Walk-on’s goal leads UND to victory over C.C.

UND forward Mitch MacMillan
Eric Classen, UND Sports

Grand Forks, ND – Last night, the University of North Dakota ended their seven game unbeaten streak with a 4-3 loss to the Colorado College Tigers.  The Tigers on the other hand stopped a horrendous seven game winless streak.

Upon arriving at the arena, it appeared that UND head coach Dave Haksol was not pleased with his line up from the previous night.  There were major changes to the lineup from the night before.

One might say, that a message was being sent to the players.

UND senior defenseman Joe Gleason was moved from defense to the fourth line. Freshman goalie Zane Gothberg replaced starting goaltender Clarke Saunders in net. Sophomore forward Connor Gaarder was a healthy scratch.  Freshman Colton St. Clair was also a spectator from the stands as well.

The moves appeared to have worked out for UND.

In the previous game, Tigers had the upper hand on UND for most of the night and the Green and White had trouble generating much in the way of offense. It appeared that UND was just a bit off their game and they were getting beat to the puck by the Tigers most of the night.

This sluggishness would follow UND into the first period of tonight’s game as well.

The Tigers would draw first blood with a goal from senior forward Scott Winkler at the 03:13 mark of the first period.

UND didn’t panic and scored the equalizer at the 05:17 mark of the first period with a goal from Danny Kristo. With that goal, Kristo extended his scoring streak to seven games. Assisting on Kirsto’s goal was Mitch MacMillan and Derek Forbort.

The Tigers would get another goal from Scott Winkler to take their last lead of the game.

UND would tie the game with a goal from senior forward Joe Gleason on the power play at the 08:02 mark of the second period. Assisting on Gleason’s goal was Corban Knight and Dillon Simpson. With the assist tonight, Knight extended his point streak to 17 games. Knight is now starting to enter in to uncharted water. Knight is now tied with former UND forward Brandon Bochenski’s 2002-03 for 10^th all-time longest point streaks. The last player from UND to record an 18 game point streak was Dixon Ward during the 1990-91 season.

Then the momentum started to turn in the second period, in UND’s favor. UND would finally get its first lead of the weekend at the 13:22 mark of the second period with a goal from junior forward Mitch MacMillan. That lead would be short lived, as the Tigers would even the score at the 05:13 mark of the third period with a goal form Rylan Schwartz.

Kristo had this to say on the swing of momentum in the second period.

“Pretty much playing desperate hockey,” Kristo said. “It was an unacceptable first period – four shots on net – losing in our home building – after we lost last night.  Pretty much said guys, you know what we have to step up – this is unacceptable – started getting puck deep. Started getting our grind game going a little bit, getting pucks to the net.”

The game winning goal would come from an unlikely hero. Dan “Jim” Senkbeil a walk-on and a fan favorite, would score the game winning goal at the 07:45 mark of the third period when he banged home a loose puck in the Colorado College crease sending the crowd of 11,915 into a wild frenzy. Assisting on Jim’s goal was Danny Kristo and Nick Mattson.

After the game, Senkbeil was all smiles; the sophomore forward had gone from being a healthy scratch earlier in the year to scoring the game winning goal at a critical time.

“It was a great shot by Dan [Kristo],” Senkbeil said. “A great initial shot by [Jordan] Smaltz and my eyes kind of lit up when the puck was in the crease and I just tried to pound it home.”

At the 18:54 mark of the third period, Danny Kristo would ice the game with an empty netter from center ice.

UND forward Mitch MacMillan
Eric Classen, UND Sports

Another player got his first goal of his career at UND.

Mitch MacMillan the transfer student from Saint Cloud State scored a goal and an assist and played on the first line with Danny Kristo and Corban Knight for most of the night. One could say that MacMillan’s college career has come full circle.

At Saint Cloud, MacMillan had a hard time cracking the lineup. MacMillan has now been playing in the top nine forward positions, since he became eligible, after sitting out a year due to NCAA transfer rules.

“They’re really special players and you know you have to take the most of an opportunity to play with them,” MacMillan said.  “I thought we had a good game tonight.”

After a slow start to the game, head coach Dave Hakstol seem pleased with his team’s effort to gut out a win against the Tigers.

“We trying hard in the first period but not a lot was happening or going our direction,” Hakstol said. “We were creating a whole lot and it was really hard to create any energy. I thought in the second period it was nothing major in terms of a major change. It was just one good shift after the next and slowly we built the momentum. So, maybe some of the chemistry was part of that. But I think it was just more the guy’s determination.”

With the win Tonight, UND is 5-3-3 when the opposition scores the first goal.

Corban Knight named Red Baron WCHA Co-Offensive Player of the Week.

MADISON, Wis. – Forwards Josh Archibald of the University of Nebraska Omaha, who scored four goals in a league sweep over Colorado College last weekend, and Corban Knight of the University of North Dakota, who produced six scoring points in a pair of victories over Holy Cross, have been named Red Baron® WCHA co-Offensive Players of the Week for January 8. Knight also earned the weekly award on Dec. 18.

 Archibald, a 5-10, 170-pound sophomore center from Brainerd, Minn., powered the host Mavericks (13-8-1) to back-to-back conference wins over visiting Colorado College on Jan. 4-5 at CenturyLink Center Omaha and into first place in the WCHA race. He notched a three-goal hat trick, the first of his collegiate career, and was the First Star of the Game in UNO’s 8-4 triumph last Friday night, scoring in each period at even-strength, on the power-play and while shorthanded. The following night (Saturday), he scored his fourth goal of the series in the third period, giving him four goals on four shots, as the Mavericks completed the sweep over the Tigers with a 3-1 win. In the two games, he had four goals, four shots on goal and a +4 plus/minus rating.

A draftee of the NHL’s Pittsburgh Penguins, Archibald is third in team scoring this season with 21 points (11g, 10a).

 Knight, a 6-2, 200-pound senior center from High River, Alberta, put together his second straight six-point weekend and figured in on both game-winning goals as host North Dakota (12-5-3) collected its second sweep in a row with 5-2 and 3-2 non-conference wins over No. 20-ranked Holy Cross at Ralph Engelstad Arena in Grand Forks. Named the game’s No. 1 star last Friday and the No. 2 star on Saturday, Knight also extended his point-scoring streak to 15 games, UND’s longest since All-American Brandon Bochenski had a 17-game streak in 2002-03. He had two goals, including the game-winner, and two assists on Jan. 4 and then had two more assists on Jan. 5, both in the third period and on the power-play, setting up Michael Parks’ game-tying goal and Danny Kristo’s game-winning goal as UND rallied from a 2-0 deficit for a 3-2 win. Knight also won 21-of-24 (87.5%) face-offs on Saturday and 31-of-40 (77.5%) in the series.

Related articles

• Knight's Four Points Leads UND Past Holy Cross (insidehockey.com)
• Why not Corban Knight for the Hobey Baker? (thehockeywriters.com)

A couple of options for the Wild...

I think the Wild should trade defenseman Brett Burns to another team so they can unload his fat contract and then pick up some offense talent. I think Patrick Sharp, Dustin Byfuglien or Kris Versteeg would be nice additions to the Wild line up. The Blackhawks are going to have to move a few players to get under the salary cap. The rule that punishes the Blackhawks because Jonahtan Toews won the Conn Smythe, is a horrible rule.

Seis: It'll be interesting what Chicago does this week. Patrick Sharp, Dustin Byfuglien and/or Kris Versteeg could be cap casualties. The Blackhawks were over the cap about $2.5 million this year, and Jonathan Toews had a $1.3 million bonus for winning the Conn Smythe. And since they were already over, all this will be charged to next year's cap. So while the official number hasn't been released, the Blackhawks cap could be about $4 million lower than everybody else's next year.

In essense, a bunch of sportswriters' votes (Toews) cost the Blackhawks $1.3 million of cap space next year. Not that Toews didn't deserve it, but you know what I mean.

The Wild would love Sharp if he's available, but I'm sure so would about a dozen other teams. They'd like Byfuglien, too, but as his mom told me in that feature I wrote on Big Buff before the Finals, she doesn't think the Wild would be a good place for him. As she said, "too many relatives, too close by." I'm sure the Wild like Versteeg, but I just don't see it being "the fit."

I think Stephen Weiss is somebody the Wild would love, but I just don't know if Florida trades him. I've mentioned Carter before.

The Wild again is looking for a big center, but as I mentioned above, any significant trade that would include somebody like Burns I would guess has to be for somebody that's in his 20s with a good chunk of contract left. [Russo's Rants]

I still to this day can't figure out why the Boston Bruins sent the Chicago Blackhawks Kris Versteeg for Brandon Bochenski? That trade is a really head scratchier. No offense to former Fighting Sioux forward Brandon "Bucks" Bochenski but Kris Versteeg has scored 101 points in two plus seasons in the NHL and Brandon Bochenski has played with six NHL teams and never played more than 40 games in a season.