Zaugg, Vetter lead Badgers to women’s NCAA title

MINNEAPOLIS, MN. — Sophomore Jinelle Zaugg scored two goals and freshman goaltender Jessie Vetter recorded her second shutout in two Frozen Four games as Wisconsin capped a spectacular breakthrough season with a 3-0 victory over Minnesota in the NCAA womenÂ’s hockey championship game Sunday.

The victory, before 4,701 fans at Mariucci Arena, gave the Badgers a 36-4-1 record and came after also winning the WCHA women’s regular season and playoff championships. Minnesota, which tied Minnesota-Duluth for second in the WCHA and lost 4-1 to Wisconsin in the WCHA playoff final, finished 29-11-1 – one game short of winning a third straight NCAA title.

Because Wisconsin had beaten the Gophers four out of five times this season coming into the game, someone asked Minnesota coach Laura Halldorson what it was that made Wisconsin so difficult for her Gophers to play against. “They have three very strong lines, very strong defense, and good goaltending,” said Halldorson. “They’re hard to play against for any team in the country.

“We were the fourth seed, and we beat No. 1 (New Hampshire), and if we’d beaten No. 2, it would have been little short of a miracle.”

Indeed, WisconsinÂ’s great teamwork and balanced skill level provided the breakthrough season. In the five previous womenÂ’s NCAA tournaments, Minnesota-Duluth won the first three and Minnesota the next two, so getting the big trophy out of the state took something special, and these Badgers had it. In their history of Division One hockey, Minnesota had beaten WisconsinÂ’s ever-improving team for a record of 23-4-2 until this season, when the Badgers won five of the six meetings.

But Wisconsin coach Mark Johnson knew history was meaningless when it came to the final game. His Badgers had barely made it to Mariucci, by beating Mercyhurst 2-1 in double overtime, and overcame a strong St. Lawrence team 1-0 in FridayÂ’s semifinals, while Minnesota was stunning top-ranked New Hampshire 5-4.

“I want to congratulate Minnesota and Laura did a nice job coaching them this year, because they were more difficult and challenging for us to play each time we played them,” said Johnson. “We had to dethrone the two-time defending champions, and we knew they weren’t going to go down without a fight.

“We told the players that what happened in the previous five games against Minnesota becomes irrelevant,” said Johnson. “We said we had to play a strong first 10 minutes. When we did that, and came out of it with a power-play goal and then Grace Hutchins tips one in, I felt a lot better. At playoff time, special teams have to be good. They have to score what I call timely goals.”

The first timely goal came at 9:56, when Wisconsin had killed a penalty and then got its first power play. Bobbi-Jo Slusar shot from the left point and the puck hit traffic in front of the net, and Zaugg, at 6-foot-1 the biggest player on either team, found the rebound and drilled it past Gopher freshman goaltender Brittony Chartier. “They gave me an open shot,” said Slusar, “so I took it, and the puck bounced around until Zaugg got hold of it.

If the goal punctured MinnesotaÂ’s opening enthusiasm, it was punctured again 30 seconds later. Nikki Burish got the puck and moved to the top of the left circle where she sent a shot skipping through the congestion in front, and Grace Hutchins deflected it into the right edge. Hutchins, a senior from Winnetka, Ill., had only scored four goals all season, and 15 in her career, and now she has a keepsake for her memory bank, and her trophy case.

Shots were 10-apiece through the first period, and the game tightened up in the second, until the Badgers got their fourth power play of the game. Sara Bauer, recipient of the Patty Kazmaier award as the nationÂ’s top female college player, had the puck in the left corner and passed across to the slot. Zaugg got her full force behind a one-timer, and Chartier had no chance, at 9:08 of the middle session.

“That third goal was a rocket,” said Johnson. “A lot of women players have a problem with the velocity of their shot as they move away from the net, but not Jinelle. Sara got her the puck, and she sent a laser.”

Minnesota outshot Wisconsin 31-19 for the game, but there was no mistaking which team was in command, even in the third period, when the Gophers threw everything they had at trying to score and had a 14-4 edge in shots. Vetter, who was in the nets for the 2-1 double-overtime victory over Mercyhurst and the 1-0 St. Lawrence game, has something under a 0.30 goals-against average for the three NCAA games. She made the final seem routine.
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“We had a three-goal lead,” said Vetter. “We’re not trying to score more goals. We’re just trying to play good defense.”

The Gophers were frustrated, but they also knew how far they had come as a team, after losing Olympic stars Krissy Wendell, Natalie Darwitz, Kelly Stephens and Lyndsay Wall, plus both their goaltenders from the team that won the last two titles.

“She (Vetter) stood on her head today and stopped everything, and their D cleared everthing,” said Minnesota captain Andrea Nichols. “But after losing all the Olympians who carried us on and off the ice, nobody expected us to get this far.”

Bobbi Ross, who scored four goals in the amazing semifinal 5-4 victory over New Hampshire, was part of the Gopher power play that got blanked, along with the rest of the offense. “Coming into this game, obviously we weren’t looking at finishing second,” Ross said. “Right now, we’re unsatisfied, but in a few days, I think we’ll be able to appreciate what we’ve done. We accomplished so much more than anyone thought we would. We replaced raw talent with strength of character and team unity, and that made this season all the more satisfying.”

Having broken through, the Badgers arenÂ’t about to let up. With only five seniors on the team, their top scorers and all six defensemen return. As does Vetter, who got the nod through all three NCAA tournament games after rotating with senior Meghan Horras and junior Christine Dufour all season.

“Jessie red-shirted last year,” said Johnson, “then she got mono and sat out the first two months of this season. The first game I stuck her in was in the third period against Bemidji, and the first shot went in. She faced a challenge because she had lost strength and conditioning, and there were two good goaltenders ahead of her.”

Johnson recalled winning an NCAA tournament as a player, playing for his dad, Badger Bob Johnson, at Wisconsin. And he won an Olympic gold medal playing for Herb Brooks in 1980. Then he had an outstanding NHL career.

“I remember in the early ‘90s, when my dad was coaching the Pittsburgh Penguins, and they were winning the Stanley Cup,” said Johnson. “I came here and watched them in Bloomington, and I got to go downstairs after they’d won it. I saw something special when he hoisted the Stanley Cup. And now, with this team, I can feel how really special it is as a coach.”

Zaugg and Vetter were teammates on a national championship club team, and with Zaugg from Eagle River and Vetter from Cottage Grove, Wis., they are two of eight homestate Wisconsin players on the Badger team. So coming to Minnesota, where the Gopher men’s team had been upset in the NCAA regional, and now the Gopher women’s team was now dethroned, the Minnesota Wild NHL slogan of Minnesota being the “State of Hockey” is in question.

“We were saying in the locker room,” said Zaugg, “that Wisconsin is the new State of Hockey.”

UMD stars lift 7 different women’s Olympic hockey teams

Anyone watching the Winter Olympics had to come away impressed with the development of women’s hockey. They also had to be surprised when Sweden upset Team USA 3-2 in a semifinal shootout. But anyone who has watched the University of Minnesota-Duluth in the Women’s WCHA could be excused for hanging up their rampant patriotism and be totally enthralled with UMD’s impact on the women’s Olympic hockey tournament.

Canada and the U.S. had been practically granted berths in the gold medal final of the womenÂ’s tournament, because neither of the international powers had ever lost a single game to any team other than each other. Canada was a prohibitive favorite for the gold this year, but both Canada and the U.S. figured to dispatch Sweden and Finland in the semifinals, and leave those two Scandinavian rivals to fight for the bronze. SwedenÂ’s upset is the first evidence that womenÂ’s hockey might be on a faster track than anticipated in striving for some sort of healthy parity.

Back in the “real world” of the WCHA, UMD’s current Bulldogs have been struggling against the same sort of new-found parity the Women’s Olympics showed. No question the Bulldogs missed a couple good players who went off to the Olympics, and during that span, Wisconsin clinched its first WCHA title, and UMD dropped back to second, and then to a second-place tie withn Minnesota. The Bulldogs were unable to preserve a one-point edge on the Gophers during the closing weekend.

As UMD regroups for the league playoffs, Bulldogs hockey fans could have found immense satisfaction from the fact that no fewer than seven different nations had their women’s hockey teams improved by the presence of UMD players past and present. Team USA, Canada, Sweden, Finland, Germnany, Switzerland, and Russia all displayed their Bulldog quotient prominently. To their credit, all of those Bulldogs came through.

From the start of the womenÂ’s games in Turin, Italy, network and cable broadcasts heaped praise and publicity on the University of Minnesota-DuluthÂ’s program, and from the way the current and former Bulldogs played, it was more than just well-deserved publicity, and stands as a tribute to the UMD programÂ’s international flavor.

The Minneapolis Star Tribune ran continuing articles about Minnesota’s contribution to the Winter Olympics, and it listed every former Gopher women’s team player, even though they may have been in Minnesota only to play college hockey. But it named only Jenny Potter, who played for UMD, as the school’s only contribution to women’s hockey, without naming any of the others.

The Duluth News-Tribune ran a story, and a follow-up editorial-page column, proclaiming the presence of such former and current UMD players in the womenÂ’s Olympic hockey as: Potter of the U.S.; Maria Rooth and Erika Holst of Sweden; Caroline Ouellette of Canada; and Nora Tallus, Satu Kiipeli, Mari Pehkonen, and Anna-Kaisa Piironen of Finland.

Strangely, however, the Duluth paper completely overlooked current Bulldog freshman sensation Michaela Lanzl of Germany, former UMD goaltender Patricia Ellsworth-Sautter who starred for Switzerland, and RussiaÂ’s Katrina Petroskaia, who played three years ago at UMD.

These players may only be temporary Minnesotans, but no different from the Gopher “imports.” Besides, UMD has made an indelible impression on the Olympians.

“I am not looking forward to leaving, because I love it here at UMD,” said Lanzl, just before departing for the Olympics. “But I am looking forward to playing in the Olympics. It will be very good to play for Germany.”

Granted, there were a lot of standouts from U.S. womenÂ’s college teams, players such as University of MinnesotaÂ’s Krissy Wendell, Natalie Darwitz, Kelly Stephens, Lyndsay Wall and Courtney Kennedy on Team USA, and WisconsinÂ’s brilliant defenseman Carla MacLeod playing for CanadaÂ’s gold medalists, and Ohio State’s Emma Laaksonen playing for Finland, among others.

But consider the contributions of UMDÂ’s representatives.

In the opening game, Team USA won 6-0 over outmanned Switzerland, but it was only 1-0 midway through the game, and 2-0 after two periods before the Swiss skaters ran out of gas. The Swiss goaltender, known as Patricia Sautter when she backstopped UMD to the 2003 NCAA championship, never faltered. She made 50 saves against the perpetual U.S. attack and was one of the biggest stars of the first dayÂ’s games.

Potter might have been the most effective Team USA player, as coach Ben Smith curiously had his lines pretty messed up as the tournament began. Instead of playing the all-Gopher line of Darwitz, Wendell and Stephens together, he had put Stephens on a different unit, where she played well almost all season, but she never approached the productivity that would have been certain had she been with Darwitz and Wendell. Potter played with Darwitz and Wendell much of the second half of the exhibition season – which meant, in some opinions, the best three centers on Team USA were on that line. As the tournament progressed, Potter played with various combinations, always strong and effective. After the victory over Switzerland, Potter, on national tv said: “Their goalie really played well.” Could it be that Jenny was so focused she forgot that she and Sautter were teammates on an NCAA championship team at UMD?
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Another star was Ouellette, who finished her UMD career last season and will undoubtedly be the second player to have her jersey, No. 5, retired by the UMD women. Powerful as Canada has been in winning silver in 1998 and gold in 2002, no Canadian womenÂ’s player ever had scored more than one goal in a period. Ouellette scored twice on her first shift. Her versatility is such that CanadaÂ’s coaching staff uses her both up front and on defense. After her two goals, Ouellette went back to defense and promptly whistled in her third goal before the first period ended. Ouellette would prefer to let others get the glory, just as she did at UMD, and many other Canadians stepped forward to score dozens of goals. But Ouellette was as good a player as Canada had on its gold-medal roster.

Meanwhile, Germany was overmatched, but Lanzl continued to draw praise with her great, quick dashes through opposing defenses, forcing every opponent to respect the Germans. Lanzl scored a goal and set up another when Germany beat Switzerland 2-1, but her most memorable rush might have come shortly after NBC ran a huge between-periods feature on former Harvard star and Patty Kazmaier-winner Angie Ruggiero, calling her possibly the best defenseman in all of womenÂ’s hockey. Shortly thereafter, Lanzl raced down the ice and, with a head fake and a high-speed deke, darted untouched past Ruggiero for a spectacular rush and shot.

Finland opened with the familiar names of Tallus and Kiipeli in the forefront, and Piironen as a goaltender, but Finland’s most effective player might have been current Bulldog Mari Pehkonen, who scored her team’s first goal in each of Finland’s first two games. Russia, meanwhile, battled gamely, showing strong improvement in the past couple of years, yet almost escaping, except when the cameras moved in for close-ups after strong shifts, was No. 14 – Petroskaia. She was one of Russia’s best players.

Sweden, however, was the headline team of the tournament. In 2002, when Rooth and Holst were still at UMD, they were uncertain if they would be leaving to play in the Salt Lake City games. SwedenÂ’s federation was debating whether to even bother sending the team because it might not be competitive enough. They went, they were competitive enough, and Rooth and Holst were their best players.

Now, in 2006, RoothÂ’s No. 27 hangs from the rafter at the DECC in Duluth as the only womenÂ’s number ever retired, a tribute after she led the Bulldogs to the national championships in the first three years of NCAA womenÂ’s tournaments. Rooth is an emotional ambassador for how beneficial it was to attend UMD and play for coach Shannon Miller. Before Sweden’s first game, Rooth and Holst, SwedenÂ’s captain, were singled out as SwedenÂ’s top scoring threats by Cammi Granato, whose presence added class to the NBC analysis set, but who might better have been used on the ice, scoring a few goals for Team USA.

Granato, though, was cut. The less cynical among observers can only assume that it is mere irony that Team USA is living in the past, with a pronounced overload of Eastern players, even while two western schools, UMD and Minnesota, have won all five NCAA titles ever held. There would be grounds for having a decided western flair, but the last cuts included Granato, who is from Illinois, and Minnesotans Winny Brodt, a former Gopher and a speedy defenseman, and goalie Sheri Vogt, a star at Minnesota State-Mankato.

Similarly, we can assume that itÂ’s merely ironic that every Patty Kazmaier Award winner went along with the Olympic programÂ’s Eastern bias every year until Wendell finally broke through last year as the first Western Collegiate Hockey Association winner of the award. Potter, Ouellette and Rooth have been finalists, but all fell short in the final vote.

Can it be linked by coincidence or irony that the WCHA dominates college hockey, Minnesota grows as the unmatched leader in girls hockey development anywhere in the world by its high school structure, and the most impressive three players on Team USA arguably were Potter, Wendell and Darwitz — the only three Minnesota-raised players on the team — yet Team USA continues to focus on Eastern players, while results systematically have dropped from gold, to silver, to bronze?

At any rate, former UMD star Holst was her usual strong, stable and always-smart and threatening self for Sweden, and Rooth was simply the most impressive individual in the tournament.

Given no chance against Team USA, Sweden trailed 2-0 in the second period until Rooth scored, then she scored again, shorthanded, to tie the game 2-2. It ended that way, after overtime, which meant a five-player shootout. Sweden got one goal, the U.S. none, then Rooth skated in and scored her third goal of the day to clinch the shootout 2-0 with only one turn left. Goaltender Kim Martin played brilliantly with 37 saves, and then she stopped everything in the shootout, including Potter, Wendell and Darwitz. Remember that name, Kim Martin, because she will attend UMD this fall as a freshman. Sound familiar?

Team USA recovered from the shock of losing 3-2 to Sweden in the semifinals to beat Finland 4-0 in the bronze-medal game. In the gold medal final, Rooth, Holst and Martin gave it all they had, but Canada was too much for Sweden and claimed a 4-1 victory. Ouellette scored a picture goal to clinch the victory, and the chance to watch Ouellette play against Rooth was a wonderful final spectacle for UMD and WCHA hockey fans.

Back in the WCHA — sounds like a good name for a Beatles song — UMD spent the final weeks hanging on, tying and winning at Minnesota State-Mankato on the final weekend to leave room for Minnesota to climb into a tie with the Bulldogs for second. The return of Lanzl and Pehkonen should help rejuvenate the Bulldogs for the playoffs, however. Pehkonen returned directly, while Lanzl, who was expected to return home for a week to Germany, where her father recently died, came later.

Injecting Olympic heroics into UMD’s struggling lineup could make an enormous difference between struggling and finding new glory at the college level. If not, well, UMD’s Olympians have helped put the school and the WCHA on the international map.

Badgers women prove elite status in tie, victory at UMD

When you were a little kid, maybe your parents stood you up against the door sill and put a tiny pencil mark to denote how tall you had grown by a certain date. If coach Mark Johnson were to do the same with his Wisconsin Badgers womenÂ’s hockey team, the biggest growth mark would be for December 9 and 10, 2005.

The dates are for when Wisconsin went to Duluth and battled No. 1 ranked Minnesota-Duluth to a 2-2 deadlock, with the Badgers holding the upper hand through the third period and the overtime, then continued it the next night to claim a 2-1 victory. It was the best, most intense hockey of the season for both teams. But it was more than that for the Badgers.

Sharon Cole is one of five seniors in the University of Wisconsin womenÂ’s hockey lineup, which means she and Badger coach Mark Johnson were rookies the same year. Cole would only measure 5-foot-3 on a growth chart, but she has grown along with her coach and he team as the Badgers have reached true status of a genuine NCAA championship contender with those two games.

WomenÂ’s WCHA hockey teams get a long midseason break, perfect for focusing on final semester exams and the holidays, but the Badgers deserve the break more than ever, because their semester exams on the ice came at the Duluth Entertainment and Conventilon Center.

Through its first six years, the Women’s WCHA has been a two-team duel between the University of Minnesota-Duluth, and the University of Minnesota. True, Wisconsin battled those teams with increasing competitiveness, finishing second last season, for example, but when it came to post-season play, it was always the “Big Two.” UMD won the first WCHA season title, and Minnesota won a coaches association national tournament that year; UMD won the first three NCAA championships, and Minnesota won the most recent two.

The Bulldogs had elite, star-quality players like Maria Rooth, Jenny Potter, and Caroline Ouellette, while Minnesota had elite stars such as Natalie Darwitz and Krissy Wendell. You canÂ’t find players like that readily available around the womenÂ’s hockey world, so against such foes, Mark Johnson took chances on players he liked and built with balance and depth. Then he coached them, teaching fundamentals, as well as little situational tricks heÂ’s known since he starred for his dad, Badger Bob Johnson, at Wisconsin and then later for the 1980 U.S. Olympic team and in the NHL.

“Mark hasn’t really changed too much,” said Cole. “He knows the game, and he teaches it so well. We doi a lot of individual skill things, and a lot of work. I’m amazed at how much we’ve developed, skill-wise. The biggest difference this year is we have a lot of depth. We can throw three lines out against any team’s first line now.”

Everything the Badgers have worked for came to focus on the series at the DECC. To open the season, Wisconsin was picked first in the country, but got thumped 5-2 by UMD in Madison. The next night, the Badgers grew a little with a goal in the closing seconds to tie UMD 3-3, and Sara BauerÂ’s power-play winner in overtime claimed a 4-3 triumph. The next pivotal series came in mid-November at MinnesotaÂ’s Ridder Arena, when the Badgers stunned the Gophers 2-0, then stamping a 6-2 victory on the rematch. Cole had a goal in the first game and two in the second, which was huge for her, being back home.

Cole played on Bloomington JeffersonÂ’s emerging girls program that won a Minnesota state championship here junior year. One of her teammates was Allison Lehrke, who is UMDÂ’s captain and one of their top centers, and Larissa Luther, who also is a senior with the Bulldogs. The Gophers have struggled to regain their previous stature, this year, however, while UMD had streaked to supplant Wisconsin as No. 1 in the country, leading the WCHA, and riding a 10-0 steak at home.

“We looked at the series as a big chance to get ahead,” said Cole, who said she went to Wisconsin with no illusions of being a standout player. She plays left wing with Sara Bauer, a 5-foot-3 junior and the team’s top scorer, while those two mighty-mites have blossomed since Johnson shifted Jinelle Zaugg, a 6-foot-1 sophomore from Eagle River, Wis., up to right wing.

“She wasn’t with us at the start of the season,” said Cole. “She’s got such a great reach, it really helps when we’re forechecking.”

As expected, UMD and Wisconsin played with great pace and intensity every shift. Noemie MarinÂ’s power-play goal staked UMD to a 1-0 lead midway through the first period of the first game, and it stood until late in the second period when Bauer came out of the penalty box, beat a defenseman up the left side, and cut to the goal to beat UMDÂ’s Riitta Schaublin at the right edge for a 1-1 tie. Junior defenseman Bobbi-Jo Slusar put theBadgers ahead at 1:02 of the third with a screened shot from the left point. At 13:04, Jessica Koizumi whirled and fired a screened shot from the top of the right circle that beat Wisconsin senior Meghan Horras high and into the right edge for the 2-2 standoff.

The tie was one thing, the fact that Wisconsin pinned UMD into its own zone for most of the remaining seven minutes, and during a 4-0 shooting edge in the five-minute overtime, meant plenty to WisconsinÂ’s confidence.

“It was like a playoff game,” said Johnson. “We got what we were looking for. Somebody challenges your team, and I liked the way our players competed. It was two good skating teams, with good players making good plays, and it’s fun to watch that.”

UMD coach Shannon Miller said: “We had a real good first period, we both killed penalties in the second, and in the third period Wisconsin outworked us, beat us to every loose puck, and we were lucky to leave with a 2-2 tie. Riitta Schaublin was the only reason we got the tie.”

The next night, Miller broke up her first two lines, supplanting Koizumi with Lehrke between explosive wingers Marin and freshman Michaela Lanzl, while Koizumi centered freshmen Sara O’Toole and Mari Pehkonen. But the Badgers came out and did two things no other team has been able to do to UMD all season – or in any season – by forcing the Bulldogs to throw the puck away in their own end, and then pouncing on those loose pucks and doing something with them.
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While killing a penalty in the first period, Cole pounced on one of those grenade-like turnovers, and cut across in front of the goal, left to right, as she jammed a backhand shot. Schaubliin went down as she blocked the shot, sliding on her knees to the right edge of the crease. The puck, however, squirted through, and was sitting in the crease, inches from the goal line. Bauer was the first one to it, and converted the equivalent of a four-inch putt for a shorthanded goal.

Early in the second period, the Badgers proved ColeÂ’s comment about their depth, as Tia Hanson knocked in a second rebound for a power-play goal at 1:21. Her linemates, Erika Lawler and Angie Kesely, both got assists. All three are freshmen, playing on the third line.
UMDÂ’s third line came back to puncture HorrasÂ’s shutout late in the first period. Freshman hometown center Tawni Mattila, who might have been UMDÂ’s most effective forward in the game, rushed through the Badger defense and got off a good backhander. Horras saved it, but junior Juliane Jubinville poked in the rebound to cut it to 2-1.

Then it was truly final exam time, as the Badgers continued to defuse UMDÂ’s offense, smartly clearing their zone and putting the puck in deep, and forcing the Bulldogs to go the length of the ice to attack, but unable to sustain any sort of passing game to get there. After being outshot 37-23 the first game, UMD outshot Wisconsin 27-25 in the second, but the Badgers always had five defenders in front of Horras, who faced few dangerous threats, while Schaublin was forced to stop repeated break-ins and threats off turnovers.

“We played much better,” said UMD coach Miller. “I thought we played fantastic hockey. This series was a great test for us, and, win or lose, it was really good for us to have to raise our level of play to this level.”

Mark Johnson said: “We knew that they’d come out flying in the initial six or seven minutes, but we weathered the storms. Meaghan did a good job when we broke down, and we got a lift from our third line. They’ve got a lot of energy, and they just want to play and have fun. These type of games, everybody gets better. They were good tests for both teams. It was a good weekend, and it’s another step in the journey to March.”

Johnson also has a good feeling for his team’s depth, and a special feeling for the seniors – Cole, second linemates nikki Burish, Cyndy Kenyon and Grace Hutchins, and goaltender Horras. Scoring has underscored the team’s balance, but the first line will be the one to rely on for pressure goals.

“Sharon Cole has really become a good player, and it’s nice to see that,” said Johnson. “She always had the skill, and she’s a good skater and understands the game. Sara Bauer surprised everybody and blossomed into an outstanding player last year. I put Jinelle Zaugg up there, and it’s been a good chance for her, because playing with Cole and Bauer, all she really has to do is get open. That can become a really good line.”

It already has, Mark, and while the coach has been working so hard and the players have been developing so much, all the while focusing on the destination at the end of this season’s journey – and the four-year journey – the Badgers have become an elite program. Completing a 3-0-1 record in the four games at Minnesota and at UMD is like getting a big Christmas present a few weeks early.

CC surge intensifies final series with Denver

A month ago, Minnesota, Denver and Wisconsin were racing toward a three-way finish atop the WCHA, and while winning the title is paramount, all three top spots are important when it comes to league playoffs. Once the playoffs reach St. Paul for the Final Five, teams 4 and 5 must play each other, with that winner advancing to the semifinals, where Nos. 1, 2 and 3 await. So winning the playoff title means winning three games in three days for the teams that miss the top three slots.

The fact that Minnesota clinched the season title by sweeping at Alaska-Anchorage last weekend is significant, even though it seems Denver and Wisconsin might be comfortably finishing the seasons to decide which will be second. But don’t look now – Colorado College has won its way back into the picture.

While Denver came off a seven-game winning streak by losing three in a row, including last weekÂ’s split against North Dakota, Wisconsin lost twice against Minnesota State-Mankato to finish 2-7-1. While those two have faltered, Colorado College, by sweeping 5-0 and 5-2 victories at Minnesota-Duluth, has now won four in a row, and six out of seven, to climb within two points of third-place Wisconsin and three points of second-place Denver.

So Colorado College goes into its traditional closing home-and-home series with arch-rival Denver – starting on Thursday – facing the tall order of getting another sweep, but a sweep that would vault the Tigers into at least third and possibly second place.

“The most important thing to us was getting our rhythm back,” said scoring leader Brett Sterling. “We had to stick with our identity – to work hard and use our skill and our speed. We know we have great goaltending, defense and forwards, but usually we peak in January or February. Right now is the best time for us to peak.

“The best thing about it is that third place is still in reach. And we have to play Denver, and every time we play them, it’s something special. Sure, we can sweep them; why not? They did it to us. They’ve been struggling a little, and we had a stretch like that when we lost five n a row. The way we were playing, we couldn’t beat a Bantam team, when we played Denver.”

In recent weeks, CC also lost the services of Aaron Slattengren, a solid and speedy forward who helped balance the offense. Slattengren ran afoul of some academic rules at Colorado College and is no longer eligible. Setbacks like that, and an injury to goaltender Matt Zaba, didn’t promise a stirring finish for the Tigers. But that’s changed.

Sterling scored the winning goal in SaturdayÂ’s 5-2 victory at UMD. He was on a power play, and he spun around and shot going down, and the puck found its way through goaltender Isaac Reichmuth for a 3-1 lead. It came three minutes after Andrew Carroll scored to pull UMD within 2-1, and stood up as CC went up 5-1 by the second intermission.

That goal was the 26th of the season for Sterling, trailing only the 29 by Minnesota’s Ryan Potulny among WCHA snipers. But the key item for CC in the stretch drive is that the Tigers have found that they can win with more than Sterling and Marty Sertich – CC’s 1-2 punch that were 1-2 in the Hobey Baker voting last year won by Sertich – getting the goals.

“We’re a dangerous team,” said coach Scott Owens, after the 5-0 first game. “But we had a huge January lull. We’re bouncing back a little, and while Sertich and Sterling get a lot of minutes, we came into this series just trying to be playing better – to get our rhythm back. If we do, I think everything else will fall into place.”

Twenty-four hours later, the rhythm was back, and things were more than falling into place.

“The good thing is we got four points,” Owens said. “And we got some other guys scoring.”
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Indeed. For the weekend, CC got 10 goals, and they came from nine different goal-scorers.

Brandon Straub, Joey Crabb, Chad Rau, Jesse Stokke and James Brannigan scored in the 5-0 first game. It was 3-0 after two periods, then Stokke scored his first goal, and, as time was running out, Brannigan scored a goal with the clock reading “0:00.” The red light, however, was on, and a quick review indicated the goal was in before time expired – just the way things have been going for the luckless Bulldogs, and for the Tigers.

In the rematch, J.P. Brunkhorst and Brandon Polich scored 49 seconds apart to stake CC to a 2-0 lead in the first period. It took an extended power play continued from the first period for UMDÂ’s Carroll to get his teamÂ’s first goal of the weekend, and then Sterling got his goal. Crabb notched his 17th as the only CC 2-goal scorer, then Jack Hillen made it 5-1. Sterling had two assists for the weekend, along with his goal, and Sertich had three assists without getting a goal.

“That’s the best thing,” said Sterling. “We’ve changed lines again, and Marty and I get some points, but the other guys are scoring too.”
CCÂ’s offense is working again, the defense looks solid, and goaltender Matt Zaba is back in the lineup after an injury. Zaba made 25 saves for the Friday shutout, and 32 saves while giving up two goals Saturday.

“We’re fighting for home ice for the playoffs, and we want to be home for our fans,” said Owens. “We don’t particularly want to go to North Dakota or St. Cloud for a playoff series.”

That could still happen, but the Tigers are looking up now, not behind them.

“It should be a great playoff,” Owens said. “There’s really no team you WANT to play. But for us, we’re only looking ahead to Denver. Our games with them have been wars. Their power-play killed us, and they may pull it together for us. But for us, it’s a short week to get ready, and it’s an emotional thing.”

Brodt, Curtin aim to inspire future women’s Olympians

Where were you when Team USAÂ’s womenÂ’s hockey team was upset by Sweden, 3-2 in a Winter Olympics semifinal shootout, to preclude the United State from its assumed slot in the gold medal game against Canada?

A lot of women and girls down to the youngest age of hockey interest may remember exactly where they were. Two of them, Winny Brodt and Ronda Curtin, probably wonÂ’t remember, because they had other things on their minds.

Ronda Curtin, one of the premier elite players in Minnesota’s young but proud female hockey history, was home, helping coach the St. Thomas women’s college team and trying to find time to play for the amateur Minnesota Whitecaps. Winny Brodt, who preceded the most famous sister act in Minnesota hockey annals – Ronda and Renee Curtin – at Roseville High School’s early state powers, was also home. She celebrated her 28th birthday, which came one day after Team USA’s stunning defeat, by also playing for the Whitecaps, a recently formed team that plays amateur senior women’s elite teams from all across Canada.

Both of them were among the best half-dozen players in the history of Minnesota girls high school hockey, starring at Roseville High School, and later at the University of Minnesota. Arguably – although it’s not arguable in Minnesota – both should have been on this year’s U.S. women’s Olympic team, and on the 2002 team as well. But they are not just sitting home grousing about it. They are doing something about it, trying to invent ways to help Minnesota’s burgeoning crop of new young girls at the youth and high school levels to have realistic goals in the sport.

Hockey observers from throughout the world are amazed and impressed with the development of female hockey in Minnesota, and how high school girls hockey has accelerated the development of far beyond any other area of the country, and, in fact, the world. Minnesota high school stars go on to college, and are generally among the better players on their teams. So it might seem logical that Minnesota-raised high school players might dominate the U.S. National and Olympic team, the way their male counterparts did, at least up through 1980, when amateurs played.

But the womenÂ’s U.S. Olympic team, which should be the pinnacle of girls through their development phase, has not been a realistic objective for most Minnesota girls and women. True, Krissy Wendell and Natalie Darwitz, two of the other elite players in MinnesotaÂ’s high school girls annals, and Jenny Potter, the famous mom on the team, were stars on Team USA. But thatÂ’s it. Those are the only three women who grew up playing hockey in Minnesota to make Team USA.

Winny Brodt, a swift, free-skating defenseman, who defended responsibly but was best-known for her spectacular end-to-end rushes, was the last player cut. Ronda Curtin, third on the all-time Minnesota high school girls point-scoring list, and who went on to star at the University of Minnesota as a forward, and then switched to defense where she was named All-America, didnÂ’t even bother to try out.

“I saw what was happening to Winny, and I decided – why bother?” said Ronda. The fact that Curtin was never invited to camp or encouraged to try out became more curious when this year’s team took one too few forwards and one extra defenseman, with the idea of shifting some players up to play forward.

“Considering that the three best players on Team USA are Jenny, Krissy and Natalie – all from Minnesota – doesn’t it make sense that they might have tried to find a few more from here?” Curtin asked.

Brodt shares Ronda’s opinion, even removing her personal involvement. “Forget all those players who are from somewhere else but might have played at Minnesota or UMD, there are only three homegrown Minnesotans on the U.S. team,” Brodt said. “Does that mean, in eight years they haven’t been able to find another Minnesota player?”

Despite the easy alternative of being bitter, however, Brodt and Curtin have actively moved toward helping future players develop.

“Ronda and I are running a hockey program for girls 8 to 18 at different arenas around the Twin Cities,” said Brodt. “We started last year, at Fogerty Arena, and Bloomington, and Wakota, and we’re going to expand, maybe to Highland and other arenas. The whole purpose is to work on fundamentals in a setting where the highest level of girls of all ages can participate. We have an evaluation to make sure we get the best, qualified players. In girls hockey, with no checking, it’s a lot easier for younger girls around age 10 to play with older girls over 12 or so.

“Last year, I decided I wanted to stay as involved in hockey as I could, and I could see the numbers of youth programs for girls, while I grew up playing with boys because that’s all there was. It’s great that there are so many girls programs for younger girls, but what I notice is that in most cases the girls are treated like girls, instead of like athletes. I was treated like ‘one of the guys.’ At our camp, we want to treat the girls like athletes, so they can develop to the maximum of their ability.”

Ronda Curtin is the opposite of Winny Brodt when it comes to playing style. Ronda is tall and strong, a classic skater who can overpower an opponent with her size, strength or booming shot, while Brodt is a shorter bundle of energy who can fly end-to-end and beat foes with great bursts of speed. But they share the common asset of hockey sense, as well as exceptional ability.

“From coaching at St. Thomas, the thing I’ve noticed most is that the girls skate well and have good ability,” said Ronda Curtin. “But they often lack the ability to see the ice. That’s one of the things we’re hoping to develop in the camps Winny and I are running.”

Seeing the ice is hockey parlance for the great and elusive skill of seeming to know where everyone on the rink is during play – of carrying the puck, but knowing where both teammates and foes are and are likely to be. It seems to be a gift of exceptional players – what separates the Wayne Gretzkys and the Neal Brotens from the average stars. It is an extention of “hockey sense,” and many think it is inborn, because gifted players have it instinctively and don’t play mechanically.

Ronda Curtin and her younger sister, Renee – who is the state’s all-time points leader but whose career tragically has been curtailed by repetitive concussions – definitely have that hockey sense, that ability to see the ice. So does Winny Brodt. And, of course, Natalie Darwitz, Krissy Wendell and Jenny Potter also share that same level of the incredible skill.

In fact, if we were going to select an all-time Minnesota women’s team – for now and possibly forever – Darwitz, Potter, Wendell, Winny Brodt, Ronda and Renee Curtin would be the elite six. If we were selecting an all-time girls high school team, the first unit would have Darwitz centering the Curtin sisters, with Brodt and Wendell on defense. If you wanted to add a goaltender, there are many, but we could pick Sheri Vogt, who went on to stardom at Minnesota State-Mankato, and, after establishing clearly the second-best statistics with Team USA, she was a last-cut along with Winny Brodt.

Potter, incidentally, doesnÂ’t make the all-time high school team for an apparently forgotten reason. Various magazine and newspaper features often credit her for being a high school record-scoring phenom at Edina High School. But Jenny Schmidgall played amateur hockey, with boys and with teams like the Minnesota Thoroughbreds, up through the time high school girls hockey was starting. She never played girls high school hockey.

At any rate, Ronda Curtin and Winny Brodt both agree that Team USA has been a great source of inspiration for young Minnesota girls interested in hockey, but so far it hasnÂ’t been a realistic objective. College hockey has been a realistic goal, and high school hockey is the perfect, and unique, stepping stone to college scholarships at the Division I level, or highly competitive play at the Division III state school level. Their objective is to give young girls a way to develop to the peak of their ability, to play the game at their highest personal levels, and to enjoy the game at its maximum.

The Brodt-Curtin connection goes back a couple of decades, when their family homes were — and still are – next door to each other in Roseville. The young women are off on their own, but they still return home frequently, where all the kids in both families grew up playing various sports, but primarily hockey. Roseville Arena and other various indoor and outdoor rinks became familiar to them, but their most prominent venue was the Curtin driveway.

Boot hockey, the perfect method for developing stickhanding skills as well as how to function in congestion, was an almost daily endeavor, all summer, and often through the winter, unless the two households of kids chose to walk over to the outdoor rink adjacent to Roseville Arena, where the John Rose Oval is now located. The driveway kept hockey alive all summer, however.

“Luke Curtin and I were the same age, and we were the two oldest, so we would be on opposite teams,” said Winny. “I’d get Kurt, who is Luke’s younger brother, and Luke would get Ronda on his side, and then Renee would play, too. We’d have some pretty ferocious battles.”

Ronda Curtin remembers those days, too. “My dad had street hockey nets there for us in the driveway, and a board we could shoot against,” said Ronda. “We’d play 2-on-2, or 3-on-3, or 3-on-2 – depending on who showed up. Sometimes my dad would flood the back yard in winter, so we could skate, but we’d still play boot hockey in the driveway, too.”

When it came to organized hockey, there were precious few chances for girls. So Winny Brodt played on the Roseville boys A Peewee team at age 10-12, and then starred for the Roseville A Bantam team, age 12-14.

“We learned from playing with and against boys, and as the boys got older and stronger, we had to improve the same way,” Winny said. “That was the driving force behind our playing ability.”

When girls started playing high school hockey, Roseville came on board a year later, and Winny Brodt was on that team. In 1996, Winny won the first Ms. Hockey award. “Ronda was a freshman on that team, and Renee played as a seventh-grader,” Winny recalled. She also recalled being able to dominate those early high school games, often skating from her own zone, past every opponent, to score goals.

“It is really amazing to see how far high school hockey has come in such a short time,” Brodt said. “It was like skating around cones in some games back when I played. I probably had better hands then than since.”

There still could be future involvement for Brodt and Curtin with Team USA, and, they hope, for more and more Minnesotans in the future, possibly graduates of their camp. The shocking U.S. loss to Sweden in this yearÂ’s Olympic semifinals is expected to signal a major change in philosophy for USA HockeyÂ’s womenÂ’s teams.

Until now, the team has been pretty much a private club selected by coach Ben Smith, who was named coach of Team USAÂ’s women since it first participated in the Olympics and won the gold medal in 1998 at Nagano. It was logical to select an Eastern-dominated team back then, because Eastern colleges had played hockey for years and the West was just getting started at the college level, and players like the Curtins, Brodt, Darwitz and Wendell were helping with the high school upsurge.
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After the 1998 gold medal, a normally reasonable Minneapolis Star-Tribune sportswriter wrote that Team USA might have won the Olympic gold medal, but there was a question whether it could beat a Minnesota high school all-star team. I was that writer, and I absorbed a lot of criticism for it. But after that season, a game for elite players was conducted at Columbia Arena, including high school, college and Olympic players, and a line of high schoolers named Darwitz, Curtin and Curtin scored twice on the first shift and dominated the game.

Still, Smith and Team USA stayed intact, but added Darwitz and Wendell, with Darwitz leaving her final two high school years to prepare for the 2002 silver medal team. So they were part of the mix this year, with Potter, as top players on the 2006 bronze medal. The apparently downward spiral from gold to silver to bronze, culminated by the shocking loss to an improving Sweden team – which almost didn’t participate in 2002 because Swedish hockey officials weren’t sure they could be competitive – will undoubtedly signal a change.

The selection process may shift to more of the format the men used to use when amateurs manned the teams, through history, of selecting a coach for each yearÂ’s national team, and having regional tryouts, where the East vs. West rivalry led to intense competition but also to selections that were more than simply retaining personal favorites.
Harvard coach Katey Stone is a possible new coach, or Mark Johnson, the coach at Wisconsin, which won the WCHA womenÂ’s title this season. Whatever, it may bring a change in concept to USA HockeyÂ’s national team selection.

“I’d love to see an all- Minnesota team play the Olympic team right now,” said Winny Brodt. “It would be great if they had actual games between the East and West to use for selection of the team.”

East-West rivalries were common to the men. In fact, when the late Herb Brooks selected 12 Minnesotans to the legendary 1980 menÂ’s Team USA, he worked so hard downplay the fact that 16 of the 20 players were from the west, that every movie, book and chronicle of that team, so far, has featured Jim Craig, Mike Eruzione and Jack OÂ’Callahan, three of the four Eastern players.

WomenÂ’s hockey is at the stage where it deserves similar treatment. The rise in the competitive level of Minnesota girls hockey is unprecedented in high school sports not only in the state, but nationwide. In other parts of the United States, girls play on youth club teams in small pockets, and the most elite of them advance to prep schools and perhaps NCAA colleges.

In Minnesota, every young girl with an interest in skating and hockey can find an outlet of rapidly expanding youth teams, or maybe playing on boys teams at younger levels. Then they can look forward to the Minnesota State High School LeagueÂ’s programs for large or small school teams that continue to reach out to every corner of the state.

ItÂ’s a worthy and realistic objective. And if college, or national team, participation follows, that would be just fine with Winny Brodt, Ronda Curtin, and all of Minnesota. Anyone seeking more information about the Brodt-Curtin girls elite training camp can find it at www.skaterslink.com.

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• 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.
  
  For those who want to keep up with John Gilbert's view of sports, mainly hockey with a Minnesota slant, click on the following:
  
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• Exhaust Notes:

  PADDLING
  More and more cars are offering steering-wheel paddles to allow drivers manual control over automatic or CVT transmissions. A good idea might be to standardize them. Most allow upshifting by pulling on the right-side paddle and downshifting with the left. But a recent road-test of the new Porsche Panamera, the paddles for the slick PDK direct-sequential gearbox were counter-intuitive -- both the right or left thumb paddles could upshift or downshift, but pushing on either one would upshift, and pulling back on either paddle downshifted. I enjoy using paddles, but I spent the full week trying not to downshift when I wanted to upshift. A little simple standardization would alleviate the problem.
  
  

  SPEAKING OF PADDLES
  The Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution has the best paddle system, and Infiniti has made the best mainstream copy of that system for the new Q50, and other sporty models. And why not? It's simply the best. In both, the paddles are long, slender magnesium strips, affixed to the steering column rather than the steering wheel. Pull on the right paddle and upshift, pull on the left and downshift. The beauty is that while needing to upshift in a tight curve might cause a driver to lose the steering wheel paddle for an instant, but having the paddles long, and fixed, means no matter how hard the steering wheel is cranked, reaching anywhere on the right puts the upshift paddle on your fingertips.
  
  

  TIRES MAKE CONTACT
  Even in snow-country, a few stubborn old-school drivers want to stick with rear-wheel drive, but the vast majority realize the clear superiority of front-wheel drive. Going to all-wheel drive, naturally, is the all-out best. But the majority of drivers facing icy roadways complain about traction for going, stopping and steering with all configurations. They overlook the simple but total influence of having the right tires can make. There are several companies that make good all-season or snow tires, but there are precious few that are exceptional. The Bridgestone Blizzak continues to be the best=known and most popular, but in places like Duluth, MN., where scaling 10-12 blocks of 20-30 degree hills is a daily challenge, my favorite is the Nokian WR. Made without compromising tread compound, the Nokians maintain their flexibility no matter how cold it gets, so they stick, even on icy streets, and can turn a skittish car into a winter-beater.