The Minnesota Gopher hockey team begins the playoffs tonight for the last time as a member of the WCHA and it ends with something new. The Gophers will matchup with the Bemidji State Beavers in the playoffs for the first time ever. The Gophers have the task of trying to beat a team 4 times in a row and sweeping an opponent in a season. That’s not easy to do especially in the playoffs and when it will be 4 consecutive games against that opponent.
Line Chart – Minnesota Golden Gophers
Left Wing – Center – Right Wing
Kyle Rau-7 – Nick Bjugstad-27 – Christian Isackson-26
Nate Condon-16 – Erik Haula-19 – Zach Budish-24
Tom Serratore-14 – Travis Boyd-22 – Seth Ambroz-17
Jake Parenteau-6 – AJ Michaelson-15 – Justin Holl-12
Left Defenseman – Right Defenseman
Brady Skjei-2 – Nate Schmidt-29
Seth Helgeson-4 – Ben Marshall-10
Mike Reilly-5 – Mark Alt-20
Goalie
Adam Wilcox-32
Mike Shibrowski-1
Scratches: G-Matt LaPrade-30, D-Jake Parenteau-6, F-Ryan Reilly-9, F-Christian Horn-18, F-Jared Larson-23
Injured: F-Connor Reilly-21, G-Ryan Coyne-31, F-Sam Warning-11
Line Chart – Bemidji State Beavers
Left Wing – Center – Right Wing
Jordan George-28 – Aaron McLeod-14 – Ben Kinne-9
Brance Orban-7 – Jeff Jubinville-12 – Phil Brewer-29
Radoslav Illo-18 – Cory Ward-13 – Danny Mattson-16
Markus Gerbrandt-23 – Mitch Cain-27 – Brad Robbins-17
Left Defenseman – Right Defenseman
Jake Areshenko-8 – Brady Wacker-25
Matt Prapavessis-22 – Graeme McCormack-11
Sam Rendle-20 – Sam Windle-15
Goalie
Andrew Walsh-30
Mathieu Dugas-35
Scratches/Injured: G-Reid Mimmack-1, D-James Hansen-3, D-Matt Carlson-5, D-Kyle Brodie-26, F-David Boehm-4, F-Tyler Tosunian-19, F-Matt Hartmann-21
Sam Warning is out of the lineup due to an injury. No word on what happened. That sets off a domino effect of line changes for the Gophers moving Christian Isackson up to the 1st line right wing, Nate Condon to the 2nd line left wing, Tom Serratore to the 3rd line left wing, AJ Michaelson to the 4th line center & Jake Parenteau to the 4th line left wing! WOW!
Let’s DROP THE CLUTTERPUCK!!!
1st Period
- The Gophers have come out with a ton of energy shooting the puck from anywhere & everywhere and dominate the first few minutes of the period! That’s not surprising with a home playoff game!
- PENALTY – Too Many Beavers On The Ice at 3:08 of the 1st period – In the madness of trying to keep up with the Gophers energy, the Beavers accidentally get 6 players on the ice for a good 15 seconds or so and finally get called for too many men!
- Looking back at the play, two Beaver players come off the ice and three go on! Obvious miscommunication in the frenzy of the moment.
- Speaking of Too Many Men On the Ice, I was often called for Too Much Man on The Ice in almost every game I played! BOOM!
- The Gophers don’t get much going on the power play save for a mini-breakaway by Nick Bjugstad that ends in a backhander from the slot.
- A face-off win back to Mike Reilly and a fanned pass results in a breakaway for Ben Kinne but Adam Wilcox makes the save blocking the five hole attempt.
- Bemidji State has weathered the storm of the first 5 minutes, killed a penalty and sit comfortably in a scoreless game. Exactly how they want this game to go.
- Give credit to Justin Holl for this whole season! It can’t be easy to be a defenseman and be told/asked to play forward for the majority of the season and to play as good as he has all season long. That speaks to the type of
player he is. You have to be a smart player to make a switch like that
at the division 1 level. - I don’t know about you but the Twitter interactive thing with Jenny doesn’t work for me. If you’re watching the game, do you really care what some person on
Twitter has tweeted about a question they made up before the game?- Especially when the question has nothing to do with the game. It’s usually a question about the season or which player this or which player this?
- You’d think they could do something better with that time.
- I love Twitter but it is what it is. It’s not meant for interacting with the announcers. They have enough to do.
- Gophers give up a scoring chance but Zach Budish makes a good play to take a away the shot attempt.
- Gophers had 4 of their players below the dots guarding 1 Beaver player.
2nd Period
- Gophers still getting chances but Bemidji is doing a great job clogging up the front of the net and clearing rebounds.
- Mark Alt gets a chance to shoot and hesitates. SHOOT THE PUCK! Don’t wait!
- All that does is give the defense and the goalie a chance to set up for the shot or get in front of it to block it.
- That’s what happened! The shot was deflected by the forward defending Alt.
- All that does is give the defense and the goalie a chance to set up for the shot or get in front of it to block it.
- A quick whistle from the official confuses Doug McLeod and he says, “It’s a Goal!”
- The official pointed to the net or the goalie and then to the face-off dot.
- Tom Chorske mentions that “it’s too bad that Herb Brooks is not with us anymore.”
- It does make you wonder if hockey would be different if he were still alive. Herb Brooks had a mind for the game like no other and just knew how to push the right buttons to get players to play the right way.
- AGAIN!
- PLAY YOUR GAME!
- What would Herb Brooks think of the game today?
- What would he do about the hits to the head?
- Would there be a Herb Brooks helmet? or a Herb Brooks system on how to check & how to take a check?
- Would he like the state of hockey as it is?
- Would he be happy with the growth of hockey in Minnesota and the United States?
- I could see him being in charge of USA Hockey or at least some part of it! That would’ve been AWESOME!
- Herbies!
- What would Herb Brooks think of the game today?
- It does make you wonder if hockey would be different if he were still alive. Herb Brooks had a mind for the game like no other and just knew how to push the right buttons to get players to play the right way.
- GOAL! – Ben Marshall from Kyle Rau at 6:56 of the 2nd period – Kyle Rau gets the puck in his own zone and takes it up the left boards. He has Aaron McLeod alongside him so as soon as he gets to the Beaver blue line, he dumps it past Sam Windle then skates around him and beats him to the puck. Rau turns to go behind the net but makes a pass back up the middle just as he gets near the net. Windle gets his stick on the pass but not enough and the puck slowly goes up the slot where Ben Marshall sees it and takes a one-timer snap shot that goes off the left post and deflects into the right part of the net! GOPHERS 1-0!!!
- Kyle Rau made that whole play happen with his speed and because he never stopped skating and/or moving his feet!
- Aaron McLeod did nothing good on that play.
- He reaches in an attempt to disrupt Rau along the boards.
- He then coasts as Rau skates hard to the puck.
- Then he watches
the puck and doesn’t look for someone to pick up since there’s two
defenseman that can defend Rau if he goes behind the net or turns back
to the left corner. - Then when the pass goes in front of the net, he ends up screening his goaltender on the play. NOT GOOD!
- FSN has a great angle from behind the net that shows you everything you need to know about the play.
- It shows every Bemidji State player watching the puck and not picking up a man!
- That goal was basically scored by three Gophers while five Beavers watched it happen!
- One Gopher player changed while it was happening!
- And lost a +1! Damn!
- You’re first thought as a back checking forward should be to find the trailer on the play.
- TALK! Tell your teammates what’s going on, who to cover, where to go!
- One of the defenseman should be able to tell the forward to pick up the trailer or just yell “FIND SOMEONE!”
- I think it’s appropriate that the Gopher hockey team scores while Herb Brooks is being talked about!
- GREAT SAVE! – Adam Wilcox on Jordan George at 14:06 of the 2nd period – After the Gophers have a solid 45 seconds of pressure in the Beaver zone where they get at least 3 good scoring chances, Ben Marshall fakes a shot & tries to go d-to-d but George gets his stick on it deflecting it back to Ben Kinne. Kinne chips the puck up to George for a breakaway and he tries to go five-hole on Adam Wilcox but he makes the save almost sliding into the net but keeping the puck out.
3rd Period
- GREAT SAVE! – Andrew Walsh on Nick Bjugstad at 6:14 of the 3rd period – After almost having too many Gophers on the ice, Nate Schmidt gets the puck at his own left half-wall and sees Nick Bjugstad breaking through the neutral zone & hits him with a tape-to-tape pass for a breakaway in on Andrew Walsh. He tries to go under his catcher arm/glove but Walsh makes the save.
- I don’t like these passes across the ice in the offensive zone back to the points. Just asking for a breakaway chance for Bemidji State.
- Like That!!! Nice back check by Justin Holl breaking up a scoring chance!
- PENALTY – Radoslav Illo for Hooking on Seth Ambroz at 14:14 of the 3rd period – After Seth Ambroz gets his shot blocked, he takes another whack at it and it bounces towards the net. A clearing attempt fails and the loose puck comes back to Ambroz and as he turns away from Radoslav Illo, he gets his stick lifted and the stick gets under Ambroz’ arm and holds him up getting a hooking call from the official.
- GOAL! – Brance Orban from Radoslav Illo & Jeff Jubinville at 19:22 of the 3rd period – With the net empty, Sam Rendle dumps the puck down the left wall trying to wrap it around the left corner. Adam Wilcox goes to stop it behind the net but the puck hits a end boards and Ben Marshall is able to chip the puck back to the boards off the glass. Then he skates past the puck and Phil Brewer is able to get body position on the puck. Erik Haula & Jeff Jubinville join the puck battle and Jubinville knocks it loss towards the face-off dot where Radoslav Illo takes a swing at it but has the shot deflected by Nate Condon’s stick. The puck bounces up in the air and fools Seth Helgeson so he misses it and the puck goes through his legs. Brance Orban is there to get to it before Adam Wilcox and he pulls off a beautiful toe drag, moves it to his backhand and shoots it past Wilcox and the game is TIED AT 1!!!
- At first I thought Seth Helgeson played that badly but he was fooled by the puck bouncing up in the air and it’s hard to blame him for that.
- A lot of crazy bounces happened on that play! Or should that be dirty?
- Weird bounce off the end boards!
- Weird bounce off the glass!
- Deflection of Radoslav Illo’s shot that makes the puck bounce up in the air!
- The puck bouncing in the air fools Seth Helgeson getting through his legs.
- That surprises
Adam Wilcox and he goes down expecting a shot but Brance Orban knowing
he has time makes the toe drag move than goes to his backhand for the
game-tying goal!
- GREAT presence of mind from Orban knowing he had the time to make that play! WOW!
Overtime
- What do you do in overtime, folks?
- YOU SHOOT THE PUCK!!! ANY CHANCE YOU GET!!! SHOOT IT! FROM ANYWHERE & EVERYWHERE!!!
- The puck wants to go in the net! That’s its home! Is it too good for its HOME!!!?
- The Gophers are chasing and watching, reacting to what they see instead of what they read! Read the play! Anticipate! Don’t watch!
- The Beavers get a few good chances and one golden chance to score as Cory Ward was sitting back door but the puck gets past his stick and he barely misses a chance to end the game! WOW!
- Mark Alt makes a move on the blue line, goes around the defender and takes a shot that’s deflected wide and hits off the glass behind the net and bounces back in front of the net and Seth Ambroz barely misses it! OHHHH!!!
- After Bemidji State ices the puck, Head Coach Tom Serratore decides to take his timeout to get his players some rest!
- Even though Doug McLeod says, “…Don Lucia has now called time out for Minnesota…”, it was actually Bemidji State that took its timeout!
- GOAL! – Kyle Rau from Nate Schmidt & Christian Isackson at 13:18 of Overtime – A face-off to Andrew Walsh’s left is won by Nick Bjugstad back to Nate Schmidt at the right point. He skates down the blue line a couple strides and takes a shot with Kyle Rau in front of the net. Schmidt’s shot is blocked by Jake Areshenko and the puck falls near Kyle Rau’s feet so he tries to shoot but that shot is blocked by Areshenko again. The puck goes right back to Rau’s stick and he shoots again and this time it goes in just to the right of Andrew Walsh and over his leg pad! GOPHERS WIN 2-1!!!
FINAL SCORE
Minnesota Gophers 2, Bemidji State Beavers 1 in Overtime
The Gophers escape Game 1, winning in Overtime off the stick of Kyle Rau! He was tremendous tonight as was Adam Wilcox. Give credit to Bemidji State and Andrew Walsh for playing a great game and giving themselves a chance to win! You can’t ask for much more from your team than that! We’ll see you tomorrow night for Game 2! Same Gopher Time! Same Gopher Channel! Hopefully, Sam Gopher Outcome! That would be 7pm on FSN if you didn’t know!
Gopher Hockey Recap from GopherSports.com – Rau Gives Gophers Series Lead in 2-1 Overtime Victory
Gopher Hockey Box Score from GopherSports.com – Minnesota-BSU Stats
Gopher Hockey Recap from BSUBeavers.com – Walsh stops 49; Minnesota takes game 1 in overtime, 2-1
In other WCHA College Hockey action tonight,
Home=”vs”, Away=”@”
- Denver won vs Colorado College 5-3
- Minnesota State won vs Nebraska-Omaha 4-3 in OT
- St. Cloud State won vs Alaska-Anchorage 6-1
- North Dakota won vs Michigan Tech 5-3
- Wisconsin won vs Minnesota-Duluth 3-1
In other College Hockey action,
Home=”vs”, Away=”@”
- Michigan State won @ Miami 3-0
- 2012 Minnesota Wild 3rd-round pick John Draeger had the 2nd assist on Michigan State’s 2nd goal
- Cornell won @ Quinnipiac 3-2
- The #1 team in the nation lost Game 1 in their 1st round matchup in the ECAC Tournament
The playoffs are underway and we have reached March Madness for College Hockey!!! Grestest time of the year for hockey fans! College hockey playoffs followed by the NHL Playoffs!!! You want some of the ‘PUCK!!!?
Bring The CLUTTER in the comments, on Google+ on Twitter and on Facebook.
You’ve Been ClutterPUCKED!!!
