andrew Panzarella, 26 Coltyn Sanderson, 21 Brendan O’Donnell

WCHA Officials: Referees: Tom Sterns (8), Matt Ulwelling (23), Linesman: Andy Carton (92), Nathan Freeman (78).

Wisconsin Badgers Forward Lines

16 Joseph LaBate–9 Mark Zengerle–25 Michael Mersch
17 Nic Kerdiles–14 Jefferson Dahl–7 Tyler Barnes
20 Ryan Little (A)–21 Brendan Woods–18 Sean Little
26 Brad Navin–12 Keegan Meuer–8 Matt Pappe

Wisconsin Badgers Defense Parings

28 Kevin Schulze–55 John Ramage (C)
22 Eddie Wittchow - 24 Joe Faust

19 Jake McCabe–27 Frankie Simonelli (A)

Wisconsin Badgers Goalies

30 Landon Peterson

33 Joel Rumpel

Kristo's assist was his 144th career point, tying him with Jay Panzer, Jim Archibald and Jeff McLean for 28th all-time at UND.
— North Dakota MHockey (@UNDMHockey) February 3, 2013