Bulldogs & Gophers SKATE TO A TIE

Going back in time, the Bulldogs fell to the Gophers in a 6-1 Friday night game, followed by a 6-2 rout of the Minnesota Gophers on that Sunday.  If you ask me, it ended the right way, but left many questions as to who actually had the better weekend.

I mean yes, the gophers did score more goals throughout the weekend (8) and the bulldogs scored less (7), but the Bulldogs played on the road, which included two long road trips from Duluth to Minneapolis throughout the weekend.

Anyway, fastward.

We'll begin with lines:


Scoring Summary

1st Period - UMTC (10:47) Kyle Rau
1st Period - UMD (11:05) Caleb Herbert
1st Period - UMD (11:26) Austin Farley from Caleb Herbert
1st Period - UMTC (15:51) PP Nate Condon from Seth Ambroz and Ben Marshall
3rd Period - UMTC (01:02) PP Hudson Fasching from Mike Reilly and Kyle Rau
3rd Period - UMD (02:24) PP Austin Farley from Tony Cameranesi and Willie Raskob
3rd Period - UMTC (11:41) PP Travis Boyd from Mike Reilly and Taylor Cammarata
3rd Period - UMD (17:51) Joe Basaraba from Willie Raskob

Goaltending Summary

Aaron Crandall (UMD): 9-7-6-1 = 23 (4 GA)
Adam Wilcox (UMTC): 12-11-12-3 = 38 (4 GA)

Faceoff Facts:

Team	Goals	Points	Plus/Minus	Blocks	P Mins	Shots	Faceoffs	PP	PK
Bulldogs	4	8	+1	8	16	42	22/68	1/6	4/7
Gophers	4	10	-10	16	25	27	46/68	3/7	5/6

First off, the game ended in a shootout after a 5-minute overtime period, which is our first problem.  In the standings and basically everywhere else but the North Star College Cup's eyes, the game went down in tie.

The Bulldogs led off in the shootout where Alex Iafallo missed, followed by a goal by Gopher Kyle Rau.  Round two brought Caleb Herbert to the stage, but he failed to sneak the puck by Adam Wilcox, and Seth Ambroz sealed the deal by scoring against Aaron Crandall.

That was it.  A quick overtime play and then a quick shootout decided the who is "the best team in Minnesota".  Problem.

I've never left an arena feeling so unsatisfied.  Imagine if your favorite movie was building up to the climax and right when you were suppose to find out what the great problem's answer is, the movie goes black.  The end.  Hasta La Vista, baby.

PROBLEM.  The Bulldogs played very well against the nation's number one team and to cut it off at 5 minutes is absolutely blue-balling (excuse my french).

The Gophers are a good hockey team, but they relied heavily on the fact that they had a very hot goaltender.  Adam Wilcox was the reason they made beat St. Cloud State on Friday night and also the reason that the Bulldogs didn't emerge victorious in just three periods.

The Bulldogs were firing on all cylinders.  The University of Minnesota Duluth's overall talent was better than that of Minnesota's power.  Despite the Gophers ranking 2nd in the nation, scoring 3.83 goals per game, the Bulldogs scored just as many on a hot goaltender.

Here's the bigger question.

How does the #1 ranked team in the United States win 46 of 68 faceoffs, or 68%, but failed to lead in shots, being outshot 42-27.

Usually one can infer that faceoff wins directly lead to the amount of time a team has puck possession.  And assuming one has control of the puck more than the other team, an assumption can be made that they are more than likely to outshoot their opponent, or at least come close, right?

Wrong.

So either the best team in the country decided to turnover the puck as soon as they won the faceoff or just had some terrible shots on net.  But that also isn't true.  As the total attempted shots were in favor of UMD, 76 to 44.

So that's confusing.  A little anyway.  But looking at the positives, the Bulldogs did jump up in the pairwise?


Keep in mind that each of the tournament winners will make it to the tournament, which includes 16 teams, but tied for 14th isn't bad.

So the TIE wasn't as bad as we can take it to be, but the most import is this.

THOSE GOD-AWFUL REFEREES ARE GONE.

To catch up on what happened, CLICK HERE.