Guyer, Potulny pace Gophers 9-2 romp past Mercyhurst

MINNEAPOLIS, MN. — In January, Gino Guyer was a freshman who had shown only flashes of strong play for the University of Minnesota hockey team, while Barry Tallackson was a big sophomore with more potential than production — which is to say zero goals — and Grant Potulny was the captain who was just coming back from a broken ankle suffered in the season-opening game.

When organizing his troops for the stretch drive, coach Don Lucia assembled those three spare parts onto one line, and for the last six weeks, that line crystallized MinnesotaÂ’s offense, and it showed why Friday night, with a record-breaking outburst for a 9-2 romp over Mercyhurst in the NCAA West Regional hockey tournament semifinals at Mariucci Arena.

Potulny scored three goals, prompting numerous members of the crowd of 9,554 to toss hats onto the ice when his hat trick was completed at 1:05 of the third period. Guyer assisted on the first four Minnesota goals, then added his fifth assist on PotulnyÂ’s third goal, and his five assists set a record for an NCAA regional game, and tied the overall NCAA tournament and University of Minnesota records. Tallackson, a constant physical force, added a goal and two assists.

The victory thrusts Minnesota (25-8-9) into the 4 p.m. Saturday West Regional championship against Ferris State for a berth in the Frozen Four and a chance to go to Buffalo, N.Y., to defend the national championship they won last April at Xcel Energy Center.

Mercyhurst (22-13-2), one of the recipients of an automatic berth as the conference winner of the fledgling MAAC, was the victim as the Gophers scored three times in the first period, five more in the second, and led 9-0 before the Lakers from Pennsylvania got a couple of meaningless power-play goals in the third period, long after Lucia had slowed down his sizzling line by playing his third and fourth lines a lot. But the damage was done.

“Mercyhurst got our ‘A’ game tonight,” said Lucia.

Mercyhurst coach Rick Gotkin was asked at what point he sensed things weren’t going favorably. “I tried to call a time out in warm-ups, but they wouldn’t let me,” he said.

“We didn’t play our best. The question is, would it have made a difference if we had played our best? At this point, the University of Minnesota is just better than Mercyhurst. I’m OK with that. This was another part of the learning process. We’re playing with the big boys, and we knew if we didn’t play well, it could be ugly…and if we DID play well, it could be ugly.”

Gotkin added that he hoped his team might be able to support freshman goaltender Andy Franck and keep the Gophers off the scoreboard in the early going. No chance.

Guyer played catch with Tallackson up the right side before relaying a pass across the goal-mouth to Potulny at 1:15, on the lineÂ’s first shift of the game. On its next turn, Guyer muscled his way out of the right corner, kept the puck protected until he got behind the net, then slid a pass out to Keith Ballard, who scored at 4:33. With five minutes left in the opening period, Potulny rushed up the right side, ducking around the last defender and cutting to the net, where he surprised Franck with a quick shot, high to the short side.

Guyer blocked the puck free in the neutral zone to open the second period, spotting Tallackson for a pass at the Mercyhurst blue line, and Tallackson cut to his right and scored with a 40-foot slapshot at 1:40.

“The guys have been very supportive,” said Guyer, a freshman who played high school hockey at Greenway of Coleraine last season. “Playing with Barry and Grant makes my job a lot easier.”

Some other Gophers got a turn with the offense after that. Thomas Vanek skated end to end, maintained his balance as he cut from the left side to the right circle, and snapped a shot into the upper left corner at 4:10. Fifty-seven seconds later, defenseman Paul Martin skated up the right side, pulled up and flipped a shot at the net, aiming for a rebound chance. Instead, the puck squirted through FranckÂ’s pads and it was 6-0. Twenty-seven seconds of scoreless hockey followed, then Jon Waibel took a short pass from Jake Fleming in the left circle and cruised to the net alone, scoring for a 7-0 lead.

The two goals 27 seconds apart made it three goals in 1:24, and settled the issue for sure, but Ballard notched his second of the night at 13:57 on a rebound, and Potulny cashed in TallacksonÂ’s feed from behind the net to open the third.

David Wrigley and Scott Reynolds got MercyhurstÂ’s goals to ruin Travis WeberÂ’s shutout, both with Gophers in the penalty box.

“We let up in the third and made some mental mistakes,” said Gopher defenseman Keith Ballard. “We can’t let ourselves slip.”

If slipping is ever to be tolerated, however, it might be once a 9-0 lead is on the board.

Ferris State whips North Dakota 5-2 in regional semifinal

North Dakota seemed to get all the breaks through the first two-thirds of this college hockey season, but those same breaks cruelly abandoned the Fighting Sioux over the last 17 games, including Friday, when their season ended in futility with a 5-2 loss to Ferris State.

All those good bounces and deflections and the ability to pounce on all the available loose pucks led to enough success to assure the Sioux a spot in the first 16-team field of the NCAA national tournament, but it couldn’t provide a shield in the first semifinal of the NCAA West Regional at Mariucci Arena.

It seems a long time ago, now, that the Sioux registered records of 19-1-3 and 21-2-3, boosting North Dakota to the No. 1 national ranking. Since then, the Sioux were 5-10-2 — which is something beyond merely falling off in effectiveness. The pucks that hit pipes and glanced out instead of in, the loose pucks that seemed to remain just out of reach instead of becoming easy goals, and the deflections that went the wrong way continued to plague the Fighting Sioux Friday, forcing them to take a 4-8-2 finish into summer vacation.

Ferris State, the CCHA regular-season champion and playoff runner-up, didn’t have anything easy against North Dakota while winning for the 31st time. In fact, the Sioux outshot Ferris 45-27, and played a tune off the goal posts. But a power-play goal by Derek Nesbitt gave Ferris State a 1-0 lead in the first period, and a pair of late goals in the second period – by Simon Mangos on a power play at 15:42 and by Jeff Legue on a speedy rush at 18:04 – gave the Bulldogs a 3-0 cushion.

“I think their goalie won the game for them,” said Sioux sophomore Brandon Bochenski, who finished the season with 35 goals. “We hit six posts, and whenever the puck came loose in front, it never came to our sticks. At the start of the season, finishing where we did might have looked pretty good, but with the group we had, and the way we played the first half of the season, itÂ’s disappointing. We had championship hopes, and it hurts.”

It wasnÂ’t until the third period, when Sioux coach Dean Blais juggled all his lines and changed goaltenders from Jake Brandt to Josh Siembida, that North Dakota came to life, outshooting the Bulldogs 19-7. David Lundbohm circled out to score at 7:25 to trim the deficit to 3-1, but Greg Rallo scored for Ferris at 9:11 to make it 4-1. Ryan Hale, who started the game on defense, moved up to center and scored with a slapshot from the right circle with 4:26 left to close the gap to 4-2, but goalie Mike Brown stopped everything else after that, and Trevor Large hit an empty net with 18 seconds left to clinch it.

Ferris State (31-9-1) will face Minnesota in todayÂ’s 4 p.m. Regional final for a berth in the NCAA Frozen Four in two weeks.

“We had 17 quality shots and hit six pipes,” said Blais. “When we hit two pipes on the same shift at the start of the third period, I knew it wasn’t our day. Brandon Bochenski hit the post on one shot and I thought the puck might split, because he shoots 100 miles an hour.”

Blais agreed that a 26-12-5 finishing record looks good, but blamed bad penalties at critical times for unraveling the Sioux. “We can’t afford to take bad penalties, but we didn’t have the discipline to stay away from them. We haven’t had the discipline for quite a while, actually.”

When asked how upset he was after the loss, Blais smiled.
“That’s why they have a 10 or 15 minute cooling off period after games,” he said. “Losing hurts, and losing in the national tournament hurts worse.”

Sejna, Tigers put No. 1 rating up against winless Seawolves

There couldnÂ’t be a more prohibitive favorite in the WCHA playoffs than regular-season champion Colorado College welcoming 10th-place and winless Alaska-Anchorage to Colorado Springs for a best-of-three series.

First of all, Colorado College has been the WCHAÂ’s vanguard, ranked No. 1 in the nation in all the polls for the past six weeks. Beyond that, the Tigers faced second-place Minnesota State-Mankato two weeks from the end of the season with the official clinching of the title still at hand, and they accomplished it with a stunning 8-1 blowout that ended MankatoÂ’s record 17-game unbeaten streak.

The emotional letdown led to a Mankato rebound the next night for a reversal, 9-6, at the hands of the Mavericks, but CC came back to beat arch-rival Denver, the defending WCHA champs and the team picked to win the title this season, in the final home-and-home series.

The result is a final 19-4-5 league record, for a six-point margin over co-runners-up Mankato and Minnesota, and a glowing 26-5-5 overall record. By comparison, Alaska-Anchorage finished 0-22-6, and 1-26-7 overall.

The struggling Seawolves know their best days are somewhere up ahead, but if they think thereÂ’s even a chance of complacency on CCÂ’s part, even that seems doubtful, as the Tigers focus in on this weekend as a stepping stone to next weekÂ’s WCHA Final Five at Xcel Energy Center in Saint Paul.

“I don’t think it will be a problem maintaining the hunger with this group,” said Colorado College coach Scott Owens. “ItÂ’s been six or seven years since weÂ’d won the MacNaughton Cup here in the Springs, and to win it 8-1, with a full house and a very festive setting was exciting for our community and our program. Then we finished up against Denver and had two good battles. So now weÂ’re ready for the playoffs.

“WeÂ’ve never won the Broadmoor Cup in the history of this program. Hopefully, if we do that, everything else will fall into place for the NCAA. But I really like this team’s ability to forget what’s happened the weekend before, and concentrate on what’s coming up.”

For the Seawolves, about the only bright spot to a season of injuries, suspensions and rebuilding, coach John Hill and his troupe face a trek to Colorado Springs, where Hill spent many happy years as Don LuciaÂ’s assistant on teams that became the first ever in WCHA history to win three consecutive WCHA championships. But itÂ’s painfully obvious that where the program wants to go and where it is right now are widely separated.

“It’s been a grind for us,” acknowledged assistant coach Jack Kowal. “We’ve been just trying to move forward. It’s a big feat for us to go down to Colorado and try to win a game. The stars would have to be aligned pretty well for us to have a chance. But we’ve got a pretty competitive group, and we just want to keep climbing that mountain.”

Kowal meant no analogy, but neighboring PikeÂ’s Peak would be an easier climb than beating the Tigers.

Colorado College leads the league in scoring, with 125 goals, to AnchorageÂ’s 41. The Tigers also lead in power play efficiency with 29 percent, and in penalty-killing, at 83.1 percent.

Locating CCÂ’s leadership is as easy as checking the statistics.
You want offense? How about league scoring champ Peter Sejna, who leads the nation in points per game with 2.00, based on his 31 goals-41 assists and 72 points. Noah Clarke, another CC senior, is third nationally with 19-42—61, and his 42 assists are the national standard. Defense? How about a group led by Tom Preissing, who has set the CC record for scoring by a defenseman. In goal? Curtis McElhinney has a 21-4-5 record and has simply been the top goaltender in the league.

Behind McElhinney and the offense, Colorado College has rallied from behind five times to win after trailing at the second intermission.
“It really helps when your upper classmen and seniors are some of your best players,” said Owens. “It just rubs off, and it doesn’t matter whether it’s Sejna and Noah Clarke, or Joe Cullen, or the defense. Our defensive corps is underrated, but they knock the puck away and help control rebounds.

“And McElhinney has been consistent. He’s just plugged along, while other guys are more in the limelight. But he plays a pro style, he’s a stand-up goalie and he’s cool, calm and mentally tough.”
McElhinney led the WCHA with 2.19 goals-against and had a .916 save percentage.

Alaska-Anchorage, in contrast, is led by freshman Ales Parez, who has 6-21—27, and ranks 22nd in WCHA scoring at 6-18—24, where he’s tied with CC’s Joe Cullen (13-11—24.)

“Our young guys are coming along,” said Kowal. “Experience and the amount of playing time should help over the next couple of years.”
Kowal added that the return of captain Matt Shasby should provide a bit of a lift, after heÂ’s missed several weeks with a broken foot.
But when asked what has been the most successful aspect of the Seawolves season so far, Kowal had to pause and think a moment.

“Our recruiting,” he said.

As hockey icon, personal friend, Brooks leaves void

ItÂ’s been a couple of days now, but it still hasnÂ’t sunk in. Herb Brooks canÂ’t really be gone.

Ever since that moment on Monday afternoon, when my cell phone rang during an auto-writing trip to California, and I was informed that Brooks had been killed in a one-vehicle rollover accident on Interstate 35 just south of Forest Lake, there has been a haunting, unrealistic feeling about accepting the fact that Herbie is dead.

If he hadnÂ’t become one of my best friends over the last 40 years, in a relationship where we felt mutually comfortable sharing confidences about any subject, I would still feel the emptiness of his loss. As a Minnesotan interested in hockey, there is a grief that wonÂ’t go away, because Herbie was the single icon who has taken the game to heights others canÂ’t imagine. There is not going to be another like him, who can take a player, a team, a state, a country, and a world, and lift it to a special plateau.

But he was my friend, and that makes it harder to accept. He was a unique, special person who made distinct impacts on my entire family almost as if we were part of his family. Most people wonÂ’t be able to comprehend what his loss will mean to his wife, Patti, or to his son, Danny, and daughter, Kelly, and their young families. But my family can, because the loss is almost as gripping to us, and to people everywhere who understand the sport of hockey and its impact on the emotions of Minnesota.

HerbieÂ’s funeral will be Saturday morning, at the St. Paul Cathedral. Maybe by then, IÂ’ll be able to accept it, to rise from the grief and celebrate the fantastic things this man achieved, while trying to overcome the realization of his objectives left undone.

I first met Herbie just after he had finished his college hockey career at the University of Minnesota, in the days when he was an assistant coach to Glen Sonmor at Minnesota and played for U.S. National teams and the Olympic teams of 1964 and Â’68. He was a fluid, smooth skater who understood the game from his proud days as an East-sider at St. Paul Johnson. But his scope of the game was different, even then.

He didnÂ’t believe that hockey had to be played in the traditional Canadian manner, up and down lanes, dumping the puck and chasing it down. The European style of puck-control, played particularly by the Soviets, seemed so much more logical. And yet, he appreciated the effect of hard-socking bodychecks and fiery spirit in place from the best elements of the North American game, which replaced the EuropeansÂ’ total devotion to skating and emotionless discipline. He dreamed of combining the two into a hybrid system that, at that time, existed only in his fertile mind.

When Brooks became head coach of the Gophers in 1972, the team was in shambles. He reassembled it, and, over seven years, raised it to heights that will remain incomprehensible to younger fans, who justifiably celebrate the current two straight NCAA championships won by the Gophers. The game was more ferocious then, played at a higher caliber in the WCHA with ageless Tier I Canadian junior hockey graduates allowed to participate freely. Against teams of a caliber that college hockey wonÂ’t see again representing Denver, North Dakota, Michigan Tech, Wisconsin, Michigan and a dozen Eastern colleges that Brooks built homegrown teams and inspired them to win the first three NCAA titles in Gopher history, in 1974, Â’76 and Â’79.

A year later, the whole country adopted Herbie when he hand-picked a gang of college players and took on the world – literally – and achieved the impossible with Team USA in 1980, by beating a Soviet Union team that absolutely was the best ever to play the game – a team potent enough to humiliate the best National Hockey League all-stars.

How could wide-eyed young men named Pavelich, Harrington, Verchota, Broten, Baker, Schneider, Christoff, Christian, McClanahan, Ramsey and the rest beat men named Tretiak, Kharlamov, Petrov, Mikhailov, Maltsev and other Soviet legends who ranked among the best men to ever play the game? It was the magic of Herb Brooks.

Think about it: In a seven-year span, from 1974 through 1980, Brooks coached three NCAA hockey championship teams, one NCAA runner-up, and completed the run by directing an Olympic team to the greatest sports upset and sports accomplishment in competitive athletic history.

It is winning that will define Herbie historically, including his successful style tuned to guide NHL teams out of their restrictive grind to unprecedented creative heights, whether with the New York Rangers, New Jersey Devils, Minnesota North Stars, or part of an interim season with the Pittsburgh Penguins. But winning is an unfortunate measuring stick. A better one was how those teams played, how they were inspired, pushed, conned, coaxed and driven to personal peaks, proving that success is best measured when athletes all contribute their individual best for the sake of a teamÂ’s collective success.

Some of his best players, even Olympians, didn’t see what it meant to play for Brooks. All he did, some of them said back then, “was let us play.” They didn’t learn until later the value of playing for a coach who selected them for their talent, pushed them to expand their abilities beyond their own perceived limits, then blended it all to improvisational heights that repeatedly brought spectacular results to what he called “sophisticated pond hockey.”

He was at his best building, creating and then demanding more, always more, from what he started with toward what he projected. If his projections were higher than his observers, or even his players, too bad – Herbie’s teams were always Herbie’s Teams, and they did it his way.

Herbie was the most critical voice in American hockey, and he challenged the USA Hockey organization to forget about selecting a few elite players at great expense and to instead invest in developing a broad base of excellence among hundreds of young prospects.

Often at odds with USA Hockey and its bureaucracy, everything came together again in 2002 and Brooks again coached Team USA. It was fascinating to watch Brett Hull, Jeremy Roenick, Mike Modano and other brilliant NHLers respond willingly, almost gleefully, to Brooks and become the best team all through the Olympic Games at Salt Lake City – until the Gold Medal game, when an awesome but underachieving Canadian team rose up to beat the U.S.

Most fans, and USA Hockey now celebrate that Silver Medal, but Herbie never did. He knew they fell short. Just barely short, but short, nonetheless.

Herbie was 66, but he never showed signs of slowing down as director of player development for the Pittsburgh Penguins, and as an icon for Minnesota and U.S. hockey excellence.

HerbieÂ’s effect on my whole family was indelible. When my wife, Joan, worked at a physical therapy clinic, Herb came to her for treatment of his occasional aches and pains, and he always insisted that she was the only one who could relieve his agony.

When my older son, Jack, was a youngster, Herbie asked him to be his teamÂ’s stick boy, and he was excited to haul sticks and stand on the bench at old Williams Arena for some of those memorable Gopher performances, watching the first-ever Gopher championship teams being assembled.

When my younger son, Jeff, was a 7-year-old Mite, Herb let him into his hockey school for 9-10-year-olds. Herb came and sat with me in the Roseville Arena seats to watch for a while, and just then a goalie who was at least a foot taller got behind Jeff in line for drills, and pushed the little kid repeatedly. Suddenly Jeff whirled and socked the big kid right on the goalie mask. Herbie erupted in laughter, and loved to repeat that story over and over in my presence. Score another one for the little guy bopping the big one.

Jeff was out in Bellingham, Wash., Joan and Jack were in the Twin Cities, and I was on a trip to California on Monday, August 11 when the hockey world stopped. We all talked to each other by phone, and we all choked back tears, some of us better than others.

Everybody, not just hockey zealots, can take inspiration every day and in any endeavor from Herb Brooks and his inner drive and desire to succeed. But from now on, itÂ’s going to be a lot tougher. Herbie is gone, incomprehensible as that may be, and there is no one who can ever take his place.

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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.