Wildcats blast Bulldogs again, 8-3, but optimism remains
It was not a pretty sight for 3,513 fans at the DECC, as UMD’s hockey team absorbed its second shellacking in as many nights, this time an 8-3 pounding at the hands of Northern Michigan. After the game, new UMD coach Scott Sandelin was upbeat, saying he noted some positive signs, but he had to cut the interview short because he was leaving town.
No, it’s far too early for Sandelin to have received any threats of being run out of town. “Recruiting trip,” he said. “I’ll drive as far as I can get tonight, then find a cheap hotel to stay in, and get to the game tomorrow night.”
That’s the way it is when you need to find goal-scorers to rebuild a program that is suffering from a serious shortage of them. The Bulldogs, who were buried 9-1 by Northern Friday night, got goals from Jon Francisco, Judd Medak and Mark Gunderson. But none of them came before the Wildcats had built a 3-0 first-period lead and expanded it to 4-0 in the second. Northern went on to spread out the UMD goals while the lead stretched from 4-0 to 6-1 to 8-2.
If you were going to be playing a team named the Wildcats this weekend, Wayne State’s football team would have been the judicious choice; just stay away from any team from Northern Michigan. UMD’s football team overran Wayne State’s Wildcats 45-13 Saturday afternoon, then the UMD volleyball team was beaten by the Northern Michigan Wildcats later Saturday afternoon. Then came Saturday night, and the Northern Michigan Wildcats completed their lopsided sweep at the DECC.
Sophomore Bryce Cockburn had a hat trick for Northern, while his linemates, Chad Theuer and Fred Mattersdorfer, each had a goal and four assists. Sophomore Terry Harrison wound up with two goals, and Sean Connolly scored for the defense. UMD outshot Northern 34-27, but the quality of Northern’s shots left Gregoire with only 19 saves. Dan Ragusett, a hometown Northern senior from Marquette, kicked out 31 UMD shots. The trouble was, the quality of UMD’s shots didn’t match the quantity listed on the shot chart.
“I’ve left our top three lines intact, and juggled players on the fourth,” said Northern coach Rick Comley. “But for a young team like ours to come in here and get two winsÂ…I don’t know how many nights I’ve had teams limp home from trips like this. I thought UMD would be tougher tonight, and I thought it was tougher. We got some early goals, but they fought through that. They were much more intense and much more physical tonight.”
Those early goals were pivotal to the outcome, of course. Cockburn opened a 3-0 Northern first period by scoring at 4:21, with two whacks at the puck near the crease after Chad Theuer’s pass out. Twenty seconds later, Tom Nelson was penalized for high-sticking, and Theuer circled the net and set up Harrison for a power-play goal and a 2-0 lead at 5:30. The Wildcats were attacking again, late in the period, when the puck popped loose and Cockburn quickly put it away at 16:50. The ‘Cats made it 4-0 at 4:10 of the second period, when Mattersdorfer converted Ryan Carrigan’s pass from behind the net with a shot that went in off the skate of UMD’s Drew Otten.
Sandelin shook up his lineup, inserting untried sophomore Jason Gregoire in goal. Eager as the former Moorhead star had to be to get in, the thrill didn’t last long. Speculation also was that Sandelin had benched regulars like captain Derek Derow and productive center Nick Anderson, but after the game, Sandelin said Derow had a strong case of the flu, and Anderson had a sore knee.
“I liked the way our lines worked tonight,” said Sandelin. “I thought we had much more effort, and more intensity and jump. We outshot ’em, and at times outplayed ’em. We made some poor plays away from the puck, and that caused us to give them some easy goals. But I got a chance to see what we’ve got. We were able to play a lot of players this weekend.”
The Bulldogs didn’t score until 5:28 of the second period, when Francisco put one off the left pipe and in. Rookie Junior Lessard relayed the puck from Beau Geisler to Franciscon on the goal. Until then, the Bulldogs had stormed the net several times, only to be unable to put the puck in the net.
Harrison countered Francisco’s goal on a turnover, when Gregoire was left alone, dropped into the splits, but had Chris Gobert neatly pass behind him to Harrison, who had an open net from five feet out on the left to make it 5-1. Theuer scored from a carom off the end boards, but then Medak scored a picture goal for the Bulldogs with eight seconds left in the middle period. Mark Carlson banked a pass off the right boards ahead to Nate Anderson, who carried in 2-on-1 and sent a perfect pass across the slot for Medak to drill behind goalie Ragusett.
At 6-2, though, the Bulldogs still needed a mighty rally to get back into it in the third period, and Connolly’s power-play goal and Cockburn’s third made it 8-2 and hopeless. Gunderson knocked in Nelson’s power-play pass from behind the net to end the scoring.
But hope remains. The Bulldogs go to Colorado College next weekend, and at 0-4, and having been outscored 27-7, the new Bulldog coach is looking optimistically toward the future. Not only in the DECC dressing room, but on the road in the USHL.
Conner’s 4 touchdowns help UMD celebrate Senior Day 45-13
Erik Conner scored four touchdowns on one side of the ball Saturday, while UMD linebackers Justin Hipple, Jimmy Malo and Chris Markas each nabbed an interception on the other, as the UMD Bulldogs celebrated Senior Day in the best possible fashion — by drubbing Wayne State 45-13 to thrust themselves into next weekend’s Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference championship finale.
Coach Bob Nielson drilled the Bulldogs all week on the importance of making no slips against Wayne State, knowing that if the importance of next Saturday’s 1:30 p.m. game at Winona State intruded enough to disrupt attention on the Wildcats, they were dangerous enough to knock off UMD and render the Winona game meaningless. The Bulldogs went into the high-noon game entangled in an amazing logjam. Winona State was 5-1 atop the NSIC, while UMD, Bemidji State, Concordia of St. Paul, Crookston and Northern State were in an improbable five-way tie at 4-2.
“Our focus all week was to go out and play a no-nonsense game, and take care of business against Wayne State,” said Nielson. “The only disappointing thing is that we gave up some big plays, and we hadn’t been doing that. But on the other side, we generated some turnovers, and we certainly played with consistency, running the football and controlling the clock. There were a couple of critical stretches, like that goal-line stand just before halftime. We held, then we came out and scored on our first possession of the second half, and after that we were able to stretch the lead out.”
The 12 seniors were introduced before the final game of the season at Griggs Field in the annual tribute to those who have been laboring for four years on the club. It was so clearly the seniors’ day that sophomore quarterback Ricky Fritz, a passing record-setter this year, could pretty much take the day off, completing just two of six passes for 15 yards, thanks to Nielson’s long-developed strategy.
“I’ve always believed that if they can’t stop you running the ball, why pass?” said Nielson. “If you throw incomplete, it can get you off your schedule.”
The coach may not have had Senior Day on his mind, but it worked out that way. Conner, the only senior starter on offense, was a one-man show, gaining 177 yards on 22 carries, and his four touchdowns give him 13 for the season — seven in the three straight victories that followed UMD’s two NSIC losses in succession, to Concordia and at Northern State. There are six starting seniors on defense, including right tackle Mike Tuisee, right end Dan Schilling and left cornerback Nathan Daigle, so it was fitting that Hipple, Malo and Markas — the three senior starting linebackers — each came up with an interception.
“It was our last home game, and our offense is clicking right now,” said Connor. “I can’t say more about our front five. This was a day where we made the plays, and if we make our plays, nobody in the league can stop us.”
Conner, who scored on a 1-yard run to cap UMD’s game-opening drive, added a 12-yard scoring run to lift UMD to a 14-7 lead, and his scoring runs of 22 and 5 yards in the third quarter boosted the lead to 38-7. Conner smiled widely when asked about the coach’s preference for running the ball: “Coming from a running back, I can’t complain,” he said. Asked if he would have rather kept playing instead of coming out, along with Fritz and other starters, with more than a quarter remaining, Conner smiled again and said: “I can’t be stingy.”
The only anxious moment came after that opening drive of 69 yards in 14 plays, which consumed over 6 minutes. Conner rammed into the end zone, but Chad Gerlach’s extra point kick was wide, leaving an opening at 6-0. Wildcat quarterback Justin Burhoop, chased back to his own 8 on Wayne State’s first two offensive plays, lofted a pass to Damon Ruffin up the right sideline, and Ruffin sprinted 89 yards before he was caught from behind, only momentarily preventing the touchdown that Bryce Teager got from the 2. Nate Hale — Nathan Hale? — made the point-after kick for a 7-6 lead for the visitors.
Teager made the most of his opportunity for the day, after coach Scott Hoffman benched starting running backs Elroy Brown and Dion Gaston for the game, allegedly for partying beyond disciplinary bounds. Teager, a slippery little (5-7, 170) freshman from South Sioux City, Neb., slithered through the UMD defense 25 times for 102 of Wayne State’s 105 total rushing yards. Burhoop also passed for 235 yards on a 12-25 day, while receivers Ruffin caught three for 104 yards and Tavaris Johnson caught five for 82 yards.
But the Bulldog offensive line led another march, this one using nine plays to cover the 64 yards in 4:45, with Conner sweeping left end for the final 12 and the touchdown. Fritz sprinted around left end for the 2-point conversion, making it 14-7. The Bulldogs did all the heavy work on their next drive before the first quarter ended, although they waited until the start of the second quarter for the first of two 1-yard touchdown runs by junior Nick Boland. Gerlach kicked the extra point and also connected on a 27-yard field goal to lift UMD to a 24-7 halftime lead.
It was about then that the sun came out, after a grey and blustery first half, and the Bulldogs, and their revived title hopes, warmed up too. Conner’s two third-quarter touchdowns, and Boland’s second, after an 11-play, 58-yard, drive took 6:35 off the clock to open the fourth, made it a 45-7 cushion. Burhoop’s 25-yard touchdown pass to Ryan Kuester for the Wildcats came on the final play of the game and did little to tarnish the bright finish to the afternoon.
“Everyone wanted to win this one for the seniors,” said junior safety Kevin Westbrock. “When we lost those two games, it made us forget about everything else and go one game at a time. Now Winona is going to be the biggest game of the season.”
Conner said: “We’ve got a lot of momentum now. We know Winona has a great team, but we also knew that Wayne State never dies, and if we didn’t take care of business today, next week would mean nothing.”
New-look Wildcats with hometown flavor run over UMD 7-1
DULUTH, MINN. — When UMD and Northern Michigan meet on a hockey rink, you could say they’d battle like cats and dogs. But in Friday night’s case, score one for the cats. Northern Michigan’s program has changed dramatically in the last two years, and the new-look Wildcats buried the Bulldogs 7-1 with a five-goal third period.
It was a painful step in the restructuring process by new UMD coach Scott Sandelin, whose team was competitive for two and a half periods before a 2-1 game blew up in front of a home crowd announced at 3,635 at the DECC.
“We strive for the third period to be our best,” said Chris Gobert, a 5-foot-9, 164-pound sophomore from Marquette who scored both first-period goals for Northern and completed his hat trick to get the Wildcat rally started in the third period. He may have set some kind of team record by scoring two of his three goals shorthanded.
“We were thinking that they were a good-skating team and we knew they would come out hard in the third period, just as they had in the second,” Gobert added. “With a 2-1 lead, we figured if we could weather the storm, we could be in good position.”
Five straight goals is a pretty effective way to show you’ve weathered the storm. Nobody better embodies the change in design of the Northern Michigan program than Gobert, who was last year’s rookie of the year in the CCHA with 18 goals and 18 assists, but hadn’t scored in five games this season, until Friday.
Under Coach Rick Comley, Northern Michigan had a rich tradition of big, not quick teams that scored so effectively that teams were less than anxious to make the trip to the Upper Peninsula, where Northern was practically unbeatable at Lakeview Arena, a cozy rink which had fast-rounded corners and seemed smaller than its regulation dimensions. Now the Wildcats are in the CCHA, and last year they moved into a new arena, with larger, 200-by-85 foot Olympic rink dimensions. And the team is different, too.
Instead of being populated by large, not-necessarily-fast Canadian players, the current Wildcats are not that big, but they are extremely quick. Comley still recruits top Canadian players, but also hits the USHL and the North American junior leagues in the U.S. He has two Minnesotans — Ambrose Tappe from Maple Grove and Dan Donnette from Anoka — but the big change is that seven Wildcats are from Michigan, including four hometowners from Marquette who grew up watching the Wildcats.
“That’s pretty good from a small town the size of Marquette,” Comley said. “And we have another one coming in next year in Alan Swanson, who is one of three Marquette kids playing for Green Bay in the USHL.”
Gobert is a prize cultivated from that crop. “I was a rink-rat wen I was younger,” he said. “When I was about 9, I’d got to the Wildcat games and wait outside the locker room. It’s unreal to get to play with the kids you grow up with, then get to play with some of them again and get the opportunity to go through this experience with coach Comley.”
Gobert is left wing on the first line, and spent the game buzzing around in UMD’s zone as if he had proprietory rights on the puck. The Wildcats were penalized in the first minute of the game, but Gobert zoomed in shorthanded, only to have his shot thwarted by freshman UMD goaltender Ryan Coole. “I was in too close,” said Gobert.
Three minutes later, Northern was penalized again, and amazingly, Gobert got loose again against the UMD power play. This time Gobert beat Coole, with a deke to his backhand and a shot from the left edge at 4:10.
Northern held command of all the loose pucks, to say nothing of the flow of the game, for the rest of the first period and made it 2-0 when Gobert struck again at 11:38, after the Wildcats pelted Coole with shots on a flurry until the little sophomore put it away. “I was just in the right place at the right time, and I shot it off the post and it went in,” Gobert said.
UMD came out with some fire to open the second period, and cut the deficit to 2-1 at 0:33 when Jesse Fibiger shot from the point and freshman Nick Anderson plunked the rebound. And that, as they say, was about the end of the highlights for the home side. The ‘Dogs stayed at 2-1 until the second intermission, and through the first 10 minutes of the third. But thenÂ…it was as if the DECC roof caved in.
“It was 2-1 after two, and they’re in a fragile situation,” Comley said. “If they came out and got that second goal, it might have been completely different.”
Anything different would have been welcome by the sparse crowd, who saw the Bulldogs outshot 45-25 for the game. At the 10-minute mark of the third period, UMD defenseman Mark Carlson carried deep into the right corner on a power play and flung a wide-angle shot that Northern goaltender Craig Kowalski had no trouble stopping. It was the last shot on goal that any Bulldog managed in the game.
Before that UMD power play expired, Gobert was sprung by a Jimmy Jackson pass for yet another breakaway at 10:33, racing in solo to score again — completing a hat trick for a 3-1 lead with his second shorthanded goal. “I didn’t have any shorthanded last year,” he said.
It was difficult to tell whether UMD suffered a complete collapse at that point or whether Northern just got fired up. Probably it was a combination of both. At 12:04, Colin Young banked a pass ahead off the right side boards and threaded it perfectly to Chad Theuer, who carried to the right circle and fired a shot right through Coole to make it 4-1. At 13:09, the Wildcats scored almost an instant-replay goal, as Ambrose Tappe carried up the right side and shot from the circle, beating Coole for a 5-1 cushion.
When the ‘Cats got a power play in the closing minutes, Sean Connolly passed crisply from the point to the right circle, where Dave Bonk promptly relayed it across the slot, and Brent Robertson one-timed his shot for a 6-1 lead at 17:55. At 18:34, Mike Stutzel steered in a Connolly shot to complete the romp.
While it’s characteristic for the coaches to exchange pleasantries after a two-game series, Comley made a point to walk directly to Sandelin on the ice when the game ended. “I told him to hang in there,” said Comley. “They’ll get the job done, but it’ll take time.”
Bulldogs blown out 9-2 by free-wheeling Gophers for sweep
MINNEAPOLIS, MINN. — As Saturday night’s WCHA game continued, UMD’s objectives became simpler. First, it was to try to gain a split of their opening series. Then it was to try to get back in the game from an early deficit. And finally, it was an attempt to win the third period, just to have something to take home from Mariucci Arena.
But when the Bulldogs climbed on their bus for the post-game ride Up North, they were empty-handed. Minnesota supported its early lead with a four-goal second period frolicked to a 9-2 victory before 9,731 fans at Mariucci Arena.
“I knew there’d be some ups and downs,” said Scott Sandelin, who just watched his new team play its first series with him as head coach. “This was a ‘down.’ We got beat by a helluva team. They came to play tonight and they beat us in every phase of the game — skating, beating us to loose pucks. Our goal in the third period was just to win the period.”
Minnesota outshot UMD 43-29, and when the Bulldogs pulled themselves together to try to at least win the third period, and, despite goals by Andy Reierson and Nick Anderson, they fell 3-2 at that modest task as well.
The Bulldogs, who played well enough to win Friday’s game before losing 3-1 on two power-play goals and an open-netter, weren’t in the rematch until the Gophers had six goals on the board. In WCHA hockey, too little-too late is the recipe for disaster. For the Gophers, it was the ninth straight victory over UMD, dating back to the Bulldogs’ 2-of-3 playoff series triumph in 1998, and it meant the Bulldog seniors have never won a game at Mariucci Arena.
“They really played hard last night,” said Gopher coach Don Lucia, about his just-vanquished foe. “They had to be a little spent from that, and once we got going, we had nine different guys score goals.”
The first goal, just 2:05 into the game, was questionable. UMD goaltender Rob Anderson blocked Jeff Taffe’s shot and Troy Riddle’s rebound try, but when he went down to smother the puck, Riddle stabbed his stickblade under Anderson and poked the puck in before it was blown dead. But there wasn’t much question about the other Gopher tallies.
A Gopher rush seemed to be defused when a pass bounced over a stick in the slot, but Ben Tharp moved in from left point and drilled a screened shot into the upper right corner of the net at 8:15 for the 2-0 first period, in which the Gophers outshot UMD 15-6.
The ‘Dogs were still in position to get back in the game, and appeared to do just that when Beau Geisler ripped a slapshot that caught the net on a power play two minutes into the second period. But referee Don Adam blew his whistle and called UMD for a man in the crease, presumably when Judd Medak had a skate in the right edge of the designated area. That would have made it 2-1, and maybe it could have rejuventated UMD. Instead, the Gophers swarmed the net.
At 9:37, former Duluth East defenseman Nick Angell bombed a low slapshot in from the left point with each team a man short. The Bulldogs were killing a Medak penalty when Adam signalled a delayed second call on Ryan Homstol, and Matt Koalska made it 3-0 on the delay. That meant Medak got to leave the penalty box, but Homstol took his spot, and on THAT power play, it became 5-0 as Johnny Pohl spun away from the defenders in front and deposited the puck in the net at 15:20.
Two minutes later, Anderson went down making a save, and two teammates went down in front of him, hoping to block any rebound tries, but Gopher defenseman Jordan Leopold backed out of the congestion and lifted his shot in over the menagerie for the 6-0 count.
Sandelin pulled the beleaguered Anderson — “It wasn’t his fault,” the coach said — and sent in freshman goalie Adam Coole to start the third period. Reierson got the zero off UMD’s side of the scoreboard with a goal at 1:42, moving in from the point to score on Mark Gunderson’s pass out from behind the net. But even then, the Gophers wouldn’t let up.
Mike Miskovich was penalized for roughing at 2:07, and had to watch his brother, Gopher senior Aaron Miskovich, score another power-play goal, this time from the right side of the net on a carom-shot off Coole at 2:44.
“The goalie had his stick in the way,” said Aaron. “I was lucky to hit it and the puck bounced in, but I saw the stick there. It all evens out. I had a slapshot that he never saw, and the puck hit the knob of his stick.”
The Bulldogs got a power play of their own next, and Nick Anderson deflected Geisler’s point shot into the left edge at 4:33.
Again, however, the Gophers roared back, with Matt Leimbeck moving in near the top of the left circle for a shot that hit Coole but trickled through his legs for an 8-2 count at 6:51.
Erik Wendell finished the rout with Minnesota’s fourth power-play goal of the game and sixth of the weekend.
“I came in here to find out about our team,” said Sandelin. “Some guys were great, and some need to find it.”
Bulldogs blown out 9-2 by free-wheeling Gophers for sweep
MINNEAPOLIS, MINN. — As Saturday night’s WCHA game continued, UMD’s objectives became simpler. First, it was to try to gain a split of their opening series. Then it was to try to get back in the game from an early deficit. And finally, it was an attempt to win the third period, just to have something to take home from Mariucci Arena.
But when the Bulldogs climbed on their bus for the post-game ride Up North, they were empty-handed. Minnesota supported its early lead with a four-goal second period frolicked to a 9-2 victory before 9,731 fans at Mariucci Arena.
“I knew there’d be some ups and downs,” said Scott Sandelin, who just watched his new team play its first series with him as head coach. “This was a ‘down.’ We got beat by a helluva team. They came to play tonight and they beat us in every phase of the game — skating, beating us to loose pucks. Our goal in the third period was just to win the period.”
Minnesota outshot UMD 43-29, and when the Bulldogs pulled themselves together to try to at least win the third period, and, despite goals by Andy Reierson and Nick Anderson, they fell 3-2 at that modest task as well.
The Bulldogs, who played well enough to win Friday’s game before losing 3-1 on two power-play goals and an open-netter, weren’t in the rematch until the Gophers had six goals on the board. In WCHA hockey, too little-too late is the recipe for disaster. For the Gophers, it was the ninth straight victory over UMD, dating back to the Bulldogs’ 2-of-3 playoff series triumph in 1998, and it meant the Bulldog seniors have never won a game at Mariucci Arena.
“They really played hard last night,” said Gopher coach Don Lucia, about his just-vanquished foe. “They had to be a little spent from that, and once we got going, we had nine different guys score goals.”
The first goal, just 2:05 into the game, was questionable. UMD goaltender Rob Anderson blocked Jeff Taffe’s shot and Troy Riddle’s rebound try, but when he went down to smother the puck, Riddle stabbed his stickblade under Anderson and poked the puck in before it was blown dead. But there wasn’t much question about the other Gopher tallies.
A Gopher rush seemed to be defused when a pass bounced over a stick in the slot, but Ben Tharp moved in from left point and drilled a screened shot into the upper right corner of the net at 8:15 for the 2-0 first period, in which the Gophers outshot UMD 15-6.
The ‘Dogs were still in position to get back in the game, and appeared to do just that when Beau Geisler ripped a slapshot that caught the net on a power play two minutes into the second period. But referee Don Adam blew his whistle and called UMD for a man in the crease, presumably when Judd Medak had a skate in the right edge of the designated area. That would have made it 2-1, and maybe it could have rejuventated UMD. Instead, the Gophers swarmed the net.
At 9:37, former Duluth East defenseman Nick Angell bombed a low slapshot in from the left point with each team a man short. The Bulldogs were killing a Medak penalty when Adam signalled a delayed second call on Ryan Homstol, and Matt Koalska made it 3-0 on the delay. That meant Medak got to leave the penalty box, but Homstol took his spot, and on THAT power play, it became 5-0 as Johnny Pohl spun away from the defenders in front and deposited the puck in the net at 15:20.
Two minutes later, Anderson went down making a save, and two teammates went down in front of him, hoping to block any rebound tries, but Gopher defenseman Jordan Leopold backed out of the congestion and lifted his shot in over the menagerie for the 6-0 count.
Sandelin pulled the beleaguered Anderson — “It wasn’t his fault,” the coach said — and sent in freshman goalie Adam Coole to start the third period. Reierson got the zero off UMD’s side of the scoreboard with a goal at 1:42, moving in from the point to score on Mark Gunderson’s pass out from behind the net. But even then, the Gophers wouldn’t let up.
Mike Miskovich was penalized for roughing at 2:07, and had to watch his brother, Gopher senior Aaron Miskovich, score another power-play goal, this time from the right side of the net on a carom-shot off Coole at 2:44.
“The goalie had his stick in the way,” said Aaron. “I was lucky to hit it and the puck bounced in, but I saw the stick there. It all evens out. I had a slapshot that he never saw, and the puck hit the knob of his stick.”
The Bulldogs got a power play of their own next, and Nick Anderson deflected Geisler’s point shot into the left edge at 4:33.
Again, however, the Gophers roared back, with Matt Leimbeck moving in near the top of the left circle for a shot that hit Coole but trickled through his legs for an 8-2 count at 6:51.
Erik Wendell finished the rout with Minnesota’s fourth power-play goal of the game and sixth of the weekend.
“I came in here to find out about our team,” said Sandelin. “Some guys were great, and some need to find it.”
About the Author
John Gilbert is a lifetime Minnesotan and career journalist, specializing in cars and sports during and since spending 30 years at the Minneapolis Tribune, now the Star Tribune. More recently, he has continued translating the high-tech world of autos and sharing his passionate insights as a freelance writer/photographer/broadcaster. A member of the prestigious North American Car and Truck of the Year jury since 1993. John can be heard Monday-Friday from 9-11am on 610 KDAL(www.kdal610.com) on the "John Gilbert Show," and writes a column in the Duluth Reader.
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