CC nears WCHA title as Bachman turns into overdrive
In the long and storied hockey history of Colorado College, no goaltender ever had recorded back-to-back shutouts in road games. Until now.
With first place in the WCHA on the line, and only three weekends remaining in the regular season, Richard Bachman took things into his own hands, gloved though they were. Bachman, a freshman, who hadn’t practiced all week because of the death of his grandmother, showed up in Duluth just after midnight Friday, and proceeded to blank the UMD Bulldogs 3-0 and 4-0 in his first time ever inside the Duluth Entertainment Convention Center.
That sent CC into this weekend’s series against Minnesota State-Mankato, and the season-ending home-and-home set against Denver, needing only one point in the last four games to outdistance North Dakota and three points to eliminate Denver for the MacNaughton Cup.
The UMD weekend solidified Bachman’s grip on both meaningful goaltending statistics, and he’s done it without even a hyphenated first name. His 1.68 goals-against mark is best, with North Dakota’s Jean-Philippe Lamoureux second at 1.88. That, however, is a measurement of team defense. More impressive is his personal save percentage, which is .938 – solidly first, ahead of Michigan Tech’s Michael-Lee Teslak.
“He’s the main reason we’re in first place,†said coach Scott Owens. “We don’t apologize for that.Ââ€
Why would they? The Tigers have been at or near the top of the WCHA all season, but they had their final idle weekend the previous week, and onrushing North Dakota caught CC for first place. But with three weekends left, CC had two games-in-hand. With North Dakota idle, those games-in-hand were literally in hand – on the DECC ice.
“I hadn’t been inside the arena, but I knew it was a small rink, so I figured they’d be shooting from all angles,†said Bachman. “I thought UMD played really good. But we’ve been playing solidly all year, including our power play, and penalty-killing.Ââ€
UMD coach Scott Sandelin had said he thought Denver was the toughest team his Bulldogs had faced in the first half of the season. “But in the second half, it’s not even close,†said Sandelin. “They’ve got good speed up front, with some skilled players who can make something happen, they have good defense – and I think Jack Hillen is one of the top defensemen in the league – and they’ve obviously goa a good goaltender.Ââ€
From CC’s standpoint, the biggest question coming into the league was the Tigers goaltending position. From UMD’s standpoint, Bachman should be declared an unfair advantage, freshman or not. When the Bulldogs were swept at CC early in the season, Bachman shut them out 3-0 with 34 saves.
But UMD had a chance to claim a home-ice position, and should have been at full intensity for the rematch at the DECC. Instead, Bachman stoned them 3-0 again, making 31 saves. The ‘Dawgs came out with renewed fire in the second game, but Bachman stopped all 29 shots and the Tigers won 4-0.
True, goals are required to win games, and the Bulldogs have been specifically goal-challenged all season. The Tigers are not, although it wasn’t until the second period that Scott McCulloch broke the scoreless tie by smacking a Jimmy Kilpatrick pass into the net at 8:12 of the second period. Twenty-five seconds later, the Bulldogs turned the puck over and Mike Testwuide fed Chad Rau a perfect pass and his 1-timer made it 2-0. Andreas Vlassopoulos made it 3-0 in the third period with both teams a man short.
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UMD hustled and pressed for shots, but Bachman never let them in. Nothing ruffled him. That, too, is understandable. He is from Highland Ranch, Colo., but he went away to private school in Massachusetts, then played junior hockey in the U.S. Hockey League, for Cedar Rapids.
“I was a little concerned about my first start in Colorado, after four years of being away,†Bachman said. “But the fans were very supportive, and I just found my rhythm. We’ve got such great defense, I was able to settle into the league pretty well.Ââ€
In the second game, Eric Walsky scored midway through the first period after a neat pass exchange with Matt Overman on a 2-on-1. Then Rau scored again, rifling a power-play 1-timer from the top of the left circle that glanced off the inside of Alex Stalock’s left leg and glanced in for a 2-0 lead at the first intermission.
Rau scored again, his third of the weekend and 22nd of the season, on a second-period power play, with Jack Hillen and Vlassopoulos both assisting on both Rau goals. Midway through the third period, Hillen moved in from left point, hesitated, then shot a hard pass toward the right of the net, and Kilpatrick deflected it in for the 4-0 final.
Bachman had 29 saves, meaning he now has shut out UMD for three straight games, and 197 minutes and 46 seconds going back to the last Bulldog goal, in the first game of the earlier series at CC.
“When North Dakota caught us, we knew we had a couple of games in hand,†Bachman said. “Our focus, coming off the bye week, was that we really needed these two wins. Our forwards played really well, and I didn’t have many hard shots.Ââ€
Hard or less than hard, he stopped them all.
It has been a trying week for Bachman. His grandmother’s death in Salt Lake City meant he was with his familyand hadn’t practiced all week.
“We knew Duluth would come out hard, and we took a licking,†said Owens. “You can’t help but hit in this rink. But I thought our quickness showed. And Bachman played with confidence and stood tall.Ââ€
Dodge Journey features, price shine in any weather
The longest journey may start with but a single step, but the best journeys are also those that bring us back home. The subject here is Journeys – as in the 2009 Dodge Journey – which was brought both of those phrases to life.
The Journey was introduced for media test drives through the moonscape-rock country of Nevada, and it surprised me. Then I promptly found a Journey R/T delivered for a test-drive back home in Minnesota, where I was able to confront some homespun snow and subzero cold for a week-long trial. And I was further surprised.
Maybe I’ve gotten crusty at driving so many crossover SUVs and lookalike/drivealike vehicles that all try to be segment-breakers, but when I traveled to Las Vegas to spend a couple of days, I anticipated that the highlight might be escaping the windchill factor, and our e at the Four Seasons resort-hotel was distinctly windchill-free.
But the Journey overshadowed even the view from the 39th floor. It performed well up and down the rocky highways and desert roads, and it combines so many impressive features from the best SUV with the most significant elements from the new Grand Caravan, resulting in a firm, secure, seven-passenger family hauler.
Dodge says the Journey fits in between the compact Caliber and the Grand Caravan, but I think you can throw the large, truck-based Durango into the mix as well. Dodge engineers took the solid new Avenger midsize sedan platform, stretched and stiffened it, and plunked the unique Journey body atop it.
All the features and impressive driveability come in three Journey models, and equally surprising is that they are priced from $19,985 for the basic Journey SE, to $22,985 for the mid-range Journey SXT, and $26,545 for the top-end Journey R/T. That means you could add on some high-end features from the extensive option list and still be below the $30,000 figure that most competitors might start at. A pleasant surprise, indeed.
Having returned to Minnesota both surprised and impressed, I quite promptly found a Journey appear from Chrysler’s press fleet, wearing my favorite “Deep water blue pearl coat†color. And the surprises kept on coming – even BEFORE I climbed in for what could be called a Journey journey. And there’s more to celebrate than the chance to shoot photos of the Journey against both Nevada desert rock formations and a Great White North snowscape.
It was below zero outside, and I was in the cozy confines of a third-floor apartment, looking out on the parking lot. I held out the Journey’s key fob, and clicked the proper symbol twice. A fleeting blink of the Journey’s lights showed that it received my message, and the engine calmly spun to life. I’ve used “remote start†features on vehicles several times, just not in such ideal conditions for implementation.
The doors stay locked, the engine is running, the interior is warming up, the ice on the windows is melting, and in the few seconds of arctic blast you endure from doorway to the vehicle were insignificant. Click the fob again to unlock the doors as you approach, and hop inside. With others I’ve driven from, for example, General Motors, you have to shut off the engine and put in the key and restart, as a fail-safe against some bozo breaking in and stealing the vehicle. In the Journey, I put the key into the ignition but didn’t need to restart; simply turning the switch to operating position worked. And we were off.
My wife, Joan, drove the Journey to work a day or two, and had to remember that feature, so accustomed she was at doing the Sgt. Preston bit across the parking-lot tundra. What a great feature. We appreciated it even more after driving to Duluth for a few days, where there is more snow and, lord knows, lower temperatures. It wasn’t more than 20-below-zero, but it wasn’t much less than that, either. And the device was awesome.
“I loved the auto-start, and I liked every little feature,†said Joan. “The only complaint I can think of is that I’d like better gas mileage.Ââ€
True, the remote-start is an add-on, but it was so slick that it seemed to make all the other little standard items that much better. Equally true, the top R/T model with the 3.5-liter V6 had to work to get 20 miles per gallon around town, and you’d have to keep 70 mph as a limit to get 25 on the freeway. The global 2.4-liter 4-cylinder would undoubtedly do better, and has adequate power, but the V6 is the engine for the top-end versions.
But the things that set the Journey apart from so many wannabe-unique competitors are its features, not the least of which is a basic front-wheel-drive layout that is transformed to a seamless all-wheel-drive if you so choose. The exterior has a nicely refined Dodge-family look, sort of a combination of the Grand Caravan and Avenger, with the cross-hairs grille, but detailed very well. For other features, step inside.
The back doors are large and wide, and open a full 90-degrees. That allows easy access to the second row, and a well-designed set of seat switches allow you to slide the second-row seats forward and tilt the backrest all at once to facilitate hopping into the rear-most seats. In fact, flip the switch harder and you can cause it to slide forward and the backrest to fold down flush to the floor, in stow-and-go style from the Caravan.
You can also fold down the third row seats, and the front passenger bucket, to form one long, flat, carpeted expanse – 9 feet from tailgate to dashboard. Nobody uses interior room better than Chrysler, and interior designer Scott Anderson has two young children, so when he incorporated so many things into the interior of the Journey, he was fully aware of what was important and what would be most appreciated.
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For example, when the seats fold down so fully, Chrysler designs the bins for them to drop into, and the Journey – like the new Caravan – puts those bins to work full-time, when the seats are up. Five open storage areas are complemented by eight covered storage bins, including a molded area located under the front passenger seat cushion, designed to keep valuable items secure and out of sight.
By stretching the platform for a 4.9-inch increase in wheelbase compared to the Avenger, engineers also slid the powertrain unit forward 2 inches. The Journey measures 2.1 inches taller than the Avenger, which isn’t much, but the chair height of the driver’s seat is 6 inches higher, the second-row buckets sit 1.6 inches higher than that, for a “stadium seating†view over the front-seat occupants, and the third row is another 0.6 inches above the second for more of the same, and less of the solitary-confinement feel of other third rows.
Sitting in the front seats, or the second row, you can easily access large storage bins in the floor just forward of the second-row seats. One of them is a “Cool-Zone†bin, which is a removable liner that holds 12 cans of pop and all kinds of ice.
Otherwise, there are enough storage bins for a variety of kids to have their own stuff in their own bin. A full-width storage area under the third-row seats can hold most of your worldlies. For added touches at both ends of the interior, there is an iPod connection in the glove compartment, so you can plug in and recharge the unit while playing it through the audio system, and at the rear end, a rechargable lithium-ion flashlight is right there for use any time.
The base audio system has a 6-CD changer. The upgrades go onward and upward to include a MyGig rear video screen, even if you don’t get the navigation system, and in the Journey you can get both.
The SE comes with the 2.4-liter 4, which has 173 horsepower and 166 foot-pounds of torque, and a 19/25 EPA range for city/highway fuel economy. In brief driving, the engine wheezed a bit when pushed, and hunted for shift alternatives frequently, which is probably because it uses a 4-speed automatic. The STX allows you to upgrade to the 3.5 V6, with 235 horsepower and 232 foot-pounds of torque, and 16/23 EPA estimates, and Chrysler’s 6-speed automatic with the Autostick manual control gate.
Another factor to differentiate models is the SE has 16-inch wheels and a base suspension; the STX and R/T have 17-inch alloys and available 19-inch wheels and a touring suspension. The 19-inch alloys, either brushed or chrome, with a performance suspension that firms up the ride for better handling and a sportier feel, come with the R/T.
Six airbags and full-curtain side bags for two or three rows, joins other standard features, which include antilock brakes, traction control, stability control with roll-mitigation, brake-pressure assist, and tire pressure monitor. Towing capacity is 3,500 pounds with the towin package, which includes an anti-sway control that involves the stability control to keep the vehicle straight.
The structural integrity is enhances by use of ultra-high-strength steel in the “B†pillars, and by triple door seals, which add to the quiet feeling. Expandable foam also is injected at 22 locations to fill cavities and isolate noise.
The Journey will be sold in Europe as well, which is why it was first shown at the Frankfurt Auto Show in September. European Journeys come with a different 3.4-liter engine with either manual or automatic, as well as Chrysler’s 2.7-liter V6, and a 2.0-liter turbodiesel, with either a manual or a dual-clutch automatic 6-speed.
The single-overhead-camshaft 3.5 is a fully adequate V6 engine, but it now finds itself against dual-overhead cam engines such as the 3.6 from GM, the 3.5 from Ford, a 3.7 version of Ford’s engine from Mazda, and an outstanding array of high-tech V6es from Honda, Nissan and Toyota.
If the low price is partly due to the simplified 3.5, I have no quarrel. But I’d like to try the 2.0 turbodiesel, or the Mercedes-issue 3.0 turbodiesel V6 available in the Grand Cherokee, as powerplants that could take the Journey on the quite-small journey from a unique to spectacular family truckster.
WCHA women’s ‘Big Three’ face final-week drama
The players on the Minnesota-Duluth, Minnesota and Wisconsin women’s hockey teams enjoy the heightened intensity whenever they play each other, creating a grudging mutual-admiration society among the Women’s WCHA “Big Three.†However, as the season hurtles into its final weekend, all three would prefer to end up playing only one, rather than both, of their favorite rivals in the league playoffs.
Of course, that possibility can only come for one of the three — the season champion. If all things follow form, which is far from guaranteed, the other two most likely will collide in the semifinals of the WCHA’s newly named “Final Face-Off,” with that winner then playing the season champion. All of the Big Three know it’s far easier to beat one of the others than both of them, on successive days.
That’s why the spotlight of the final weekend is shining both on Ridder Arena and the Duluth Entertainment Convention Center. At Ridder, two-time defending NCAA champion Wisconsin faces Minnesota in a Saturday-Sunday set of matinees. The Badgers (19-5-2) trail the Gophers (21-4-4) by three points, so they need to sweep in order to catch, and bypass, the Gophers. To do so they’ll have to stop a 21-game undefeated streak by Minnesota (19-0-2).
Meanwhile, up at the DECC, UMD (22-4) is clinging to a one-point lead over Minnesota going into another Saturday-Sunday series, against St. Cloud State (11-11-4). UMD has its destiny in its own hands, and can secure the title by sweeping the Huskies, regardless of what happens in the Minnesota-Wisconsin series. St. Cloud State, however, is a solid fourth in the league, with senior goaltender Kendall Newell standing in the way of the Bulldogs. Newell lost a close opening-night game to UMD, but later she and the Huskies upset the Gophers with a 4-4 tie and 2-1 victory, and surprised the Badgers 2-1 for an early-season split.
UMD’s players and coaching staff are all aware that if the Bulldogs stumble, Minnesota could easily vault past them by sweeping the Badgers. The Bulldogs had last weekend off to heal up some ailments, and will get star sophomore Saara Tuominen back from a knee injury that has kept her out since January. But the status of freshman Iya Gavrilova from Russia, who supplanted the injured Tuominen as team-leading scorer, remains in limbo. A question arose about her NCAA eligibility when a report circulated that she played in an alleged “professional†league in Russia.
The report may have been inspired by an off-hand comment reported in the Duluth News-Tribune in January, saying she played on a pro team. Gavrilova moved 2,500 miles from her Siberian home and reportedly got a stipend of about $500 a month to play on a sports institute team in Moscow. The word “professional” carries all sorts of connotations. Back in the 1970s and ’80s, the top Soviet men’s league was simply called the Elite League. Players were supported in the communist society, and they were always considered amateurs by the Olympic Committee, and their top players annually formed the slick USSR teams that dominated World Championships as well as Olympic tournaments.
When the Soviet Union broke up, and players started coming to the “professional” NHL, that term acquired a certain cachet, and some Europeans started calling their top leagues professional. There are no professional women’s leagues in Canada or the U.S., which are clearly the dominant two women’s hockey powers. Nor are there any in Sweden or Finland, the next tier of female hockey development. Russia has never been considered better than fifth-best in women’s world hockey, and with only 300 women playing hockey in all of Russia – roughly the same number of female players as in the city of Duluth, the concept of Russia having “pro” women’s leagues or teams is ridiculous.
The NCAA precludes professional players from collegiate eligibility, but exceptions are readily granted for participants in Olympic development programs. Natalie Darwitz, Krissy Wendell, Jenny (Schmidgall) Potter, Angie Ruggiero, and Julie Chu did that for the U.S. team that was gathered together for expense-paid years, then returned to their colleges, after the Winter Olympics. Similarly, Gavrilova prepared for and played on the 2006 Russian women’s Olympic team. Still, the matter awaits resolution and Gavrilova has been withheld from the last two UMD series.
Meanwhile, the teams WCHA rivals refer to as “the Big Three†have beaten up on each other all season, and all three of them established impressive streaks — as long as they weren’t playing each other.
Minnesota is on a record hot streak, having won 11 straight, and going undefeated in 21 games — dating back to a 5-0 loss at UMD on November 17. A 3-0 Minnesota victory in the rematch the next day started the record streak for the Gophers. But Minnesota hasn’t played another of the “big three†since then, until this weekend.
In turn, UMD hadn’t lost since that 3-0 Gopher game, compiling a 16-game winning streak — until Wisconsin topped the Bulldogs 3-2 two weeks ago to snap the streak. That victory gave Wisconsin an 11-game winning streak, dating back to when they were swept by the Bulldogs in December in Madison. But one day after Wisconsin stopped the UMD streak, UMD returned the favor, beating the Badgers 3-2 to end Wisconsin’s streak.
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The Badgers started a new streak with a pair of shutouts over Bemidji State last weekend, while UMD was idle.
In a scheduling oddity, the Gophers played UMD all four times — sweeping the Bulldogs 3-1, 5-1 at Ridder in October — and also played Wisconsin twice, losing 3-0 before rallying for a 3-2 victory and a split of their early November series at Madison.
Minnesota stands 3-1 ledger against UMD, and 1-1 against Wisconsin, for a 4-2 record in those games. UMD is 4-4, having gone 3-1 against Wisconsin and 1-3 against Minnesota. And Wisconsin, which is 1-3 against UMD and 1-1 with Minnesota, is 2-4, but could make all three teams 4-4 in their competition if they could sweep.
The tightness at the top carries over to national competition as well. UMD ranks No. 3, Minnesota No. 4 and Wisconsin No. 5 in the national polls, although UMD is No. 2 to Harvard in the pairwise computer simulation of NCAA selection procedures. In overall stature, UMD is 25-4-1, Minnesota 25-4-3, and Wisconsin 23-7.
Until the split with Wisconsin, UMD’s only three losses all season were to the Gophers. The Bulldogs tied and won in an early series to knock Mercyhurst out of the No. 1 national rating, and swept two games at highly-rated St. Lawrence, earning the highest rank among the Big Three.
This weekend’s games command full attention, however, with strong league playoffs ramifications. While UMD, Minnesota and Wisconsin will be favored to get past first-round foes, once they reach the WCHA Final Face-Off in Duluth, the top-seeded team gets to avoid the other two until the final.
If, for example, UMD holds on to take first, and playoff form follows the seeding, Wisconsin and Minnesota would have to meet in the semifinals.However, in a scenario with Minnesota sweeping Wisconsin, and UMD winning and tying St. Cloud, the Gophers and Bulldogs would end up tied for first, and Minnesota would be No. 1 seed for the playoffs on the strength of the season edge over UMD.
All three are likely to be invited to the eight-team NCAA tournament, selected after league playoffs, and the playoffs obviously can affect the seeding, because only one team can win all the games in the WCHA playoffs. Outside of the “Big Three,†a team like St. Cloud, Ohio State or MSU-Mankato could fight its way into an NCAA spot with an upsurge in the playoffs, to give the West four entries.
Just added incentive on the final weekend of the regular season.
About the Author
John Gilbert is a lifetime Minnesotan and career journalist, specializing in cars and sports during and since spending 30 years at the Minneapolis Tribune, now the Star Tribune. More recently, he has continued translating the high-tech world of autos and sharing his passionate insights as a freelance writer/photographer/broadcaster. A member of the prestigious North American Car and Truck of the Year jury since 1993. John can be heard Monday-Friday from 9-11am on 610 KDAL(www.kdal610.com) on the "John Gilbert Show," and writes a column in the Duluth Reader.
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