Martin bolsters WCHA connection to Team USA

SAINT PAUL, MINN. — There seems to be a dry spot in the United States National hockey talent pool, and it may have been to blame for preventing Team USA from defending its World Cup tournament championship. But nobody can blame the WCHA, which continues to contribute a steady stream of talent to represent the U.S.

The most recent example is Paul Martin, who just turned 23 years of age, and was the second-youngest player on Team USAÂ’s roster. He also was just one year away from playing defense for the University of Minnesota, and five years past helping Elk River High School remain a perennial state powerhouse.

Martin surprised all — except those in his hometown — when he stepped onto the Xcel Energy ice and played like an experienced veteran midway through the World Cup tournament. He would be first to refuse the credit, but the U.S. had faltered in losing 2-1 to Canada and 3-1 to Russia, before coach Ron Wilson shuffled his lineup and inserted Martin and four other back-up players. After that, the U.S. came back to beat Slovakia 3-1, then avenged the loss to Russia with a 5-3 victory in the quarterfinals.

Team USA lost a tight, tough 2-1 semifinal to Finland, which went on to lose a tense 3-2 title game to Canada in the final of the eight-team international World Cup tournament. But nobody questioned Martin, or several other WCHA stalwarts on the U.S. team, such as Chris Chelios, Brett Hull, Brian Rafalski, Jason Blake and Jordan Leopold.

“I’ve played a lot of games at this place,” said Martin, who helped the Gophers win successive NCAA championship in 2002 and 2003, with the 2002 tournament and the 2003 NCAA Regional both held at Xcel. “But I felt a little nervous at first, because I hadn’t played in the first two games. I definitely had some butterflies.”

Chelios, the 41-year-old Detroit defenseman and former Wisconsin star, declared this would be his last appearance on a national team. Brian Rafalski, another ex-Badger, was another New Jersey representative and standout on the USA defense. Brett Hull, the seemingly ageless sniper from Minnesota-Duluth, just left Detroit for Phoenix in the NHL and is another of Team USA’s “old guard,” players who obviously can still do the job, but are nearing the end of glowing pro careers.

The gap comes in the “middle-age” national prospects. The oldest players are almost legendary, and the young guard is well-represented by Martin, mercurial forward Blake, who is a former North Dakota star, and Leopold, who starred for Calgary’s rush to the Stanley Cup finals in the spring of 2004, two seasons after winning the Hobey Baker Award on an NCAA championship Minnesota team.

Martin, in fact, wouldn’t have even made Team USA’s final roster until a concussion knocked out Leopold, his former Gopher teammate, during World Cup exhibition play. Martin, who bypassed his senior year at Minnesota to sign a contract with the New Jersey Devils a year ago, had impressed teammates, management, fans and foes with his cool demeanor under fire and his apparently limitless “upside” in his rookie pro season.

U.S. coach Ron Wilson, a former NHL star and an All-America defenseman at Providence during his college days, wasnÂ’t sure about inserting Martin, but he threw all five of his spare players into the lineup for the Slovakia game. It only took one game for Wilson to appreciate Martin.

“I was really impressed with Paul Martin,” said Wilson, after his first game, the victory over Slovakia. “He came in the middle of camp. When Jordan Leopold went down, I asked Brian Rafalski about Paul and he had nothing but good things to say about him. They had been partners at New Jersey, so there’s some chemistry there.
“But tonight I saw why everybody’s so high on Paul Martin.”

Martin’s cool, smooth puck-handling under pressure earned him immediate and continuing duty on the penalty-killing unit. “At New Jersey, I’ve been lucky to play with defensemen like Scott Stevens, Scott Niedermeyer and Brian Rafalski,” said Martin. “But that also means I don’t kill many penalties. So I was glad to kill penalties here.”

Martin also manned the point effectively on the power play later in the tournament, notching an assist on the only goal in the 2-1 elimination loss to Finland.

When the U.S. lost the preliminary game to the Russians, Martin watched from the seats. In the quarterfinal rematch, he was on the ice and played another impressive game. He noted a difference in Team USAÂ’s play.

“The hockey is a little more open, with less clutching and grabbing than the NHL,” said Martin. “We played a lot smarter, about where we put the puck and eliminating turnovers.”

As a humble and respectful player, Martin never showed the awe he had for some of his teammates, and certainly not for any of his extremely skilled adversaries.

“I watched guys like Chelios and Brian Leetch when I was growing up,” said Martin. “And Mike Modano played for the North Stars until the team went to Dallas. His wife is from here, and our family knows her family, so I was able to get posters of him. I still have posters of Mike Modano all over my house. He doesn’t know that.”

When Finland prevailed with two third-period goals to overturn a 1-0 U.S. lead in the semifinals, Chelios, the team captain, came out to address the media. “We knew what we were up against, and we stuck to our game plan and played a good game,” Chelios shrugged. “But they played well, too. We have nothing to be embarrassed about. Everybody stuck to the system and there was no selfishness.”

Chelios disagreed with suggestions that his departure might mean an end of an era of success for the U.S., which won the World Cup in 1996 and the silver medal at the 2002 Winter Olympics, another team with Chelios as captain. “Aside from me, and maybe Brett (Hull), this is a young team. There are guys like Martin and others who can carry it on.”

A similar theme came from Wilson, after he paid tribute to Chelios.
“When you see how Chris Chelios operates in a dressing room, you see what he’s all about,” said Wilson. “Chris is all-inclusive. He’s not an elitist. That’s a rare quality in a modern-day athlete. He makes sure everybody is involved.

“People ask me if there’s a gap in the U.S. program after those older players, and I don’t know about the personnel other than what I’ve seen. But the U.S. won the World Junior title last winter, and not by fluke, either, so the future is bright. There might be a few jars missing in the cupboard along the way, but we’ll be replacing them soon.

“Chris has been a tremendous ambassador for USA Hockey and the NHL. So have players like Brian Leetch, Mike Modano, Bill Guerin and Keith Tkachuk. But players like Paul Martin and Scotty Gomez will carry that torch in the future, and hopefully they’ll remember some of the things they learned from some of those warriors.”

And who knows? Maybe 20 years from now, Paul Martin will still be making pinpoint passes out of the zone, and a much-younger Team USA teammate will marvel at his skill, even while moving his own play up to that levelÂ…and maybe being reluctant to tell his veteran partner that he has Paul Martin posters all over his house.

Miracle makes good movie, but better in real life

The movie “Miracle” has been unanimously acclaimed as the best and most comprehensive attempt to recapture Team USA’s miraculous victory over the Soviet Union during its 1980 gold-medal performance at Lake Placid. The movie takes on eerie extra importance, especially for Minnesotans, because its release followed by only six months the sudden and tragic death of coach Herb Brooks in a rollover freeway accident. Brooks and 12 of his players were from Minnesota.

Everybody who was alive in 1980 remembers where they were on that day in February when Team USA upset the Soviet Union 4-3 in the Winter Olympics. For me, itÂ’s easy; I was in the press box at the arena in Lake Placid. Having chronicled the team since it was put together at the National Sports Festival in Colorado Springs in the summer of 1979, and through its home exhibition base at Met Sports Center in Bloomington, I eagerly anticipated the new movie.

It was ironic that the movie about the greatest sports achievement in U.S. history wound up being recreated in Vancouver, because a huge part of the mystique of what Brooks accomplished was to help extricate the U.S. from the smothering domination Canada has had on American hockey development. It’s Canada’s game, but Canadians long have failed to acknowledge any variations from their style of up-and-down, NHL style of play, whether those variations came from Russia, Sweden, Finland – and especially the U.S. To Canada, the U.S. has mostly been the primary source for monetary support for Canadian professional players and administrators, and certainly not the source of a wellspring of fresh, new hockey ideas.

Still, Canada adopted the magical USA ride in 1980, so there was hope that Miracle would avoid the pitfalls that have plagued whatever movies, television specials and books have been made on the subject. It did overcome most of them, while telling the story with realistic performances and gripping drama.

Kurt Russell is excellent as Brooks. He inserted himself into the only Brooks he came to know, a reflective 66-year-old with glasses, and he captured the mannerisms, facial expressions, the walk, and the speech patterns — except where he says “You OK wid dat?” and slips from Eastside St. Paul into Brooklynese. But the Brooks Russell came to know was 66, not the impulsive, 42-year-old fireball that orchestrated the miracle. Patricia Clarkson plays Patti Brooks as a perky but almost-Stepford-Wife type, which completely misses PattiÂ’s sarcastic wit, which always offset HerbieÂ’s seriousness. In real life, Patti never criticized Herbie’s devotion to hockey, but created her own parallel universe in which to raise son Danny and daughter Kelly.

Real hockey players, some of them Minnesotans, skate and portray the players, which adds considerable realism, although I would have insisted on using real-game footage for some elements. Nobody, for example, comes close to the beautiful long strides of Rochester’s Eric Strobel, to say nothing of Soviet stars like Valery Kharlamov, who was a quicker Wayne Gretzky before Gretzky arrived on the hockey scene. Billy Schneider portrays his dad, Buzzy Schneider, even though he can’t duplicate the hasty, staccato strides of the tough, lanky Babbitt Rabbit,” who played for Brooks at the University of Minnesota as well as on the ’80 team.

The filmÂ’s creators never seem to grasp the circling style Brooks distilled from the Europeans, and the movie demonstrates both the U.S. team and European foes skating in the contemporary up-and-down Canadian/NHL style, universal in Canada. It would have been laudable to insert actual game footage of both the spectacular Soviets against the U.S. college kids, both in their pre-Olympic meeting, and when it mattered — when the U.S. kids proved they could defuse the Soviet style and ultimately improvise better than the masters.

Make no mistake, the Soviet team that Brooks’s Team USA defeated was the most-skilled hockey team ever assembled. One year earlier, virtually the same Soviet team engaged the best NHL all-stars, coached by Scotty Bowman, and crushed the NHLers 6-0 in a spectacular display of hockey brilliance in the deciding game of a three-game series at Madison Square Garden.

Miracle may have lost some realism by failing to capture the skill and style of the Soviets — and the U.S. team — but it definitely didnÂ’t miss the intensity of the teamÂ’s preparation. When Brooks skated the players through repeated “Herbies,” the movie portrays them, except to allow the players to sprint from line to line instead of to each line and all the way back to the end of the rink in flat-out intervals. They also turn in either direction instead of facing the same way, a Brooks-enforced trick so theyÂ’d turn both ways equally over the course of the full drill, instead of to their preferred strong side.

Brooks selected 12 Minnesotans on his final 20-man team – nine of them Gophers – along with two from Wisconsin, two from Michigan and four from Boston University. He diverted attention from the dominant Minnesota concept so successfully that every retelling of the tale has overlooked the Minnesota input to focus on BU teammates Jim Craig, the goalie, and Mike Eruzione, the captain who scored the game-winner in the 4-3 victory over the Soviet powerhouse. Miracle does more of the same, and adds another BU player, Jack O’Callahan, into the third most-prominent role.

Credit it to “Minnesota nice” that the dozen Minnesotans never complain about being slighted, and are satisfied to have been part of the team. They still exchange a few barbs, though, such as when the ’80 team members saw the first screening of Miracle in Los Angeles, and one of the Minnesotans suggested to the group that a sequel could be called “Miracle West,” in order to mention that some non-BU guys played, too. The importance of Mark Pavelich of Eveleth or Mark Johnson of the University of Wisconsin, the clear catalysts of the offense, would be worthy of character development. The Conehead Line, also called the Iron Range Line, with Pavelich centering Schneider and John Harrington of Virginia, was the prominent U.S. line throughout the Olympics, but we learn nothing about any of them. Again.

Pavelich, an improvisational genius who had teamed with Harrington on some great UMD teams through 1979, had a goal and five assists in the seven Olympic games, with almost every point a pivotal one, such as the set-ups on the last-minute tying goal by Billy Baker against Sweden, and to Eruzione for the famous goal to beat the Russians. Wisconsin’s Mark Johnson, who suffered in silence with a heavily taped shoulder injury through most of the Olympics, scored 5-5—10, with two of his goals against the Soviets, plus a goal and an assist in the three-goal, third-period rally of the 4-2 gold-medal-clinching game against Finland.

“The movie ended up three hours long, so they had to cut out nearly an hour of it,” said Harrington, the former UMD star who now coaches St. John’s University. “The first time I saw it, I picked at the things that were wrong. But I went back and watched it again, just as a movie, and it does a great job of telling a motivational story about a group of guys accomplishing a seemingly impossible task.”

It is a well-crafted movie, but it seems curious to alter some nuggets to less-compelling fiction, either for “dramatic effect or because of faulty memories. For example, Brooks closely scrutinized a four-team round-robin tournament at the National Sports Festival, in which everybody played three games, then a semifinal and bronze and gold finals. He pretended to allow input from numerous scouts and coaches that had been assembled, although he kept his own private list for picking the 28-man roster he named at nearly midnight after the “gold medal” game. The movie goes to length to stress that Brooks arrogantly picked his team before the week-long tournament, implying that the fiercely-played games weren’t necessary and maybe didn’t even occur.

Lou Nanne might be miffed that the actor portraying him is a slippery little guy. My theory is it might be a last laugh for Brooks. If he had any influence on the casting, the image remains of Brooks now looking down on the proceedings and chuckling at the final zinger inflicted on his long-time buddy.

The fiery O’Callahan is shown venting left-over hatred for the Gophers who had beaten his Boston University in a brawl-filled NCAA tournament semifinal at Denver in 1976. O’Callahan singles out ex-Gopher Rob McClanahan for having robbed him of the trophy, and blasts McClanahan with a bodycheck followed by an early practice fight. “O-C supposedly hated Robbie, but they never had that fight,” said Strobel. “Think about it: Robbie was a senior at Mounds View High School in 1976.”

Impromptu football games in the snow are neat, but fiction. In reality, Pavelich frequently led his teammates out to some outdoor Twin Cities ice for pickup games, even after long practices. They were rink-rats, and those pickup games may have been more unifying than any late-night skating drills or phony practice fights. “We always played using a tennis ball,” recalled Strobel. “I remember being at some rink in Hopkins, spending the whole time trying to take that tennis ball away from Pav. It was impossible.”

The movie extends the common belief that Brooks carefully plotted for his players to hate him in order to create unity. He was tough on them in his quest for total discipline under fire, as well as conditioning, and when the players gritted their teeth in their determination to show Brooks they could rise to his challenges, it might have evolved to something perceived as hatred. But it certainly wasn’t that Brooks wanted the players to hate him. Brooks created similar “us against the world” scenarios on every team he coached, but there was never any doubt Brooks was part of – and the leader of – the “us” faction.

The mind-games and psyche-jobs are valid, as Brooks deployed them to keep his team alert and ready for anything. Brooks always relied on catch-phrases and barked his “Brooksisms” so repetitively that Harrington logged them in a notebook. The movie shows a softer, emotional side of Brooks, but makes him view everything too seriously. In reality, he heckled himself for recycling some of his favorite phrases and tactics, and sympathized during the Olympic games about how players like Schneider, Strobel, Duluth’s Phil Verchota, Billy Baker from Grand Rapids, McClanahan from Mounds View, Richfield’s Steve Christoff, and Steve Janaszak of Hill-Murray, who had played three or four years for his Gopher teams before making the Olympic outfit. “They must be sick of hearing me by now,” he said.

As for the exhausting post-game skating drills in Norway, following a lackluster exhibition tie in Norway, Brooks indeed enforced endless Herbies. “The guys from Boston, Michigan, Wisconsin and UMD must have thought Herbie was nuts,” said Strobel. “But to me, and to the rest of the Gophers who had played for Herbie, it wasn’t anything we weren’t used to.”

Highlights of the film include Brooks agonizing over cutting Ralph Cox as the 21st player, and pondering whether to keep or replace Eruzione with high-scoring Gopher Tim Harrer right before the Olympics. Those are valid. But the four BU players accosting Brooks about it in the corridor works on the silver screen, when actually the whole team, in the dressing room, made it clear they thought Brooks should stick with the unity he had created.

Brooks kept OÂ’Callahan on the team even after he strained his knee ligaments in a 10-3 drubbing administered by the Soviets in an exhibition game at Madison Square Garden right before the Olympics. OÂ’Callahan makes a dramatic and heavy-hitting return in the Soviet medal-round game in the movie; in real life, he reappeared two games earlier. You could look it up: He assisted on a Christoff power-play goal in the game against Romania, but played only a few scarce shifts the rest of the way, including the Soviet game.

In the Olympics, everyone contributed. Schneider and McClanahan joined Johnson as goal-scoring leaders with five goals each, while Verchota matched Eruzione’s three goals. Gophers Neal Broten of Roseau and Steve Christoff, BU’s Dave Silk and Bowling Green’s Mark Wells scored two goals each, and Baker, Strobel and Morrow got one apiece. With O’Callahan virtually on one leg, Brooks primarily went with four defensemen – Ken Morrow and 20-year-old Gopher Mike Ramsey on one unit, Baker and David Christian from Warroad on the other, with Bob Suter of Madison, Wis., swinging in. Their characters were never developed, including the amazing one-year conversion to defense of Christian, who was a center at Warroad and the University of North Dakota before the Olympic year, and for a long NHL career afterward. Plus, his dad, Billy Christian, and uncle Roger Christian were stars on the 1960 U.S. gold medal team.

At the Olympics, Brooks did indeed jump McClanahan as a prima donna from the wealthy Twin Cities suburb of North Oaks when a painful leg bruise knocked him out in the first period of the opening 2-2 tie against Sweden. The obvious effect it had to startle the team to attention didn’t, however, require the movie version to have Brooks boast “That’ll get ’em going!” as he left the dressing room. In reality, the move inspired McLanahan to leap off the training table and chase Brooks into the hallway in a shouting match that made the wide-eyed Swedish team inadvertent witnesses.

The depiction of Brooks offering inane answers at post-game press conferences in a tiny room was also silly when it could have been a dramatic nugget. Actually, after two games, Brooks announced he would boycott the press conferences, which were held in a huge, high school auditorium across an entryway from the arena. New York columnist Mike Lupica had ripped Brooks for not bringing players for interviews because he wanted all the attention for himself. Brooks had never met nor spoken to Lupica, and he called him out from the podium at the next press conference, then announced that to prove his move wasn’t for personal attention, assistant coach Craig Patrick would be coming to subsequent press conferences instead. He also said the media wasnÂ’t allowed to talk to his players on game-day any more. In the movie, that whole flap is altered to a journalist asking Brooks politely if not bringing players was for self-gratification, and he cordially answers, “No, Mike…”

Eruzione has often retold the story that before the final period of the final game, Brooks came into the dressing room and said if the U.S. couldn’t rally to erase a 2-1 deficit and beat Finland, the players would “take it to your grave; to your (bleeping) grave.” Strobel said he remembers that comment being at practice on the day between the Soviet and Finland games. Going back to my notes and the story I wrote in the Minneapolis Tribune after the game against Romania, a quote from Brooks says he used that exact phrase on the players before that game, when a letdown could have precluded the U.S. from reaching the medal round.

Perhaps the most curious movie change is to the elegantly brief and legendary pregame talk that Brooks gave to inspire his players for the Soviet game. He said: “You were born to be a player. You were meant to be here. This moment is yours.” For some reason, the script adds all sorts of embellishing words to all three sentences in Russell’s reenactment, including replacing the priceless “This moment is yours,” with “This is your time.”

Unfortunately, the film-makers, like a lot of fans, were so drained by the Soviet conquest that the movie misses some incredible drama in the gold medal game against Finland – when no medal was yet certain. “Everything in the movie is geared at the Russian game, as if we spent the whole year building up to it,” said Harrington. “Actually, Herb prepared us for every game, and we had no idea we would even play the Russians.”

But itÂ’s only a movie. It’s the best thing done so far on that magical two weeks. And maybe itÂ’s best to leave something more for that “Miracle West” sequel.

(All rights: John Gilbert, Tuesday, February 17th, 2004 02:00:57 AM)

Gophers outrace No. 1 Sioux for WCHA playoff title

SAINT PAUL, MN. — Minnesota coach Don Lucia tried to deny it, but his team offered further evidence that when it comes to playoff time, the Gophers are magic. The latest example was Saturday nightÂ’s WCHA Final Five championship game, when the Gophers exchanged blows in a true battle of college hockey heavyweights, and beat North Dakota 5-4.

There was talk that this game might be low-key, because No. 1 ranked North Dakota and No. 4 Minnesota were already assured of claiming top seeds at two of the four NCAA regionals, which will be announced Sunday. But if the game meant nothing, the WCHA record crowd of 19,306 at Xcel Energy Center certainly was fooled by the spectacle that unfolded on the ice below.

You want magic? The game-winning goal, at 13:58 of the third period, came from Grant Potulny, the captain who started MinnesotaÂ’s magical post-season streak when he scored the overtime game-winner against Maine in the 2002 NCAA final on the same Xcel Energy ice, the first of two straight national championships.

“How fitting for Grant to get the winner in the last game he plays for us in the Twin Cities,” said Lucia. “This senior class is special to me, because it was our first fully recruited class.”

Potulny, as usual, was the team leader. And a mini-tantrum he threw may have had a major impact on the Gophers. It has taken such actions to transform Minnesota from the Complacent Gophers to the Playoff Gophers. The unanimous coaches choice as league champ, and the unanimous preseason No. 1 team in the nation, the Gophers were 0-4 in regular-season games against Minnesota-Duluth, but beat the Bulldogs 7-4 in FridayÂ’s semifinals. Then came the Fighting Sioux, who had beaten Minnesota three out of four games during the season, before confronting the far more focused Playoff Gophers. Just like that, the Gophers turned a combined 1-7 slate into two racehorse victories.

It wasnÂ’t just the seniors who came through. Freshman Danny Irmen, who flanks Gino Guyer opposite of Potulny on the second line, scored his third goal in two nights on a first-period power play to stake the Gophers to a 1-0 lead. Drew Stafford tied it for the Fighting Sioux later in the opening period, also on a power play, by deflecting Zach PariseÂ’s hard pass past Gopher goalie Kellen Briggs.
Jon Waibel, a light-scoring senior on the fourth line, put Minnesota ahead 2-1 early in the second period when he outreached the dive of goaltender Jake Brandt and slid the puck behind him at 4:09. Three minutes later, Waibel scored again, converting the rebound of Barry TallacksonÂ’s goal-crashing shot. But Tallackson was still in the crease after flattening Brandt when the puck bounced out into the slot and Waibel shot it in, so after consultation with video supervisors upstairs, the goal was disallowed.

That reversal sparked the Sioux, who had been outshot 17-8 in the first period, to a 19-8 shot edge in the second, resulting in two goals by top scorers Brandon Bochenski and Parise. Bochenski poked the puck in from the crease after Parise had snapped the puck off Briggs from behind the net. The puck squirted through Briggs, awaiting BochenskiÂ’s fencing-style lunge to poke it in at 8:50.

Later in the middle period, Parise vaulted the Sioux ahead 3-2, pouncing on a rebound in the slot and whirling to shoot into the lower right for his 22nd goal of the year. That came eight seconds after expiration of a power play, which occurred when Parise was left sprawled by Thomas VanekÂ’s cross-check to the head. Fortunately for Minnesota, benevolent referee Bob Ames gave Vanek only a minor penalty instead of a major or disqualification, and Vanek was able to come back later to score a huge goal.

When the first period ended 3-2 for the Sioux, Potulny did his thing. “I kicked over a garbage can,” said Potulny. “After Waibel’s second goal was called off, North Dakota came on and I felt like we were letting the game slip away.”

Bochenski saw it the same way, from the other side. “Having that goal disallowed was as big as us scoring a goal,” said the junior winger. “Once we got it tied up, we took over for a while. Then it went back and forth.”

Vanek got his chance early in the third period, with Sioux defenseman Nick Fuher tried to slam a hard pass out of the zone. Vanek picked it off at the top of the left circle, moved in alone to deke Brandt down, then shifted around him on the right to slide the puck back in an instant before the diving Fuher slid through the crease trying to block the shot.
That tied the game 3-3 at 2:08, and Troy Riddle put the Gophers up 4-3 at 4:48 when he caught a high flip, dropped dropped the puck to the ice, and shot it low. Brandt got part of it, but it slithered across the line for RiddleÂ’s 23rd goal of the season.

The big crowd cheered when the Gophers got a power play, but Bochenski got the puck on the right boards, made a great move to shift past star Gopher defenseman Keith Ballard in a confrontation of Hobey Baker finalists, and rushed at the net, cutting right-to-left to score a spectacular shorthanded goal for the 4-4 equalizer. It was the second goal of the game and 26th of the season for Bochenski, who also had an assist.
Bochenski and Parise, who also is among the Hobey Baker final 10, have been split apart several times by coach Dean Blais, although he reunites them whenever scoring a goal seems mandatory. “I think I’ll be leaving them together from now on,” smiled Blais. Makes sense, after Bochenski, who also got two assists in Friday’s 4-2 semifinal victory over Alaska-Anchorage, and Parise added a goal and two assists, leaving them with matching 2-3—5 slates in the two Final Five games, meaning they had scored four of North Dakota’s eight weekend goals, with 10 combined points.
“I noticed that their big players had come up big,” said Lucia, “and I told our guys it was time for our big players to do the same. They did, with Vanek, Riddle and Grant all scoring.”
Both coaches noted they were more mellow than usual because both knew they had NCAA top seeds already locked up. Blais said he thought it was a “great game from start to end. I even pulled the goalie with four minutes to go to try to get a goal. But there was good excitement from both teams, and we learned we can compete when the pressure is on. It was a fun environment, and it takes a little special character to play well in a game like this. We wanted to win, but we got a lot out of it.”
North Dakota outshot Minnesota 39-38, and Lucia added that he’s not used to seeing his team give up so much – 31 shots and four goals to Minnesota-Duluth, and 39 shots and four more goals to North Dakota.

“I’m not happy giving up four goals a night,” said Lucia. “But that’s what happens when you play the two highest-scoring teams in the country. We played well, and we have to continue to get better, but we know we’re not going to see anybody who’s better than the two teams we saw here this weekend.”

TOURNAMENT NOTES: A three-person committee either showed up only Saturday night, or apparently got completely caught up in the tense final, because they ignored three teams to name an all-tournament team from only the two finalists. North Dakota forwards Parise and Bochenski and defenseman Matt Jones were joined by Minnesota forward Irmen – a great pick – plus defenseman Keith Ballard and goaltender Briggs. While Briggs allowed eight goals from 70 shots for two games for a meager 4.0 goals-against mark and .866 save percentage, Alaska-Anchorage goaltender Chris King, for example, allowed only five goals in two games while facing 90 shots for a glittering 2.50 GA and .946 save percentage while stealing a 4-1 upset victory over Colorado College and holding his team in a 4-2 semifinal loss to North Dakota. More incomprehensibly, the same committee also named Briggs the tournamentÂ’s most valuable player…Alaska-Anchorage used backup Kevin Reiter in goal for the third-place game, and he also played well, although UMD beat the Seawolves 4-2, outshooting them 40-27. He blanked the Bulldogs until Evan Schwabe scored his third goal and fourth point of the weekend midway through the second period for a 1-1 tie, then league player-of-the-year and Hobey Baker finalist Junior Lessard scored a power-play goal and Luke Stauffacher tallied shorthanded for a three-goal second period, and Bryan McGregor made it 4-1 in the third. The Bulldogs lost Lessard to a knee injury later in the second period, while forwards Tyler Brosz and Tim Stapleton and defenseman Tim Hambly all sat out with injuries.

(John Gilbert can be reached by email at sports@jwgilbert.com.)

Gophers turn on playoff magic to overcome UMD 7-4

SAINT PAUL, MN. — ItÂ’s all in the timing. Minnesota met arch-rival Minnesota-Duluth four times during the WCHA season, and for the first time since UMD joined the WCHA, the Bulldogs won all four times. But that was against the “Regular Season” Gophers. Friday, the “Playoff Gophers” showed up at Xcel Energy Center and whipped the Bulldogs 7-4 in the second semifinal of the WCHA Final Five playoffs.

Just like that, the sting of being swept twice by the Bulldogs was left in the rear-view mirror. The Gophers, who seemed to be in neutral all season in the afterglow of two straight NCAA national championships, advanced to Saturday nightÂ’s playoff final with a 25-13-3 record to face No. 1 ranked North Dakota. UMD, meanwhile, must pick up the pieces of a disheartening loss and take a 25-12-4 record into the third-place game against Alaska-Anchorage.

By those records, UMD seems to have an edge on the Gophers, by the slimmest of margins. By league standing, the Bulldogs had a clear edge, finishing second to MinnesotaÂ’s tie for fourth and No. 5 seed in the league playoffs. But the timing of the victory boosts the Gophers ahead of UMD and into fourth place in the country in the strange computerized world of NCAA ranking criteria.

That means that regardless of what happens on the final day of the league playoffs, top-rated North Dakota and Minnesota both will be among the nationÂ’s four top seeds, each assigned to a different regional, along with Maine and Boston College. The loss means UMD will become a No. 2 seed, to be assigned wherever the NCAA selection committee chooses to send them on Sunday.

All of those things were riding on FridayÂ’s game, which drew a WCHA record crowd of 19,208 to Xcel Energy Center. More disturbing than even the loss was how it came about, in a complete unraveling that has to leave coach Scott Sandelin wondering what happened.

The Bulldogs opened in complete command, outshooting the Gophers 19-8 in a dominating first period, which produced a 3-1 lead. Luke Stauffacher slammed in a goal at 2:08, Evan Schwabe got his first of two when he cruised in from the right side and shot high, glancing his shot into the short side off the arm goalie Kellen Briggs at 9:06.

Minnesota countered when Troy Riddle scored his 22nd goal on a power play at 14:03, but that barely slowed down the speeding Bulldogs, who went up 3-1 just 18 seconds later when Schwabe skated up the left side, faked a shot then stepped to his left to score beyond Briggs, who had dropped to the ice.

ThatÂ’s the way the Bulldogs had done it all year, countering quickly to put down opposing rallies. But in the final minute of the period, the Bulldogs turned the puck over when a careless pass in the neutral zone left a clear chance for Gino Guyer, who rushed up the left side but shot off the left base of the net. Guyer, however, got to the end boards first and threw the puck back out front, where Danny Irmen cashed in against goalie Isaac Reichmuth, just 35 seconds before intermission.

The Gophers still trailed 3-2, but the goal was pivotal. “The goal at the end of the first period was big,” said Minnesota coach Don Lucia. “That typifies Danny Irmen, too. We’ve got some guys who don’t want to get their noses dirty, but at this time of year, guys who are willing to get their noses dirty seem to score the goals.

“We thought this game was very important, but we came out in the first period and we weren’t playing at the level we needed against a great team like Duluth. And they are a great team – as good as any we’ve played. Up front, I thought only Riddle and Irmen were competing for us in the first period. After the period, there were a few blankety-blanks said, and I thought we played much better the last two periods. We were able to put some pressure on their ‘D.’ ”

It didnÂ’t seem like pressure, so much as the entire UMD team seemed to become infected with a strange tendency to throw the puck away. A team that had played virtually flawless hockey to beat Minnesota 4-3 in overtime and 4-2 at Mariucci Arena in October, and 6-1 and 4-1 in Duluth five weeks ago, embarked on a series of defensive lapses that became contagious.

Irman broke loose while killing a penalty, gathered in Keith BallardÂ’s long pass, and sailed in to score on a crease-crossing move at 4:51 of the middle period, and the shorthanded goal lifted the Gophers to a 3-3 tie. Ten minutes later, the Bulldogs had the puck in complete possession in their own corner, but a mishandled pass squirted out to the slot, resembling a perfect feed to Gopher Ryan Potulny, who immediately drilled his sixth goal in only four games since coming back from a season-long injury.

“We had a good first period, then they got that goal at the end of the first,” said Schwabe. “That was a downer, and from then on, we lost the game at both blue lines. We got outskated, outhit, out-everythinged.”

After outshooting Minnesota 19-8 in the first period, UMD was outshot 32-13 thereafter, for a 41-31 Gopher edge for the game.

Trailing only 4-3 when the third period started, the Bulldogs got renewed life when Justin Williams scored at 0:41 to tie it 4-4. But the occasional UMD offensive rushes were overwhelmed by the BulldogsÂ’ inability to clear their zone. They failed to get the puck out of the zone at 3:45, and a couple of passes later, Minnesota took advantage when Thomas Vanek scored his 23rd goal to break the 4-4 tie.

The Gophers got a huge goal at 14:41 when Jon Waibel fired a pass from deep on the right that found Andy Sertich alone at the left edge of the crease, and he shoveled it in before the beleaguered Reichmuth could respond to make it 6-4. The Bulldogs struggled to get back in the game over the last five minutes, but by then they could scarcely complete a coherent pass, and the Gophers – who outshot UMD 20-6 in the final period – finished the victory with Barry Tallackson’s empty-net goal with 36 seconds remaining.

For a team that had played so consistently through the entire season, such a collapse seemed out of character. Coach Scott Sandelin was asked if he had ever seen such a turnabout this season. “Yeah,” he said. “Last Sunday. We were up 5-0 on Mankato in the first 11 minutes, and we were lucky to win 6-5. That’s two games now where we didn’t play very well defensively. That’s the most disappointing thing for me. You’re not going to win playing defensively like that.”

Gophers turn Golden as playoffs arrive

ItÂ’s not what youÂ’ve done, itÂ’s what you have done lately that counts when it comes to WCHA playoff time. For the University of Minnesota, it seems that a season of sputtering stops and starts and a fifth-place finish has long since passed, because the tournament-savvy Gophers are on what has become an annual post-season ascent.

A record of 15-12-1 left the Gophers only the fifth seed in the WCHA playoff picture, and in need of a season-ending sweep of St. Cloud State to hang onto that final home-ice berth behind North Dakota, Minnesota-Duluth, Wisconsin and Denver.

Typically, Minnesota got past St. Cloud State in a first-round playoff series, erupting for a dominant two-game triumph. It seemed the Gophers were primed and ready for a new challenge. After all, two years ago Denver was the WCHA champion, but when the Pioneers faltered in the NCAA playoffs, the Gophers went on to win the NCAA title for the first time in 23 years. And last year, after Colorado College won the WCHA title, the Tigers, also, faltered in the NCAA regionals, and again the Gophers stormed on to win their second straight NCAA title.

This year, the challenge would be that the Gophers – already set on an NCAA berth because of a strong nonconference showing – would have to advance through the WCHA Final Five by winning the dreaded play-in game between fourth and fifth, then beating league champ North Dakota, and then the winner between second and third seeds UMD and Wisconsin.

But wait! The Playoff Gods have smiled early on the Gophers this time around. Denver, fresh from sweeping a season-ending pair from Colorado College, lost two straight to CC in the opening playoff round and will stay home from this weekÂ’s Final Five. And Wisconsin, at home in spacious Kohl Center, were beaten by eighth-place Alaska-Anchorage two out of three times and also will be at home when the five survivors convene at Saint PaulÂ’s Xcel Energy Center.

Those results knock out third-seed Wisconsin and fourth-seed Denver, and because the WCHA recalibrates the five survivors, Minnesota moves up from fifth to third – avoiding the play-in game, which now will be between Colorado College and Alaska-Anchorage on Thursday night. That winner will advance to play North Dakota Friday afternoon, while Minnesota faces UMD in the Friday night semifinal.

Facing the runner-up Bulldogs is no treat for Minnesota, because the Bulldogs won all four games against Minnesota during the season, including 6-1 and 4-1 romps a month ago in Duluth. Ah, but those were the “regular-season” Gophers, who bear little resemblance to the Gophers in playoff mode.

One of the keys for Minnesota is a pivotal decision made by the Potulny family, which produced Grant Potulny – the captain, the game-winning overtime goal-scorer to give Minnesota its NCAA title victory against Maine two years ago, and the team’s unequivocal leader. The same family also contributed Ryan Potulny, last year’s USHL junior league scoring champion, as a Minnesota freshman this season.

Ryan Potulny was injured in the eighth game of the season, and while that was part of one game beyond the point where medical redshirt years are granted, it was a cinch he could get the redshirt year on appeal. Going into the last weekend of the regular season, however, coach Don Lucia surprised everybody by announcing the rehabilitated Ryan Potulny would rejoin the lineup for the remainder of the season, however far the Gophers go.

Lucia isnÂ’t foolish enough to exchange a full season for a handful of games, no matter how important, and regardless of the fact that the Gophers finished with a listless four losses in six games stretch. But he discussed it with the Potulny family, because RyanÂ’s skill level is such that heÂ’s more likely to be lured by a pro contract before four years are up than he is to stay through four full years and a fifth, redshirt season.

“It was their call,” said Lucia. “The only question was whether the family thought that Ryan would be here for a fifth year. If he’s not planning to be here for a fifth year, then why redshirt and waste the rest of this season. He adds a lot.”

After Minnesota beat St. Cloud 7-4 in the season-ending series, Ryan Potulny stepped in and scored a goal at 3:34 of the second period. He followed a rush by Thomas Vanek, and when goaltender Ryan Coole poke-checked the puck away from Vanek, the younger Potulny put it in. Minnesota finished the sweep with a 4-2 victory, and Ryan PotulnyÂ’s goal was the game-winner.

Assistant coach Bob Motzko, who manned the bench while Lucia sat up in the press box with a padded collar easing the aftermath of some surgery on his upper vertebra, wasn’t surprised by the impressive return. “It’s going to take Ryan a while to get everything back together, but he’s something special. We’ve just got to extend our season a few weeks to give him time.”

Was there any doubt? The Gophers whipped the faltering Huskies 6-1 and 7-3, and Ryan Potulny scored four more goals in the sweep, giving him five goals in three games.

As if they needed any more incentive against UMD, the Gophers have their hot hand going against a Bulldog outfit that narrowly escaped Minnesota State-Mankato. UMD lost 4-3 in overtime in a Friday shocker at the DECC, then came back to win 6-2 on Saturday. In SundayÂ’s deciding game, UMD flew off to an insurmountable lead with five goals in the in the opening minutes, then found out the lead was surmountable, after all, and had to hang on for a 6-5 escape.

For UMD, a strong post-season will wash away all sorts of post-season blues. Last year, the Bulldogs were the hottest team in the WCHA at the end of the season, and finished third in the Final Five with an impressive run, but their lack of nonconference success killed their pairwise computer rating and left them out of the 12-team NCAA field.

This year, their strong pairwise assures the Bulldogs of a slot in the expanded 16-team NCAA, but the close call against ninth-place Mankato, coupled with MinnesotaÂ’s sudden resurgence, reduces the effect UMDÂ’s regular-season four-games-to-none record may have had against the Gophers.

After all, UMD is breaking new ground this year by coming into the Final Five as a semifinalist. For Minnesota, it’s same-old ground, revisited. At least this year, UMD can share in Minnesota’s “home-ice” advantage, where the Xcel Center’s contract calls for the Gophers to play the night game in the tournament to assure a big crowd. Last year, UMD won the play-in game, then lost a close battle to top-seeded Colorado College, before coming back to win the third-place game.

This year, the Dogs knew theyÂ’d be in the semifinals, and they anticipated facing a Wisconsin team they had just beaten in a season-ending sweep in Madison. Instead, they get the Gophers, who suddenly look like theyÂ’re on a mission. Again.

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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.