The Blog That Yost Built

Cornell Preview

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 05:12:00 +0000

Michigan's first (and hopefully not last) opponent in the 2012 NCAA Hockey Tournament is the Cornell Big Red out of the Eastern College Athletic Conference.

The Big Red finished second in the ECAC, 2 points behind #1-seed Union. They were 18-8-7 on the season and 12-4-6 in conference. The big takeaway? All their games are close. They only had 13 games the entire season that weren't decided by 1 goal or fewer (of those, there were 3 more that ended up being 2-goal games due to an empty-netter). That works out to 23 of 33 games being extremely tight. They've played 12 overtime games on the season, including 10 of their last 19. They won't be intimidated if it's a close game.

When you think Cornell hockey, you think defense-first, strong goaltending, and it seems like they've got that again. They rank 12th nationally in team defense and Andy Iles has been very good in net for them. He's played every non-empty-net minute this season and has a 2.13 goals against (10th nationally) and a solid .918 save percentage (28th nationally). He also has six shutouts, five of which came in a six-game span back in November and December. Only two goalies have more. He's given up two or fewer in seven of their last ten, though he was shelled by Harvard (6 on 30 shots) in the ECAC semifinals.

The offense is middle-of-the-pack, 23rd in the country at 2.91 goals per game. In their last 9 games, they've scored 1 goal on 3 occasions, 3 goals on 3 occasions, and 4 goals on 3 occasions.

They have two players who cracked the 10 goal mark: Former St. Michael's Buzzer Greg Miller, who has 14-16--30 in 33 games, and senior Sean Collins (13-11--24). Those two happen to be their two leading point scorers as well. Defenseman Nick D'Agostino (also a former Buzzer) has 8-12--20, and has scored big goals for Cornell. 6 of his goals have come with the man advantage, and five of them have been game-winners. He leads the team in both categories. They have six guys with 20+ points and nine with 15+.

They were 1-0-1 against Union this year. Keep in mind that Union throttled Michigan (though, so did everyone back in November). They beat Niagara 1-0 about a month-and-a-half after Michigan beat them 5-0 in the opener. They also beat St. Lawrence by a single goal on two occasions. Michigan downed the Saints 10-3 in October.

The Big Red also took BU to overtime before losing 2-1 and took three of four points from Colorado College at CC.

Collins is a former Wolverine-his junior team was the Waywayseecappo Wolverines. And I mention that only because it's really fun to type Waywayseecappo.

Michigan is 3-2-1 all-time against Cornell, the last meeting coming in 1997. In their previous meeting in the NCAA Tournament, Michigan won the best-of-three series two games to one. That was the famous weekend when the Michigan faithful picked up a few things about cheering from the Cornell fans, which led to Yost becoming what Yost is today.

Kevin Lynch is actually the only Wolverine with multiple goals in NCAA Tournament play. He has a 2-1--3 line in six games. Shawn Hunwick is 4-2-0 with a 1.55 goals against and a .948 save percentage when they are playing for keeps. He's 16-4-0 with a 1.65/.938 in post-season play as a whole.

For more on the matchup, check out:
MGoBlog
The United States of Hockey, who has Michigan at 35% to come out of the region (Denver is also at 35%).

Also:
Vote Shawn Hunwick for Hobey!!! It literally takes like 5 seconds and you don't have to register, or fill out captchas or anything. He currently trails Spencer Abbott by 2% in the voting. We actually had him in the lead for a period earlier today.

Hoover Street Rag has their annual picks contest. No team capsules this year, guys?

I'll be at the game in Green Bay. I probably won't make it up there for the Ferris/Denver game, as, while I think it's going to be a great game, I don't want to take off half a day of work to be there, when I'm saving up vacation for my wedding/honeymoon in four months. If Michigan wins, it's highly likely that you'll find me at The Stadium View on Saturday, drinking before the game.

Travis Turnbull made his NHL debut tonight for the Buffalo Sabres. He played just over six minutes and didn't register anything on the stat sheet. Still, that makes 21 former Wolverines to appear in the NHL this season. Almost enough to dress an entire team.

Wolverines #1 Seed in Midwest Regional, Will Face Cornell

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Sun, 18 Mar 2012 19:22:00 +0000

Ladies and gentlemen, it's time to brace yourselves once again for the heart-attack-in-hockey-form that is the NCAA postseason. The brackets are out, and the Wolverines will be the #1 seed in the Midwest Regional, which takes place on Friday and Saturday in Green Bay, WI.

Michigan's first opponent will be the Cornell Big Red out of the ECAC. I'll have more on them later in the week, but they rank 12th in the PWR and have an 18-8-7 record on the season. They go to overtime a lot. 10 of their last 19 games have gone to at least one extra session. They lost 6-1 to Harvard in the ECAC Semifinals, but beat Colgate 3-0 to take third place. Earlier this year they had 5 shutouts in a 6-game span, but averaged less than 2 goals per game of their own during that stretch (and 8 of those were in 2 games). They're 23rd in offense and 12th in defense.

The winner of that matchup will take on the winner of Ferris State and Denver.

Here is the full bracket:
Midwest:
1) Michigan vs. 4) Cornell
2) Ferris State vs. 3) Denver

East:
1) Union vs. 4) Michigan State
2) Miami vs. 3) UMass-Lowell

West:
1) North Dakota vs. 4) Western Michigan
2) Minnesota vs. 3) Boston University

Northeast:
1) Boston College vs. 4) Air Force
2) Minnesota-Duluth vs. 3) Maine

The winner of the Midwest bracket will take on the winner of the East regional in the Frozen Four, which, for Michigan, would mean no BC or North Dakota until the Championship Game. Things actually set up really nicely.

The only complaint is that Michigan is the only #1 seed playing the late game in their regional. We saw this weekend what can happen when you're playing the late game and it goes multiple overtimes. I'd love to know what the logic is there, and it better be more than the miniscule TV ratings they'll get on ESPNU. For selfish reasons it's a good thing, since I won't have to take a day off work to get up there in time for our game. It's probably not the end of the world if the game is settled in regulation. If it goes multiple OTs, it could definitely play a factor the next day.

Michigan's trade off for not getting shipped to St. Paul is a tougher (seed-wise) first round game (13th seed instead of the 15th seed) and a potentially tougher second round game (6th seed instead of the 7th that you'd expect with the seeds). In practice, it's Cornell instead of Michigan State and Ferris instead of Minnesota-Duluth. With all due respect to the teams in our region, I'm happy with the way things shook out.

Michigan's game is at 9:00 pm EDT on Friday night. It will air on ESPNU and ESPN3.com. I'd assume we'll get more information about possible syndication later in the week.

Here's a blurb from MGoBlue about ticket information:

The Michigan Athletics Ticket Office will have Midwest Regional tickets on sale for hockey season-ticket holders only beginning at 9 a.m. on Monday (March 19) until 9 a.m. Tuesday (March 20). All-session tickets are $68. Hockey public season-ticket holders may order up to two tickets and hockey student season-ticket holders may order one ticket. Purchases can be made in person at the U-M ticket office or by phone by calling (734) 764-0247 or toll-free (866) 296-MTIX (6849). Tickets will only be available for pick up at the Resch Center.

General public looking to purchase tickets are directed to visit NCAA Regional Tickets (Green Bay) for more information.

For those of you headed up to Green Bay, here are a few tidbits:

-The Packers Hall of Fame and seeing Lambeau Field are probably the two best things to do. Lambeau is as historical of a venue as there is in this country and I think even non-Packers fans would enjoy seeing it.

-There are a bunch of bars down the street from Lambeau, but my favorite without a doubt is The Stadium View. It's really close to Lambeau (obvious?) and it's even closer to the Resch Center. Great place. And given Cornell's mascot, it might not be a bad idea to learn the "The Bears Still Suck" polka. You'll make friends with the locals and it applies!

-As far as food goes, I haven't been up there in a few years. I remember liking the food at Brett Favre's restaurant. I'm actually kind of surprised that it's still there. The Prime Quarter is a solid grill-your-own-steak place. Chili John's and Kroll's are two of the famous local places, but I've never been to either one.

Wolverines Advance to the Joe!

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Sun, 11 Mar 2012 22:03:00 +0000

Michigan drew a dangerous-but-underachieving Notre Dame team in round two of the CCHA Tournament and likely sent the Irish home for the season, sweeping the best-of-three series by 2-1 and 3-1 scores.

Friday night's contest was a goaltender duel, and Shawn Hunwick was slightly better than Steve Summerhays for the Irish. Michigan scored just over a minute into the contest when AJ Treais broke up a clearing attempt. Phil Di Giuseppe got off a nice shot that Summerhays got 90% of. It trickled in behind him, nicked the goalpost, and sat right on the goalline. Luke Glendening was driving the net and knocked it home.

That would be it for Michigan for the next 80 minutes of hockey. The Irish tied the game up about halfway through the third period. Hunwick stopped Tynan on a 2-on-1, but the Irish were able to regain control of the puck and get it to Anders Lee, who fired one past Shawn.

One overtime wasn't enough to settle things, even though both teams had numerous chances. Both goalies made some great saves to keep their respective team alive, and both goalies had some help from the iron. By my count (listening on the radio), the Wolverines hit three posts in the first overtime and the Irish hit a pair. Michigan had numerous chances early in the overtime. They had the benefit of a power play and nearly ended things several times, but couldn't get a puck to find the back of the net.

Early in the second OT, Travis Lynch and Jeff Rohrkemper won a battle on the sideboards for a puck. Lynch got it back to Bennett at the point, who found Chris Brown all alone by the faceoff circle to Summerhays's right. Brown sniped one shortside and the Wolverines had themselves a 1-0 lead in the series.

Hunwick made 37 stops in the contest. Tiny Jesus was spectacular at times, stopping numerous odd man rushes and flashing his glove to stymy the Irish (check out picture 25 in the photo gallery). Coach Berenson and Luke Glendening gave him credit for stealing that game.

The next night Michigan got out to a 3-0 lead behind two goals by David Wohlberg sandwiching a PDG tally. Notre Dame drew back within two on Peter Schneider's second of the year, but that was the last goal they'd score. Hunwick made 25 saves in the game, including a breakaway while it was still 0-0, and Michigan advanced to the CCHA semifinals for the 24th consecutive year. Hunwick is now 15-4 in playoff games.

Michigan took a 1-0 lead when Luke Glendening won a battle on the boards to get the puck down to PDG. Di Giuseppe centered for Wohlberg who put one off the water bottle.

The Wolverines increased their lead on another goal set up by an AJ Treais takeaway. He stripped Lorenz of the puck and threw one in front of the net that PDG tipped home. 6 1/2 minutes later, the Wolverines would score their last goal at Yost for the year. Alex Guptill tried to split the defense and had the puck poked away. It went right to Wohlberg who blasted one past Summerhays for his second of the game and 15th on the year.

Notre Dame scored just 19 seconds later to get back within two on a shot that Hunwick had no chance on. One of the Domers dumped one high off the glass out of the zone. Moffie caught it but was immediately knocked to the ice, which set up a 2-on-1 for Notre Dame down low. Sheahan got the puck across to Schneider and he was able to get one past Hunwick.

Notre Dame would come close on a shot that rolled up over Hunwick and down his back, but it somehow stayed out of the net. They had some chances in the waning moments, but the "second best" goalie in the CCHA prevented the Irish from making a game of it, and the Wolverines swept their rivals from South Bend.

For Notre Dame it's a likely end to a disappointing season that started with a lot of promise. The Irish went 10-2-3 out of the gate, Anders Lee looked like a Hobey contender, and then things pretty much just fell apart, even as their goaltending got better. (Summerhays had a sub-.900 save percentage at the time of the first meeting between these teams and ended up with a respectable-enough .910.)

The Wolverines will head to the Joe once again. Their opponent will be determined by the outcome of the lone Game 3 in the CCHA Playoffs tonight. If Ferris State beats Bowling Green, the Wolverines get Western Michigan. If the Falcons are victorious, they'll be the Wolverines' opponent. Miami absolutely rolled FYS and will be the fourth participant at the Joe.

Michigan now sits second in the Pairwise, behind only Boston College. Ferris State and Miami are 4th and 5th. Michigan State and WMU are part of a 3-way tie for 14th and the final two spots in the tournament. As things currently sit, they'd both be part of the field and Merrimack would be out. Merrimack has a Game 3 against Maine tonight. Northern, Notre Dame, Ohio, and Lake State are the next four teams out.

CCHA Quarterfinals: Notre Dame Preview

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Fri, 09 Mar 2012 03:49:00 +0000

Thanks to NMU losing a home playoff series to BGSU for the second year in a row, the Wolverines will take on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish in the second round of the CCHA Tournament. Notre Dame advanced by putting Ohio out of their misery, 2-0 and 4-2.

In Friday night's contest, ND used two Billy Maday goals and 33 saves by Steve Summerhays (11 in each period) to take a 1-0 lead in the series. On Saturday, Ohio scored a pair of goals in the first period to take a 2-1 lead into the intermission, but the Irish scored three unanswered (including a Maday ENG to seal it) to end Ohio's season in all likelihood. Unbelievably, the Buckeyes were 14-4-1 on New Year's and won one game the rest of the season and finished the year .500.

Notre Dame is a more dangerous opponent than you'd typically expect to see in the second round as the #2 seed, but the Irish stumbled to an 8th place finish in the conference this year. They're 19-16-3 overall and were below .500 (12-13-3) in conference. Like Ohio, they got off to a good start (10-2-3 in their first 15), and then got wildly inconsistent. They lost 4-straight (including an ugly 9-2 loss to Northeastern), won 3 in a row, then went 6-10 down the stretch (including 5 straight losses, where they were outscored 18-4).

The offense hasn't been there lately and the defense has been hit or miss. The four goals they scored against Ohio in the clinching game of the first-round series was the first time they've put up more than 2 in a game since late January. They had gone 9-straight scoring two or fewer. The defense gave up 18 in their five game losing streak, but only gave up 25 over the past ten as a whole.

I can't imagine we'll see Mike Johnson in net. Steve Summerhays played both games last weekend, gave up 2 goals total, and made 30+ saves in both games. Johnson hasn't won since February 3 and has an ugly stat line: 9-10-3 with a 2.69/.883. Summerhays is 10-6 with a 2.43 and a .907. He's given up two goals in his past three starts, but lost his four starts prior to that. He was chased in two of them, including 5 minutes into a game against Ferris. Summerhays did hold Michigan to three goals on the weekend the last time these teams met.

Despite the offensive struggles (42nd nationally in offense), this team does have some talent up front. Everyone knows about TJ Tynan (13-28--41) and Anders Lee (16-17--33) by now. Behind them are Billy Maday and Riley Sheahan, who both have 20+ points. It doesn't seem like they get a whole heckuva lot out of the top two lines though. Outside of their top 5 forwards, no one has more than 5 goals (and no other forward has more than 11 points).

Tynan has been held in check lately. He has just one goal and four points in his last nine. He had two assists in ND's Friday-night win against Michigan earlier this year. Lee has scored goals in two of his last three, but before that he was held out of the goal column in 14-straight games and 23 of out his last 24(!!!!). He started the year with 12 goals in his first 11 games, but has really cooled off since.

Tynan, Lee, Maday, and Sheahan have combined for 24 power play goals on the season (also, all four of Robbie Russo's have come with the man advantage). ND is middle of the pack on the PP and PK.

None of the Wolverines have been overly successful against ND in their careers. No active player has more than 2 goals or 4 points against the Irish. Hunwick has a .931 save percentage, but hasn't gotten much help. He only has a 3-3-0 mark. The big stat in Michigan's favor: They've made the CCHA semifinals in 23 straight seasons.

All two/three games will be at Yost and will be 7:35 faceoffs. Saturday night's game will air on Comcast Local, but there is no TV for the other one/two games. This sure would be a nice time to have the live internet video back, Dave Brandon!

Michigan Splits with Bowling Green, Finishes Second in CCHA

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 03:12:00 +0000

This weekend the Wolverines needed to sweep Bowling Green and have Western Michigan sweep Ferris in order to earn a share of the CCHA Championship. They got neither. On Friday night, the Falcons scored twice in the last seven minutes of regulation to down the Wolverines 3-2. It didn't matter from the CCHA Championship perspective as the Ferris State Bulldogs took WMU to a shootout to earn the one point that they needed to clinch the title.

On Saturday, the Wolverines rebounded with a tougher-than-the-score 3-0 victory. That was enough to tie WMU for second in the conference. Michigan gets the #2 seed via their one-win edge in conference wins over Western.

What does that mean? Michigan will have a bye in the first round of the CCHA Tournament and will then play one of the following teams in a best of three at Yost: LSSU, Notre Dame, Ohio, or Alaska. If all the home teams win in the first round, it will be LSSU.

The matchups in round one are:
Bowling Green at NMU
Alaska at LSSU
Ohio at Notre Dame

We know FYS will travel to Miami in round 2.

On Friday night, the Wolverines got off to a quick start, with Phil Di Giuseppe scoring just 38 seconds into the contest to give Michigan a 1-0 lead. Bennett got the puck up ice to Treais who slid it over to PDG. The lead was short-lived, however, as Chad Sumison scored his first of the year just six seconds later.

David Wohlberg knocked in the rebound from a Bennett shot to put the Wolverines back on top at the 4:58 mark of the first period, but once again the Falcons had an answer. Cameron Wojtala beat Hunwick over the blocker with about six minutes left in the opening frame. Moffie may have screened Hunwick on that one.

Late in the second, Brown worked it down low to Wohlberg who sent a centering pass in front that Guptill was able to tip home for his team-leading 16th goal of the year.

Adam Berkle tied things up for BGSU with just under seven minutes left in regulation. Cameron Sinclair put a shot on net and Hunwick left the rebound. Berkle jumped on it and got it past a diving Hunwick to make it 3-3. That's one that Hunwick would want back. The initial shot didn't seem particularly difficult.

The game seemed headed for overtime, but with just over a minute remaining Bryce Williamson picked Jon Merrill's pocket as he was bringing the puck out of the zone. Williamson turned around and sent one over Hunwick's glove for the game-winner.

It was a rough night for Moffie and Merrill, who were each -3. Pateryn and Bennett were +3 in the game.

If you're so inclined to watch the highlights, here they are:

On Saturday, it seems the goalies were the stars of the show. Hunwick and Andrew Hammond were the first and second stars of the game, which ended in a 3-0 Michigan victory.

The game was tied 0-0 after two periods, despite a 31-15 shot edge for Michigan and eleven power plays between the two teams. The Wolverine penalty killers again did their job, surrendering just five shots on the seven BGSU power plays through two. At one point, power plays were 6-1 in BGSU's favor. In one stretch the Wolverines killed five straight BGSU power plays without surrendering a single shot on goal.

Granted the CCHA officiating is, in large part, incompetent, but this is an alarming trend where Michigan ends up spending significantly more time in the box than their less-talented opponent. (I didn't see either of these games, so I have no idea as to the quality of these calls or if it was more Gongshow.)

After going 0-for-3 on faceoffs the night before, Alex Guptill won a big one five minutes into the third. He drew it back to David Wohlberg who let a shot go that somehow found its way past Hammond.

A few minutes later, Kevin Lynch gave the Wolverines a two goal lead. He won a draw back to the point. The shot deflected around and Moffatt got a stick on it. The puck sat just to Hammond's right and Lynch found it before anyone else, diving head-first toward the net and knocking it home.

Michigan would add an ENG from Mac Bennett for the final margin of victory. Hunwick made 22 stops for his 10th career shutout. Hammond stopped 46 Michigan shots in the loss.

AJ Treais put ten shots on net in the game. Kevin Lynch had seven of his own. Only Hyman, Travis Lynch, Rohrkemper, and Sparks were not a plus on the night. All the other Wolverines were on the ice for one of the Michigan goals.

Highlights are here.

As MGoBlog predicted, a split wasn't too damaging in the PWR. The Wolverines sit 2nd in the RPI, .01 behind BC, and rank third in the PWR behind Minnesota-Duluth and BC. If the tournament started today, North Dakota and Merrimack would be the last two teams in. Cornell would be the first team out, closely followed by 4 CCHA teams (WMU, Ohio, Notre Dame, and LSSU).

Tory Krug and TJ Tynan tied for the CCHA Scoring Title. Reilly Smith's 18 goals were good for the conference crown in that category (by 5). Alex Guptill was tied for 2nd in goals and tied for 6th in points.

Connor Knapp led the CCHA in GAA (1.41 to Hunwick's 1.93) and save percentage (.945 to Hunwick's .937), but also only played half the minutes that Hunwick did. Hunwick was second in GAA, Save %, and minutes played. He led the conference in shutouts with 5.

JMFJ Traded to Columbus

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 05:29:00 +0000

Jack Johnson was traded to Columbus as part of a deal that sent Harvick family-favorite Jeff Carter to the Kings. The Kings need help offensively as they are dead-last in the NHL at just a hair over 2 goals per game (125 goals in 61 games). Helluva team you've built there, Dean Lombardi!

It's a cruel fate for Johnson, who now has to live in Columbus, Ohio and play for that crappy team. On the bright side, Michigan fans will get to see him play more often and he gets away from Lombardi.

JMFJ ends his Kings career with 30-94--124 in 343 games. His numbers have been down this season, largely because it's hard to get assists when no one on the team can score. His best season was one year ago, when he had 42 points, including 28 on the power play.

Cue the haters in the comments....

Bowling Green Preview

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 04:28:00 +0000

Have you voted Shawn Hunwick for Hobey today? Here's the link. It literally takes 2 seconds.

The final weekend of the regular season takes the Wolverines down US-23 to Bowling Green, Ohio. After giving up just six goals in a 4-0-1 start, the Falcons have struggled to a 9-20-5 record this season (4-18-4-3 in the CCHA). Just four of those wins have come at home. They've beaten LSSU, Alaska, WMU, and Notre Dame in conference play.

BGSU comes in having lost their past four games. Last weekend they went up to Big Rapids and were handed 5-1 and 4-1 losses by the #1 Bulldogs.

They've given up 4+ goals on fifteen occasions this year, and haven't scored more than 3 since a 4-4 tie against Miami back on November 19th. They've scored just 26 goals in the 20 games since. In 14 of the 20, they've been held to 0 or 1. They rank 57 out of 58 in offense at 1.65 goals per game. Alabama-Huntsville is the only team below them (with a dreadful 1.19). They haven't won a game when they've given up more than 2 goals.

As you'd expect with that kind of offense, the numbers aren't pretty. Jordan Samuels-Thomas, the leading scorer the past two years, took his 46 carer points and transferred to Quinnipiac. The Falcons have just five players who have cracked the 5-goal barrier and five players who have double-digit points.

The good news for BGSU is that 43 of their 56 goals have come from underclassmen and their five leading scorers are made up of three freshmen and two sophomores. They're led in goals, assists, and points by freshman Ryan Carpenter who has 8-12--20. Camden Wojtala is right behind him with 7-11--18.

Lee Moffie has outscored their entire defense corps by 2 goals and 6 points. Robert Shea is the top-scoring blueliner with 4-4--8.

CCHA Commissioner Fred Pletsch's son Ted is a freshman forward. He has 5-1--6 on the year.

The power play is 55th at 9.5% and they haven't scored with the man advantage in their last 35 opportunities, dating back nine games. Both Wojtala and 7-goal scorer Alan Williamson have 3 PPGs to lead the team.

Defensively they aren't that bad. They rank 32nd in the country at 2.82 goals per game, tied with Notre Dame for last in the conference (but still fairly middle-of-the-pack overall). The PK is 25th, despite having given up a goal in five-straight games.

In net it's been Andrew Hammond all the way. He's started every game this year and has every decision but one. He has a 2.67 goals against and a .896 save percentage. He's done his part, despite a 19 point drop in his save percentage from last season. He currently ranks 4th in the CCHA Perani Cup Three Star Award standings.

Andrew Wallace is a 60% faceoff guy, but no one else on the team is higher than 50%.

Michigan has won seven straight in the series and was 4-0 last season, outscoring the Falcons 17-5. No Falcon player has more than one career point against the Wolverines. Wohlberg (9), Moffie (4), and Merrill (4) all have averaged one point per game against BGSU. Shawn Hunwick has faced the Falcons on three occasions and is 3-0-0 with a 0.72 goals against and a .963 save percentage.

The Wolverines can wrap up a share of the CCHA Title with six points against the Falcons, combined with Western Michigan sweeping Ferris State again. Michigan has locked up a bye in the first round of the CCHA Tournament and will clinch home-ice in the second round with two points this weekend. There is no video for either Michigan game, though the Friday night WMU/Ferris game will air on FSN-Detroit.

A Few Links of Note

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 06:10:00 +0000

VOTE SHAWN HUNWICK FOR HOBEY!!! Here's the link. It literally takes 2 seconds.

AJ Treais and Lee Moffie were named CCHA offensive and defensive players of the week, respectively, for their performances against NMU. Treais had 1-3--4, including the game-winner in OT on Saturday. Moffie also had 1-3--4 on the weekend. It's kind of funny that the Defensive Player of the Week award tends to be given based on offensive stats, but whatever. Congrats to them both!

Matt Slovin from The Michigan Daily covered Shawn Hunwick's Hobey chances. Chris Peters gives his take on Hunwick's chances from more of a national perspective. I'd agree that the chances aren't great. Only two goalies in history have won the award and Hunwick's numbers aren't nearly as good as Ryan Miller's were. That said, Peters is right, you'd be hard-pressed to find a player that is more important to his team. He needs to at least be a finalist. He's clearly the top goaltender in the country and the field should be wide-open this year. I'll break it down more once the finalists are announced. Call me conference-ist, but man I don't care about Austin Smith. Like, at all.

The Daily also covered the defensive-zone turnover problems and AJ Treais's metamorphosis into a sniper.

MHNet has the weekly recruiting update and a chat with Evan Allen.

Bob Miller from College Hockey PROSPECTive has a profile of JT Compher.

Michigan Sweeps NMU, Still Has a Shot at CCHA Crown

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 05:39:00 +0000

It wasn't the model of perfection for a hockey weekend, but this weekend the Wolverines swept the NMU Wildcats at Yost. The wins jumped them past Western Michigan into second place in the CCHA.

On Friday, the Wolverines were perfect on special teams (2-for-2 on the power play and 6-for-6 while short-handed) en route to a 4-1 win in a game that was closer than the score.

Michigan jumped out to a 2-goal lead in the first period thanks to goals from two freshmen. Phil Di Giuseppe scored a goal for the first time since December 2nd, and Alex Guptill notched his team-leading 15th of the year. Treais skipped a pass off a defenseman's foot and it ended up on PDG's stick right in front of the net. He popped one upstairs to give Michigan a 1-0 lead one second shy of the halfway point in the first period.

With Reed Seckel in the box for "elbowing", which could have easily been five the way they've called contact to the head this year, Pateryn let a shot go from the point and Guptill got a gorgeous tip on it to put Michigan up by a pair. That was a great-looking power play. Michigan had three good scoring chances, four shots on goal, and one found the back of the net.

Most of the rest of the game was me seething about the officiating. Michigan didn't play well in the second period, but that was at least partially influenced by them killing so many penalties. This is the part of the article where I point out that I was really happy we won that game going away so this doesn't sound like sour grapes. Red was diplomatic after the game, but admitted he hadn't seen the penalties. I suspect he had a different opinion when he saw the tape. It was bad enough at times that I had to dig this guy back up:

In the first period, DeBlois was sent off for cross-checking on another one of those "the forward pushed him and so he fell into the goalie a lot harder than he should have" plays that Miami worked to perfection. Then in the second, Sparks was pushed into Coreau. He was sent off for goalie interference. Of course he was. Midway through the third, Luke Glendening was pushed into the net. He was called for high-sticking the goalie. Mac Bennett was called early in the second for "cross-checking" on a perfectly clean shoulder-to-shoulder hit that prevent a scoring chance as a guy drove the net. It was amazing to see some of the decisions that Hall and Miller made. That said, I'd take both of them over Sergott.

To their credit, they called a pretty good game Saturday. It just amazes me how officials consistently get calls around the goalie wrong. I can see the DeBlois one going against him. The ones against Sparks and Glendening were absurd, and the Bennett call was worse than either of them. It didn't matter, though, because the penalty killing was fantastic. Northern had four shots on goal combined on their six power plays.

NMU did make it 2-1 on Ryan Daughterty's first career goal, and it was a beauty. Hunwick made the initial save and the rebound came to Daughterty. He basically shot it from between his legs. That made it 2-1 with about 8 1/2 left in the second. Sparks was called for goalie interference immediately afterwards, which was special. Michigan killed that one off pretty easily.

In the third, Glendening was called after a great-looking give and go with PDG. Coreau absolutely robbed Glendening. NMU didn't come anywhere close to the net on that power play.

DeBlois gave Michigan an insurance goal off a great feed from Merrill. That was a nothing play at center ice, but Merrill got into position to spring DeBlois on a partial breakaway. DeBlois went five-hole.

Tyler Gron was sent off on a "make it look good" penalty (we didn't get a replay...it could have been legit) and the Wolverines implemented what we'll call a power-kill, since running two minutes off the clock was just as important as scoring. But they did the latter as well! Merrill over to Moffie for a one-timer and Michigan iced it with a minute and a half left.

Shawn Hunwick made 26 stops in the game, but the penalty killers were the story of the game. They were absolutely phenomenal. They only gave up multiple shots on goal on one of NMU's six power plays. The Sparks and Glendening penalties were complete garbage calls and it was a one-goal game. In those four minutes, Michigan outshot NMU 1-0. Two huge chances for the Wildcats to tie things up and Michigan didn't give up a shot. That's championship-caliber penalty killing right there.

Saturday's game was alarming because Michigan got back to their struggles in getting the puck out of the zone. Chiasson had a brutal turnover early in the game, but Hunwick was able to stop Daughterty. Both goalies made some good saves in the first period. Hunwick had a beauty with the right pad and then Ellingson stoned Guptill.

The Wolverines took a 1-0 on a goal by Luke Glendening. Moffie brought the puck into the zone then made a beautiful pass back to Glendening out by the point. The NMU defenseman tried to block the shot and ended up deflecting it past Ellingson into the net.

DeBlois nearly made it 2-0 moments later. He walked out from behind the net and Ellingson made a fantastic save on the first shot. The rebound went off the goal post.

The Wildcats tied it up off a Michigan turnover. The puck was centered for Florek and he doesn't miss too many chances like that.

Gron snapped a Wolverine player's stick in half almost immediately after the goal and Michigan would capitalize on the power play. Jon Merrill got a shot through a Luke Moffatt screen for his first goal of the year.

Michigan had a chance to pull further ahead but Brown missed an empty net and then Andrew Cherniwchan went end-to-end, walking Merrill, and roofing one over Hunwick. Great goal, 2-2.

In overtime, the Wildcats turned it over, Glendening sent it cross-ice to Treais, and Treais sniped yet another one for the game-winner. It seems like all he's done lately is fire lasers from the top of the circle past goaltenders. His 15th of the year gave the Wolverines another dramatic Senior Night win and kept them in contention in the CCHA.

Greg Pateryn was absolutely fantastic in the game. He leveled no less than four Wildcats with clean checks (and to the officials' credit, they didn't call penalties on any of them!) and late in the game beautifully broke up a 3-on-1. He didn't get a star in the game, but he very easily could have.

The officiating was much better on Saturday. The only play that really got me up in arms was when Guptill was racing Ellingson for the puck. Guptill got there, Ellingson dove into his knee, sent him awkwardly into the goal, and there was no call. It's ridiculous because he didn't get the puck (and in college I don't think it matters), and he took out a player's knee. They called Hasek for flipping Gaborik back in the day, and Hasek did get the puck first (and in the pros that matters). But they let the teams play Saturday. NMU had one power play, Michigan had two. Again, the Michigan penalty killers came up big. Moffie was called for boarding in the middle of the third period and the Wolverines didn't give up a shot.

Hunwick had 26 stops for the second straight night.

Michigan is still six points behind Ferris State with two games to play. A Michigan sweep of Bowling Green and a WMU sweep of Ferris would give the Wolverines a tie for the CCHA crown. They would win the tie-breaker and take the #1 seed into the CCHA Tournament.

It's not as unrealistic as it sounds. Michigan should sweep the Falcons, who have won just four conference games and have only scored 3+ goals on three occasions since Thanksgiving. You'd like to think that happens. The WMU sweeping Ferris piece is a little tougher, but the Broncos did sweep the Bulldogs in a home-and-home earlier in the year, so it's certainly not out of the realm of possibility.

Wolverines, Spartans Split Late-Season Series

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 18:57:00 +0000

Michigan and Michigan State split a pair of 3-2 contests in their late-season series. The Spartans won at Munn on Friday night, while the Wolverines rebounded in overtime at the Joe on Saturday.

Friday night's game was wide-open early on. There were only 2-3 stoppages in the first nine minutes. Michigan State held a 10-8 edge in shots, but the teams went into the intermission 0-0. In the first frame, the best sequence was a 4-on-2 for Michigan State that was broken up by Hyman. That led to a 3-on-2 the other way for the Wolverines and Sparks had a good chance that was denied by Yanakeff.

Early in the second, Mike Chiasson had to hook Merrifield after he split the defense. The Spartans kept the puck in the Michigan end for a good 1:50 of that power play, but outside of a chance by Krug, the PKers kept the Spartans at bay.

Just after the Spartan power play ended, DiGiuseppe and Treais came in 2-on-1. PDG got it over to Treais and he buried it to give Michigan a 1-0 lead.

Michigan nearly made it 2-0 moments after another Spartan power play. Sinelli was sprung on a breakaway and got denied by Yanakeff.

Kevin Lynch actually did make it 2-0 midway through the period. Moffie got deep into the zone to dig a puck loose. He got it to Lynch and Lynch was able to sneak it underneath Yanakeff.

The Spartans responded in a big way just a couple of minutes later. FYS won a faceoff in the Michigan end. They tried to center it through the slot, but no one was home. The puck bounced back to Torey Krug at the point and he ripped one past Hunwick. Merrifield would hit the post before the end of the period, but it remained 2-1 Michigan after two.

The third period was a reminder of how wildly inconsistent CCHA officiating can be. The officials had really let them play for the first two periods and I was actually thinking how well-officiated the game had been. The third was characterized by weak calls all around. The Spartans capitalized on the ones in their favor. Michigan didn't, when an awful call gave them a late chance to tie the game.

Just 27 seconds into the third period, PDG was called for roughing on what was a completely-clean hit. Initially it looked like a possible hit from behind, but he clearly got him shoulder to shoulder. It was a hard hit, but completely legal. Not sure how they got roughing out of that. It was just another example of an alarming trend in college hockey where any hard hit is liable to get you sent to the box, if not ejected. This one was a game-changer.

It took the Spartans just under a minute to tie the game. Hunwick was run into, no call. Play continued, the puck got back to Krug at the point and he ripped another one past Hunwick to tie the game.

The Spartans momentum continued and Hunwick was forced to make a good stop on Buttery. FYS went back on the power play after a soft offensive-zone trip on DeBlois. He tapped the guy on the shin pads and he went down like he was shot.

That one came back to bite Michigan as well. Krug walked through the defense and got the puck to Berry by the back door. He had an empty net to shoot at and made it 3-2 Spartans.

You knew Michigan was going to get one opportunity with the man advantage to tie things back up after three Spartan power plays in the third, and that chance came with about 4 minutes left. Brett Perlini was called for elbowing on as poor of a call as you'll see all year. There was absolutely nothing wrong with that hit. The announcers described it well, saying that he was "winding up that elbow" as he went in for the check, but he didn't use it. They anticipated what was going to happen.

Unlike the Spartans, however, Michigan wasn't able to capitalize on a poor call in their favor. They only had one decent chance on the power play, PDG centered to Moffatt in front. The Wolverines got Hunwick out with about a minute left in regulation, but didn't have anything resembling a chance and the Spartans got the victory.

The next night at the Joe, Michigan was able to rebound from the loss. It wasn't easy, however. Both teams swapped periods of dominance. Michigan State had the edge in play through a large chunk of the third period, but Shawn Hunwick was fantastic. Michigan scored on a fluky goal in OT to get the victory.

Out of the gate, Michigan controlled the play. Clare had the first really good chance of the game as the late man on a 3-on-2. Treais got it to him with PDG driving the net. Yanakeff made a good collarbone save.

Hunwick made his first big stop of the game on Walrod, and Perlini sent the rebound off the side of the net.

Michigan took a 1-0 lead at the 12:12 mark of the first. PDG sent a behind-the-back pass to Glendening and Glendening found Treais in the slot. Yanakeff made the first stop but Treais corralled his own rebound and was able to tuck it into the net.

The next five minutes were much more back-and-forth. Walrod hit the post.

Early in the second period, Wohlberg turned it over, leading to a 2-on-1 for the Spartans. Bennett played it absolutely perfect and broke the play up without them getting a shot away.

Hunwick then made a great stop on Wolfe, but Wolfe got his revenge moments later off a pass from Walrod to make it 1-1.

Hyman ran into Yanakeff and knocked him over. The CCHA showed that they are willing to call goalie interference after all, and sent him off. Weird. I thought goalies were fair game...maybe that's just when Sergott is reffing.

On the power play, Perlini got the puck by the side of the net on the goal line. Hunwick cheated a little bit and crouched low. Perlini got a great shot away--put it right up over him and the Spartans had themselves a 2-1 lead.

Moments later, Hunwick made a game-changing stop on a Perlini breakaway. The would've made it 3-1 Michigan State. Instead, we got a TV timeout and a chance to calm things down a little bit. Right out of the TV timeout, Glendening fed Treais just inside the blueline. Treais ripped a wrist-shot from the top of the circle top-shelf, far side. He got it past Yanakeff's blocker to the tie the game at 2.

The teams would trade opportunities for the remainder of the second period. Michigan State nearly got back on top but Hunwick stopped Sorenson on a 2-on-1 and then the Spartans hit the post.

Late in the period, Guptill had himself a breakaway. He made a great move and when he got the shot away, it looked like it was destined for the back of the net, but Yanakeff got his blocker down and somehow kept it out. Jake Chelios was sent off for elbowing with about a minute left in the first. Merrill had a couple of keeps at the blueline, but nothing much came of it. Walrod had a great pass breakup to keep Guptill from being in all alone again in the waning seconds.

The first 16-or-so minutes of the third were as bad as Michigan has looked since before the GLI, but their Hobey Baker-candidate goaltending saved their bacon time and time again. Moffie made a good play to break up a potential Merrifield goal. Hunwick stopped a 2-on-1. Moffie turned it over and Michigan State had several good chances, but nothing really got through. Hunwick made a great little right pad save on Berry, and then Moffatt was called for hooking after another Moffie turnover.

Even though the PK struggled this weekend, they had a big, big kill there. Some good work by K. Lynch and DeBlois.

Mac Bennett then had a horrid turnover and Hunwick was right there to rob Trevor Nill and deny him a potential game-winner. Pateryn then rushed the puck and rung one off the post. The rebound came out to Bennett and he had the entire net to shoot at. He went high and may have caught iron as well.

Shots were 14-11 FYS in the final frame, but neither team was able to break the 2-2 tie and the game headed to overtime, just like the last time they met at the Joe.

And just like the previous overtime game at Joe Louis, it was the Wolverines coming out on top. Hunwick stopped Nill on a tough backhander and Wohlberg hit Guptill on a shot after a nifty little toe-drag around the defense.

Kevin Lynch just missed being the overtime hero once again off a feed from Travis Lynch, but Yanakeff was there. The puck came out to center and DeBlois dumped it back in. Crandall bent down to stop the bouncing puck, but somehow it got through his legs. Kevin Lynch had cycled back into the offensive zone and was right there to pounce on it. He fired it past a surprised Yanakeff and the Wolverines were victorious!

That was certainly not the gold standard for victories. There were way too many odd-man rushes allowed, the defense turned the puck over way too much, and the top line wasn't as effective as they need to be. But Hunwick was there when they needed him and they were able to gut out a victory to keep themselves in the CCHA title hunt.

Ferris State swept Notre Dame this weekend, so they lead Michigan by 6 points (and WMU by 5) with two weekends to play. Ferris and Western play each other the last weekend of the season, so it's probably unlikely that Michigan wins the conference title even if they sweep NMU and BGSU, but there's a chance, and they should certainly be able to get second place.

In the PWR, the Wolverines currently sit in 4th, though they're second in the RPI. Ferris State is tops in both at the moment. Nine CCHA teams rank in the top 20 of the PWR at the moment. Six would make the tournament if it started today. Miami is the last team in. Notre Dame (!), second-place Western Michigan (!) and LSSU would be three of the first five teams out.

Next weekend, the Wolverines have Northern Michigan at Yost, and again, both games will be on TV. The Big Ten Network will have Friday night's game. Saturday's game will air on FSN Detroit as part of Hockey Day in Michigan. Note the odd 5:05 EST start time on the Saturday game.

Lastly, vote for Shawn Hunwick for Hobey! He's 14% behind the lead right now, but there have only been 76,000 votes cast, so it only works out to about 10,000 votes. It seriously takes 2 seconds and you don't have to register for anything.

FYS Preview

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 04:56:00 +0000

It's fitting that Michigan is playing against Little Brother this week, given that Brian Hoyer got to be Tom Brady's water boy in another Super Bowl, Mario Manningham made a game-changing play that gave Greg Jones a chance to propose to his girlfriend, and the eyes of the hockey world were on Ann Arbor as the NHL wants to play their Winter Classic at Marcia, Marcia, Marcia's stadium! It's not fair, dammit!

Anyway, Friday night's game is at Munn Library and Ice Arena while Saturday's contest will be at Joe Louis Arena. The Big Ten Network and Fox Sports Detroit will air the respective games.

The Wolverines will play Friday night without Chris Brown, who was suspended for his altercation with Miami's Will Weber on Saturday night.

The Shartans sit in a tie with LSSU for seventh place in the CCHA, though FYS is just one point behind Ohio and Miami and has two games in hand on both of them.

Sparty returns home after playing their last four on the road. They were swept by Ferris State and then swept the Buckeyes in Columbus, as Ohio continues their free-fall from the top spot in the rankings to possibly landing out of the NCAA Tournament.

They rank 15th in the nation in offense at 3.13 goals per game, but have just one player with 10+ goals, and that's Mike Merrifield with 11. They do, however, have six players with 8+ goals. Sophomore forward Lee Reimer leads the team in points with 8-19--27. Torey Krug has 8-16--24 from back on the blueline, including five goals on the power play.

Merrifield got off to a very fast start, but has only put up 3-1--4 since the start of December. Assist-leader Reimer has been in a slump as well. He has just four assists in 2012 and hasn't scored since a 1-1--2 performance the last time these teams met at Munn. Krug has 10 points in his last 7.

In net, it's been almost a dead-split between DREW PALMISANO IS FROM ANN ARBOR and Willie Yanakeff, who played for the NTDP in Ann Arbor. Yanakeff has outperformed the senior, however. He has a 10-5-1 record to Palmisano's 5-6-3. Yanakeff leads in GAA 2.37 to 2.77 and has a .927 save percentage compared to Palmisano's .914. That said, the Wolverines put four past Yanakeff at Yost, and Palmisano has given up 7 on 87 shots in two games against Michigan (a shootout win when he acted like they won the Stanley Cup and an overtime loss in the GLI).

Palmisano has only played three games since the GLI Championship game, and has given up 11 goals, including 9 in his last two starts. Yanakeff has played in seven games this calendar year and has three 40-save performances to his credit in that span. I'd imagine we'll see both goalies.

The Spartans have a 15.9% power play, which is actually one slot in the rankings behind Michigan's 16.1%. They've scored one fewer power play goal on five fewer chances with the man advantage. They're very good on the PK however. They rank second nationally with an 89.1% (and the team ahead of them is Robert Morris, so for all intents and purposes, the Spartans are the best penalty killing team in the country). They've given up 13 power play goals on 119 chances. Michigan has climbed the ranks up to #15, as they've been phenomenal since these teams last met. Michigan has given up 20 PPGs on 127 short-handed occasions (84.3%).

David Wohlberg has been an absolute Spartan-killer in his career. He is far and away the tops on the team against FYS, with a 9-8--17 line in 18 career games. The next highest on the Wolverines in points is Chris Brown, with 8 in 13 games. He'll only get one crack at them this weekend.

Shawn Hunwick is 6-2-1 with a 1.94/.929 against Michigan State in his career.

Winter Classic Official; GLI Outdoors

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 04:30:00 +0000

At long last, the outdoor games over the Christmas season are now official. After the Regents voted yesterday to rent Michigan Stadium to the NHL, the NHL announced today that the Red Wings and Maple Leafs will play at the Big House on January 1, 2013 in the Winter Classic. That is, if the CBA situation is settled. #buzzkill

Additionally, a second rink will be constructed at Comerica Park. Among the games featured on that rink will be the 2012 GLI, which will include Michigan, FYS, Michigan Tech, and Western Michigan. St. Cloud State was previously thought to be the fourth team involved, but were reportedly told that the organizers wanted a fourth Michigan team.

Both days of the GLI will be outdoors at Comerica Park, which means that the outgoing senior class will have played in five outdoor games by the time their careers end.

Also, of particular interest to me, the Red Wings and Maple Leafs will have an alumni game. The goalies for Detroit are rumored to be Chris Osgood, Mike Vernon, and Dominik Hasek. Hasek is my favorite player ever outside of Yzerman, and is probably the funniest player to watch that I've ever seen. It greatly excites me that there might be another opportunity to see him strap on the pads. No word on if CuJo will play and switch teams in the middle of the game.

There has been a lot of talk about outdoor games losing their appeal and I just don't see it. I get that the novelty is wearing off, but I've been to all four that Michigan has played in, and I'm going to do everything in my power to be at Comerica and the Big House this Christmas season. Having two Original Six teams playing in Michigan Stadium is special. Having the GLI outdoors is special. According to College Hockey Inc, it will be the first tournament title decided outdoors since the 1950s. It probably wouldn't be the worst idea for Michigan to give it a break for a couple of years after the GLI. That said, outdoor games in general: If they're shifting the teams around, the novelty isn't wearing off for the individual fanbases. There's something about your team participating in one of these games that really is special. I hope the trend keeps up and more clubs have a chance to host, because it really is an awesome way to engage people that might not otherwise come out, and it's a unique experience for players, coaches, and fans.

As part of the deal for Michigan Stadium, the NHL will pay Michigan $3 million and will also donate a significant amount of money (reported to be at least $250,000) to the University of Michigan for scholarships. Like it or not--and from the sound of it, most people are on board--Dave Brandon found an additional way to pack the Big House, outside of the Michigan football home slate. It's a huge amount of money for the Athletic Department, and will help with the renovations, buildings, and new sports teams. It's also a huge boon to Ann Arbor. Brandon said he expects it to generate $14 million for the local economy. I'd imagine this will be more than the Big Chill, since we'll have a bunch of visitors from across the border spending their loonies and twonies.

Gary Bettman said that they expect to have more demand for tickets than they can satisfy with the 115,000-or-so tickets that will be made available. Bettman also went on:

“Based on what we’re doing for this Winter Classic and Detroit, I’m not sure if anyone’s going to be able to top it. (That’s) both in terms of the number of events and the sheer enormity of how fans can connect to it.”

This is going to be a huge event for the city of Detroit, the city of Ann Arbor, and the University of Michigan. Anyone who was at The Big Chill knows how great the stadium can be for hockey. It was a first-class event, and the NHL has some work to do if they're going to live up to that one.

Turning attention to the Great Lakes Invitational at Comerica Park, College Hockey Inc posted a picture of a possible rink configuration. The sight-lines (at least from this spot) look great!

Other News:
Max Pacioretty had a hat trick tonight for Montreal in a 4-2 win over the New York Islanders. It was his first career hat trick and also gave him the first 20-goal season of his career. He has 22-19--41 in 52 games to lead the Habs in both goals and points.

Speaking of Max Pacioretty, this story will make you proud that he is a Wolverine. Pacioretty started a foundation which is trying to raise money for the hospital where he was cared for after the vicious hit he took last year.

Earlier this year, I suggested that it's time the NCAA fought back against the dirty recruiting tactics of the CHL, and it appears that they're doing just that. According to the Grand Forks Herald, College Hockey Inc. is working to enact legislation to prevent players from jumping to the CHL for one year after they've signed their National Letter of Intent. The United States of Hockey has been covering the story and explains how the transfer agreement between the US and Canada could play a role. Chris also covers some of the pros and cons. Bravo to College Hockey Inc. Here's hoping that they can find a way to make it work. I'm okay with kids changing their mind. But once they sign the Letter of Intent, it's officially too late to find anyone else if they bail. Making the LOI binding would at least allow coaches to know how committed a kid was, and recruit as if he wasn't coming if he didn't sign when he was able to. Love it.

Michigan 3, Miami 0

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 06:35:00 +0000

If it wasn't already there, I'd like to think that Shawn Hunwick thrust his name right into the thick of the Hobey conversation with another sparkling performance--this one a 29-stop gem that led the Wolverines to a sweep of Miami. Lee Moffie scored twice, Chris Brown added as pretty of a goal as you'll see all season, and the CCHA officials peed down their legs once again. All in a day's work.

If you don't like 5-on-5 hockey, you loved the first period of this game. Of the first 14 minutes, ten of them were played with one team up a man. Usually it was Miami. Pateryn, Hyman, Brown, and Wohlberg were all called for infractions in the first 12 minutes of the game (and Miami got whistled for too many men).

The RedHawks weren't able to generate a shot on their first power play of the game. On the second, Hunwick made a sparkling stop on either Vogelhuber or Murphy, sprawling to the ice and somehow managing to keep the puck out of the net. While shorthanded, Kevin Lynch started a Michigan rush with a great breakout pass that led to a 3-on-1 for the Wolverines. Glendening went cross-ice to Moffie who sniped one past Connor Knapp to give the Wolverines a 1-0 lead.

Miami nearly tied it up right away, but Hunwick made a great stop on Murphy. The penalty killers kept up their good work. Brown hit a player from behind and the RedHawks managed two shots and nothing more. Then Wohlberg threw a shot toward the net after the whistle, got violently cross-checked in the back by Weber, a scrum ensued and an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty on Wohlberg ended up being the difference there. Once again, the Wolverine PK was stellar, holding Miami without a shot and managing two of their own.

So after the first 13:50 of the game, the RedHawks had had nearly eight full minutes of power play time. In that 7:57 span with Miami up a man, shots were 5-5 and goals were 1-0 in favor of the Wolverines. That is some penalty killing!

Hyman nearly scored on a wraparound shot that bounced around in between Knapp's legs, but stayed out. The period ended with Michigan leading 1-0.

Early in the second, Vogelhuber was called for hitting Wohlberg from behind. Michigan's best chance on the PP was Guptill backdoor, but neither team was credited with a shot on goal during that power play. Just six seconds after the penalty ended, however, Moffie was at the right point and went down low to Moffatt. Moffatt sent it to Treais in the middle of the ice, who laid a pass perfectly for Moffie who was cruising into the slot. He buried it for his second of the night, and Michigan led 2-0. Really, really pretty play there.

Hyman set up Moffatt for a good look and Knapp made a great save. Then Hyman fed Sparks, who rung one off the post.

Pateryn was called for high-sticking late in the period, but Michigan held the RedHawks to one shot, and took a 2-0 lead into the second intermission. The Wolverine penalty killers had to come up big again in the third, this time on a bench minor for too many men. They held Miami without a shot on a power play that was abbreviated when Brian Paulazzo hooked Kevin Clare. Clare went hard into the boards very awkwardly, but luckily he was okay.

That power play led to the turning point in the game. Jon Merrill took a slapshot and broke his stick. While he went to the bench to get a new one, Miami was able to break the puck out and spring Matt Tomassoni on a breakaway. Hunwick made a nice save and Moffie was able to clear the puck away as it inched toward the goal line. After play continued for a couple of minutes, there was finally a stoppage and Brian Hill reviewed the play. The replay showed that it was about as close as it could possibly get. We didn't have access to the overhead look, but it appeared that Moffie cleared the puck out when it sat right on the goal line. It was probably more over the goal line than not, but you couldn't see any white space. Hill waived the goal off and Blasi, who was able to see the replay on the Megatron, went bonkers.

After Blasi's rant, Hill went back into the penalty box for another look. The commentators commended him for taking another look to make sure he got it right. I feel the exact opposite. Going back to take another look completely undermined his credibility. All it said was, "I didn't do a good enough job the first time and I'm not confident in my ruling." If the video was inconclusive, it was inconclusive and it's no goal. If it showed the puck in the net, call it a goal. If it didn't, call it no goal. You already made the decision that there was no angle that showed the puck in the net. Tell Blasi to STFU and let's play.

Shockingly, no new video evidence surfaced from the last time he stepped into the penalty box, and Hill again ruled it no goal. I have a feeling the roof would have blown off of Yost if he had changed his mind after being argued into taking another look. Even if the puck did go in, we're still about 499 missed calls against Miami in our favor away from making up for the hose-job in Fort Wayne. Just saying. But that puck wasn't in the net. I whole-heartedly support a verification line. Or lasers.

Michigan then iced the game on as pretty of a goal as you'll see this season. Brown took a pass from Wohlberg and brought it into the zone one-against-two. He puck the puck through Will Weber's legs, stepped around him, and ripped it past Knapp. Brown Tebowed. Weber broke his stick over the net, much to the delight of the Children of Yost who had serenaded him with "Weber sucks" for much of the game after his fairly dirty play this weekend.

Then all hell broke loose. Spinell planted Bennett with hands to the face and was ejected for contact to the head. Almost immediately afterwards (like, 20 seconds), Pateryn was ejected for contact to the head. The RedHawks pulled their goalie down by 3, and after a defenseman made a save on Travis Lynch, Reilly Smith was called for charging.

The Wolverines got another shot on goal and Alex Guptill took a light poke at the goalie after the save. Three RedHawk players went after him and Guptill slashed at one. A melee ensued that resulted in Chris Brown and Will Weber dropping the gloves. When the penalties were sorted out, both Brown and Weber were given DQs for fighting, Guptill was called for slashing, and four other players were given roughing minors. We were treated to some rare 3-on-3 hockey, and the game ended with a 3-0 Michigan win.

After the game, Red Berenson opened his press conference by instruction reports to not ask him about the officiating. He later criticized Blasi for not controlling his players, and suggested that Miami took some liberties, knowing that they've got a pair of games against the worst team in the country next weekend.

All in all, it was what I've come to expect when Keith Sergott is officiating a series. There will be dangerous plays that go uncalled, wildly inconsistent officiating, a couple periods that are almost entirely power plays, and he'll ultimately completely lose control. Luckily we got out of this one without anyone being assaulted. Add in Hill's complete unprofessionalism by allowing a coach to badger him into re-evaluating a judgment ruling that he had already made, and you've got a duo that really doesn't need to be calling any more important games this year. Or ever. There's a reason that things blow up every time Sergott is around. He can't handle heated rivalries and he shouldn't be calling these type of games.

The wins, combined with OSU's continued struggles, and surprising losses by Notre Dame (to BGSU) and WMU (to Alaska), jumped the Wolverines up into 3rd in the conference. They now sit just 3 points behind CCHA-leading Ferris State and just one point behind Western Michigan. The top 8 in the conference are separated by a mere 6 points, though Miami and Ohio have played two more games than everyone else (they both have 36).

It was also a very good weekend for the Wolverines in the PWR. Minnesota-Duluth plummeted after a loss to Alaska-Anchorage and the Wolverines moved into a tie for second behind BU. They edge out the surprising UMass-Lowell (who now has the best record in college hockey) in the RPI tie-breaker.

Miami is in 18th in the PWR. Good.

Lost in the fisticuffs was the fact that Red Berenson moved into 5th place all by himself on the all-time wins list.

Hunwick moved into 4th place in the history of the program with his ninth-career shutout. He also now ranks second nationally in wins, is fifth in save percentage, and ninth in goals-against. Hobey. Seriously.

Of the eight guys in front of him in GAA, four come from minor conferences (Union, Niagara, RIT, Quinnipiac), and he's played twice as many minutes as Knapp and CJ Motte. Only Douglas Carr from UML and Kent Patterson from Minnesota are from major conferences, have played around as many minutes, and have a better GAA. And Patterson is only .01 ahead.

The four guys ahead of him in save percentage play for Niagara, Union, RIT, and Robert Morris. And none of them are within 225 saves of him.

The PK gave up 6 shots on 6 Miami power plays. Once again, the RedHawks spent more than a half-period's worth of time (11:05) on the power play and came away with -1 goals to show for it. Michigan has now killed 31 of 32 penalties since Jon Merrill has returned, and, with the short-handed goal, is actually net-even when killing off penalties over the last eight games. They're up to 16th now, and are within .7% of cracking the top ten, which is remarkable.

The Wolverines will now head to East Lansing to take on FYS in a road/Joe series. Chris Brown will have to sit Friday night due to his suspension. BTN and Fox Sports Detroit will carry the games.

Michigan 4, Miami 1

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 17:14:00 +0000

It's a big game when Denard is in the house!
Photo Credit: Bill Rapai

The birthday boys stepped up in a big way for the Wolverines last night. Chris Brown and Jon Merrill both turned a year older on Friday, and today is AJ Treais's birthday. Those three players combined for 3 goals and 2 assists as Michigan drew ever-closer to getting back into the race for a CCHA crown by downing the Miami RedHawks 4-1.

Michigan got on top early, used a strong first period to build a three-goal lead, and never appeared to be in any danger of relinquishing it, outside of a 1 1/2 minute span in the early second period. Shawn Hunwick stopped 24 of 25 shots and the special teams were fantastic in the victory.

Chris Brown got things started 1:40 into the contest. Just moments after Alex Guptill narrowly missed on a goal-mouth pass from Brown, Brown took it himself on a 2-on-1 and beat Cody Reichard 5-hole to give the Wolverines a 1-0 lead. The Children of Yost raised the Texas flag, the band played "Deep in the Heart of Texas" and Yost was rocking!

Photo Credit: Bill Rapai

Luke Glendening planted a RedHawk player, won the battle for the puck, and got it over to AJ Treais. He had PDG with him, but ripped a shot past Reichard to make it 2-0. That was a snipe right there.

Reilly Smith took a high-sticking penalty and early in the Michigan power play, Will Weber was called for roughing after the whistle. That was an interesting situation. He drilled one of the Wolverines from behind (Wohlberg I think). It could have been five, was certainly two, and it went uncalled. Something happened behind the play, and Weber was given a penalty. From the sound of it, Wohlberg took exception to the hit and there was a scrum? We didn't get a replay of it. Anyway, Blasi was pissed, but if they hadn't missed the original call, we would have had the same result: Long 5-on-3 for Michigan.

And the Wolverines capitalized. Treais had the puck in the corner and centered a pass for Luke Moffatt. It deflected in and Michigan took a 3-0 lead into the first intermission. Blasi was pissed.

Blasi was less than thrilled with Keith Sergott. Join the crowd.
Photo credit: Bill Rapai

The RedHawks changed goalies after one and came out with Connor Knapp. Early in the second it looked like Miami was going to get back into the game. Their star, Reilly Smith, took a shot that looked like it handcuffed Hunwick a little bit. It found its way into the back of the net and Miami got back within 2 just 30 seconds into the second period.

If that was just what the RedHawks needed, they certainly didn't need the too many men on the ice call a minute later. It took the Wolverines just twenty second to capitalize with the man advantage. Jon Merrill took a shot from the point and Luke Moffatt got a gorgeous tip on it. It went up over Knapp and Michigan had their 3-goal lead back. That would be the only shot the Wolverines would put on net in the second period. Miami outshot Michigan 11-1 in the frame, but the goals ended up 1-1.

The third period was mainly Miami gooning it up and Michigan getting called for it. Hunwick was run over for the third or fourth time in the game and Pateryn was called for cross-checking. This was the Miami MO: With any contact around the net, take it as an opportunity to plow Hunwick and blame it on the defenseman. It worked, largely because Keith Sergott and Brian Hill are nincompoops. Anyway, the puck don't lie, the penalty killing was terrific, and Michigan kept Miami off the board.

With 1.2 seconds left in the contest, Blake Coleman ran over Hunwick yet again. It was at this point that the officials decided to make him pay. Coleman received a five-minute major for charging, which, with 1 second left in the game, they might as well have really sent him a message and given him an eleventy-billion minute penalty. Quite honestly, that was probably the least-severe of all the times Miami ran into Hunwick in the game. You know what would send a message? Call the same thing the first time they do it tonight, and give them a penalty that they actually have to serve.

You'll remember that Sergott was the official a few weeks back at Notre Dame, when he let the Irish run Hunwick at every opportunity and usually just evened things up on the rare occasion that he did call anything. He was also the official when Steve Kampfer was attacked by Andrew Conboy and Corey Tropp. He was also the official of the ND/WMU game when the wrong player got ejected. Even if you set the bar for your officials at "Don't endanger players with your incompetence", Sergott fails in a big way. He shouldn't be reffing BGSU/Alabama-Huntsville, let alone high-profile games.

Let's talk about the Michigan special teams. Much-maligned for most of this year, both units were special (in the good way) last night. The power-play was two for their first three, and ended the game 2-for-5 with five shots on net. The penalty kill killed off 10:12 of Miami power play time. They did surrender 10 shots on goal, but kept the RedHawks off the board. This was especially crucial during the second period when it was "Get Miami back into the game because Rico is mad" time, and Miami spent 40% of the period with the man-advantage.

How big has the return of Merrill been? When Merrill made his return after the GLI, Michigan was 76/95 on the PK (80.0%). They have gone 25/26 (96.1%) since then and are now 23rd in the country at 83.5%.

Before Merrill's return, opponents were averaging 2.6 goals per game (57 goals in 22 games). Michigan has given up just 10 goals in the seven games he's been back (1.43 goals per game) and now ranks 10th in team defense (2.31 goals a night). It would be a mistake to give him all the credit for the turnaround, but when you add your best player back into the lineup, it certainly is a boost, and the numbers have shown that.

The teams return to the ice tonight at 7:35. The game will air on the CBS Sports Network.

The Venue: Not a Mundane Detail, Michael

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 00:49:00 +0000

So, about the OHL playing a game at Michigan Stadium thing. Not happening, from the sound of it!

After Dave Ablauf told the Michigan Daily that the rumors were "not true" this morning, Matt Slovin was able to further confirm:

[A]n OHL source with one of the teams involved informed the Daily that the league is, in fact, planning an outdoor doubleheader. The source went on to name Detroit’s Comerica Park as the most likely venue.

A couple of others asked around and heard similar things. Spath talked with Red about it and apparently got the glare. Sorry, Mike! (And sorry to Dave Brandon for blowing up his Twitter feed, though I still think that was a good exercise, just in case there were any lingering thoughts!)

As for the original source of the rumor, there's this now:

As soon as I heard last night that Comerica is likely setting up a rink I agree that that will be the site of #OHL DH Dec. 31

So as it turns out, this:

Can confirm NHL has approved the CHL request to play an outdoor DH @ Big House Dec. 31st. Teams not confirmed but LDN/SAG, WSR/PLY likely

...turned out to be not entirely true and wasn't actually based on any knowledge of the venue. The other reporter for CTV, Norman James, is now saying Comerica Park as well:

What we know at this point is that the NHL has approved a CHL request to hold multiple outdoor games December 31st in Detroit. The target venue seems to be Comerica Park, where we could see the Knights and Spitfires in action against the OHL's two Michigan based clubs.

That makes much more sense. It's closer to Windsor, closer to London, roughly the same distance from Plymouth, and no one in Saginaw gives a crap anyway. Plus you aren't making Red Berenson's head explode. Or mine.

Anyway, in hindsight, I wish I had tweeted at the original reporter and asked the "Are you sure it's the Big House and not Comerica?" question before calling in the cavalry, but he posted three different times saying basically, "confirmed request to play" "at the Big House".

For something like that, I didn't want to wait to hear it actually being confirmed before I reacted. Remember the uproar over SBC wanting to purchase the naming rights for the Michigan/Ohio football game, and how Michigan eventually called it off? To me, this story was like that. Except times a billion.

I'm happy to hear that Michigan hasn't sold their souls, from the sound of it. There is still that tiny part of me that remembers they denied the Winter Classic rumors at first as well, but Comerica makes much more sense for a lot of reasons.

If nothing else, I got to remind everyone once again why the OHL is evil, and I like doing that. It was also really rewarding to get to see the passion in our fanbase. Thank you to everyone who immediately took up the cause. That was pretty cool to see.

Just Say No to the OHL

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 06:11:00 +0000

I don't get riled up all that often, but I saw something on Twitter tonight that needs to be stopped if there's even one hint of truth to it (and you know I'm serious since I'm more than willing to deploy single-sentence paragraphs and single word sentences in this post!):

According to a tweet by Brent Lale, a reporter for CTV in London, Ontario, the NHL has approved a request by the CHL to play an outdoor double-header at Michigan Stadium as part of the Winter Classic festivities. London vs. Saginaw and Windsor vs. Plymouth are the rumored teams. Sportsnet would be televising it.

This needs to be stopped immediately.

The OHL is a competing product. They steal our recruits. They play dirty and continue to recruit players after they've signed with colleges. They steal players during the season when it's too late for the NCAA team to replace them. They do everything they can to convince prospects that the CHL is a superior path to the NHL. Michigan should not be allowing them to use our beautiful stadium to showcase their product.

Trevor Lewis. Jared Knight. AJ Jenks. Jack Campbell. John Gibson. Robbie Czarnik. Lucas Lessio. Tyler Swystun. Danny Richmond. Jason Bailey. All players that have committed to Michigan, signed with Michigan, or played for Michigan, before being poached by teams in the CHL in the not-so-distant past. If you want to go back further, do Mike Comrie and Mike Van Ryn ring a bell? I'm sure there are more.

To this point, I've only talked about kids affiliated with Michigan. Need more evidence? A couple of the rumored teams played roles in the mass exodus of NCAA-bound players to the OHL this summer. Plymouth signed JT Miller, a North Dakota recruit. Saginaw signed Jamie Oleksiak, a defenseman who would have been entering his sophomore year with Northeastern. Additionally, Gibson bailed from Michigan after signing a Letter of Intent. Reid Boucher, a Michigan State recruit, signed with Sarnia. Connor Murphy passed up Miami to sign with Sarnia as well. And that was all in about a week's span. Not to mention BU and BC lost a trio of much younger recruits as well.

Michigan wouldn't let Michigan State and Ohio State play an outdoor game in Michigan Stadium, and rightfully so. They're competitors. Why would you give them an opportunity for the positive publicity that an outdoor game at Michigan Stadium in conjunction with the NHL's Winter Classic would provide? You wouldn't. It would be stupid. Don't do anything to help your rivals, especially if they'd never return the favor.

The same thing applies here. The OHL is not only not a friend to college hockey, they're an enemy. Truth be told, I'd be less offended if it was FYS and Ohio State playing in our stadium than I am about the prospect about OHL teams playing there. There's no way in hell they'd extend the same invitation to a collegiate team if the situation was reversed, unless they thought there was some way that they could steal a player or two while the team was in Canada.

The NCAA, and specifically Michigan, should do NOTHING to accommodate them in any way, shape or form. If the OHL wants an outdoor game, they can host one in Canada or have it at Comerica with the rest of the ancillary events.

There have been some people that think having pro hockey in Michigan Stadium taints the Big House in some way. I don't feel the same way about the NHL, but I certainly do feel that way about the O. They don't belong anywhere near Michigan Stadium. Not as long as the playing field is so unequal with regard to poaching players. The thought of having an OHL game (or two) at the Big House is souring me on the whole thought of the Winter Classic there, and that's too bad since I'm probably one of the people who was most excited about it initially.

And the teams they're throwing around? Windsor STOLE OUR MOTHER FREAKING GOALIE (thank God for Shawn Hunwick) and they have the rights to Evan Allen and Phil Di Giuseppe. Plymouth took Robbie Czarnik mid-season, signed AJ Jenks away, and don't think for a second they didn't immediately call Jon Merrill when his suspension was announced. London signed *anny Richmon* away, landed Michigan-commit Jared Knight and convinced Max Domi to not go the college route (the latter isn't that big of a deal, but I figured I'd mention it since he was a pretty high-profile recruit). They've been one of the most troublesome OHL teams from an NCAA perspective over the years. Saginaw just acquired the rights to Boo Nieves and they have the rights to JT Compher.

None of this even includes future players that are deciding between the NCAA (specifically Michigan) and the OHL. Michigan is constantly in a battle with this league for recruits and they're constantly fighting a (one-sided) battle to keep the recruits that have already signed (or the players that are already on the friggin team). It would be the ultimate kick in the face to see Phil Di Giuseppe and Evan Allen playing at Michigan Stadium for the Windsor Spitfires next year.

This. Cannot. Happen.

I seriously urge everyone to email or tweet at Dave Brandon and make your feelings known. I'd hope that Red has as well. Based on the initial reaction from people on Twitter, I know I'm not alone in feeling this way. Maybe it's too late, or maybe it's no longer in his control. Maybe it's just a silly internet rumor that I'm freaking out about for nothing. But just on the off-chance this happens--or could happen--I don't want to sit quietly.

The OHL has no business playing a game at Michigan Stadium. They're a competitor--and not one that competes in good faith. They're not our friend. If Windsor could find a way to steal Di Giuseppe away, they'd do it in a heartbeat. We should not be helping them to market their product. The answer shouldn't be "Yes" if they ask to use the ice at Michigan Stadium. It actually shouldn't even be "No". It should be something more along the lines of, "Hell no. Go **** yourselves." Slam phone down.

I'm 100% behind the AD making money. I have a very progressive view in this regard. I'm firmly of the belief that if you don't want advertising in Michigan Stadium but you want renovations to Michigan Stadium, Crisler, and Yost, and you want a basketball practice facility, lacrosse teams, etc. that the AD needs to have the ability to host events like the Winter Classic. You're going to get Arby's sponsoring The Big Chill. It's unreasonable to ask them to ignore all these potential sources of revenue. But this is the ultimate in selling out. You'd be letting a dirty competitor come into your house, use it to help market their product, indirectly (or directly) steal players away from you, and make it harder for your own team to compete. And for the minimal amount of revenue that a pair of OHL games would provide.

This. Absolutely. Cannot. Happen.

Edit: Some good news today, as Michigan's Dave Ablauf has called the rumors "not true" and an OHL source has confirmed to the Michigan Daily's Matt Slovin that a doubleheader is in the works, but suggested that Comerica Park is the most likely location, which is how it should be.

That said, Michigan initially denied the Winter Classic rumors when they first came out. It is certainly comforting to hear that one of the OHL teams involved is saying Comerica as well, though.

Michigan Splits at Notre Dame

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 18:13:00 +0000

Hunwick was sharp both games this weekend, earning himself a #2 and #1 star

The Wolverines and Fighting Irish entered the weekend tied for fifth in the PWR and two points apart in the CCHA standings and that's how they remain. Notre Dame won Friday night's contest 3-1 (with a late empty-netter). On Saturday, the Wolverines got out to a 2-0 first-period lead before hanging on to win 2-1.

On Friday, Notre Dame made it their goal to seemingly hit Shawn Hunwick as much as possible and try to get in his head. They ran into him, slashed him after the whistle, high-sticked him, at least a half-dozen times (many in the first period alone). The first instance led to a power play. Then the incompetent boobs officiating the game, Keith Sergott and Barry Pochmara, decided to basically let ND do whatever they wanted to our goalie. At one point, Hunwick got frustrated enough that he threw his stick to the ice after a scrum. I thought they then called him for unsportsmanlike conduct--that seemed to be the consensus on the telecast as well--but in the box score they've got him down for slashing. I'm guessing the reaction was based on them evening it up after he got slammed into for at least the fifth time.

Outside of Notre Dame hitting anything that moved--or wore goalie pads--the game was characterized by Michigan failing to convert on some gorgeous scoring chances. Steve Summerhays played very well--he was the #1 star (and Hunwick was 2)--but a lot of the problems were self-induced. Chris Brown had Summerhays beat on a breakaway late in the first period and rung it off the bar. Just after Notre Dame made it 2-0, Brown led a 3-on-1, decided to shoot, and missed the net high. In the third, with the game 2-1, Derek DeBlois walked in all alone after a Riley Sheahan turnover and missed the net. It was that kind of night.

After Michigan failed to take advantage of an early power play for Hunwick getting run over, Pateryn was sent to the box for a fairly normal slash. On that power play, Hunwick absolutely robbed Sheahan off a great pass from Tynan, who was spectacular on Friday night.

Wohlberg was called for holding, but the best chance on that power play was Mac Bennett's, who was the recipient of an awful turnover from Robbie Russo. He walked in all alone and Summerhays made a good stop. Moffatt just missed connecting with PDG on a 2-on-1. The pass was a little behind him.

Notre Dame made it 1-0 on a rush by TJ Tynan. He brought the puck in, faked the shot and got Hunwick down, then circled behind the net and fed a cutting Sam Calabrese. Calabrese juuuuust snuck the puck inside the far post.

The Irish then hit Hunwick again. Michigan came to his aid this time and somehow things ended up evened up. Apparently Hunwick slashed someone. Probably the guy that nailed him. Shortly thereafter, he got slashed on the glove after he had the puck covered. Hunwick was clearly getting aggravated and the refs didn't want to hear any of it. I was worried at this point because it seemed like Hunwick's head wasn't in the game, but, outside of throwing his stick down at one point, he handled it well.

Wohlberg was blatantly hauled down driving the net, no call, though they did call both players for roughing as they came back up ice. The first period of this game was just awful officiating.

Brown then intercepted a Sheahan drop pass and that put him off to the races. He beat Summerhays clean, but put it off the bar.

Things calmed down in the second period. Michigan failed to convert on an early power play, earned when Hyman was hauled down.

Notre Dame had a few chances on a scramble, Hunwick got knocked down again, Michigan came up ice and both Treias and Glendening had chances, then ND came back and scored. They rushed the puck up on a 3-on-2. Bennett took his man to the boards, then Pateryn went down to block a centering attempt. Calabrese got deep into the zone and finally threw one at the net. Hunwick blockered it away, but it went right to Lorenz, who was able to score on the rebound.

Bennett was then on the good end and bad end of a couple of scoring chances. He made a slick move through the offensive zone, but Summerhays made a stop, then Sheahan absolutely walked him and shot high.

Kevin Lynch had a good opportunity to get Michigan on the board, but couldn't pull the trigger with an empty net to shoot at. His line (both Lynches and DeBlois) was very good in the second frame. They had a really good shift right before intermission as well.

Early in the third, Mike Voran was called for tripping and the Wolverines were able to capitalize. They had some really nice passing to get the puck down to the goalie's left, reverse it back to the right, and then Pateryn's shot was tipped in by Alex Guptill...

...and immediately after the ensuing faceoff, Luke Glendening was called for boarding. Not a play that you want to see out of your senior captain. It didn't come back to bite Michigan as DeBlois had the best chance of the power play off another horrible Sheahan turnover.

Lynch was then sprung on a breakaway. Sheahan hooked him very early and there was a delayed call. Lynch came in, was slashed worse than what Pateryn got called for, and it prevented him from getting a good scoring chance. The original penalty was the only thing that was called. Later on the NBC telecast, Kerry Fraser, longtime NHL official, questioned why that wasn't a penalty shot. It would have taken some cojones to whistle them for two infractions on the same play, but the slash was worse than the hook that was being called in the first place.

Michigan had two more good chances to tie the game up, but Clare shot wide with Summerhays down and out, and then the ND netminder made a very good save on Wohlberg off a great centering feed from Brown.

Hunwick then kept the Wolverines in the game with a big stop on Voran. Voran caught up to an alley-oop pass and cut to his left to try to get around Hunwick, but Hunwick stayed with him and just got a toe on it. The defense then lost Costello, someone (Tynan maybe?) fed him in the slot, and Hunwick got over to make the save.

Summerhays then made his stop of the night as PDG worked some Datsyukian magic down behind the net, shrugged his defender, and fed Treais in front. Treais got a good shot away going five-hole, but Summerhays made the stop.

The Wolverines got Hunwick to the bench and had one good opportunity off a Moffie feed, but then Jon Merrill bombed a shot right into Billy Maday's shin pads and it put him off to the races with an empty net. He didn't miss. Merrill did have some traffic in front if the shot got through. It was fitting that the game ended on another ND blocked shot. They blocked 16 attempts on the night, and that was Maday's third.

For the game, Notre Dame outshot Michigan 35-31 and outhit them badly, though I don't have the final stats on that.

Treais had a stellar individual effort for the GWG on Saturday.
Photo Credit: Bill Rapai

On Saturday, there were some good chances early on. Anders Lee hit the bar right out of the gate. Sparks, back in the lineup for the first time in a month, had two or three good chances early. Then Larson hit the post, though Hunwick had that side completely covered and didn't really give him much else to shoot at.

The Wolverines went to a power play after Lee was called for tripping and they capitalized. PDG fed Treais and Summerhays stopped him, but later in the power play, Guptill got a tip on a Pateryn shot from the point for his second tip-in from Pateryn in as many nights. Berenson would later compare his goal to something that Holmstrom would do. Guptill called it high-praise.

Merrill went for a hit and it led to an odd-man rush. Sparks got back but ND had a couple of very good scoring chances. Pateryn then went for a hit and got called for kneeing. It was pretty much the same thing that Maday did to Hyman (uncalled) the night before. Sparks then shot the puck into a crowd of players, got a ten-minute misconduct for him, and I'm not sure we saw him back on the ice the rest of the night. He certainly didn't do anything noticeable after that. Probably not the way to endear yourself to the coaches after sitting out for a month and a half. I thought he did some good things in the first period, though. He even had a nice defensive play.

After the kill, Costello was sent to the box for slashing Guptill and the Michigan power play struck again. PDG kept the puck in at the line and Treais picked it up. He cut all the way across the zone, got the defenseman to bite on a fake shot, got Summerhays off his angle, and then snapped it past him to the far side. That was a great, great goal.

Notre Dame pulled within one early in the second as Wuthrich went to the front of the net unmolested and Lee found him.

Moffie saved a goal with a nice defensive play after some fancy passing by the Irish. The Irish started to buzz in the middle part of the second period and PDG prevented a great scoring chance with a backcheck/stick-lift.

Guptill and Brown then broke in on a 2-on-0. They passed it back and forth 3 times and the return feed to Guptill was just out of his reach. Kind of the way breakaways/shootouts have gone for Michigan this year. Maybe I shouldn't complain about the lack of a penalty shot on Friday night.

Shots were 12-6 in Notre Dame's favor in the third period, but they couldn't solve Shawn Hunwick. Outside of a good chance by Stephen Johns and a great save on Gerths, I didn't notice any particularly interesting chances in the final frame. Michigan's best chance was a Treais one-timer from a Glendening feed that Summerhays stopped.

Notre Dame played the puck with a high-stick after Summerhays had gone to the bench and that took them out of any real chance to capitalize with the extra skater. The faceoff came back into their end with 45 seconds left and they never really threatened after that.

A split was probably the right result for the weekend. I thought Notre Dame was very impressive, albeit fairly dirty on Friday night. They're a damn good hockey team. They fore-check like crazy, their defense hits like crazy, and Tynan and Lee are amazing hockey players. I could see them doing some damage in the tournament if they get goaltending like they did this weekend. Summerhays doesn't have good numbers, but I thought he was very good the whole weekend. He was the number one star on Friday night. The Treais goal was the only one that he had a chance on.

The best sign for Wolverine fans was that Michigan got the power play going and the penalty killing was great. Michigan was 3-for-8 with the man advantage on the weekend, and a couple of the failed attempts were abbreviated. Notre Dame was 0-for-8 and managed 6 shots on goal. Coming in, the Irish had only been held without a power play goal on 5 occasions (in 24 games) this season, so to hold them off the board for a weekend is pretty impressive. In Saturday's win, ND had just two shots on goal in 6:54 of power play time. Bravo to the PK.

And bravo to Hunwick, who was great the entire weekend. He stopped 32 of 34 on Friday and came back with 38 saves on 39 shots on Saturday. The Irish actually outshot Michigan 39-24 last night. Hunwick stole that game.

Guptill has now scored in 5 straight games and has 5-5--10 in his past six. For the year, he has 14-12--26, to lead the team in goals and point (tied with Brown). He actually has the national lead for points by a freshman, though he's 8th in points per game.

The Wolverines now have a week off to prepare for the stretch run where they'll face Miami at home, a road-and-Joe against FYS, NMU at home, and BGSU on the road. Coming out of road series with OSU and Notre Dame with a 3-1-0 record is a nice start to this tough slate of games.

Notre Dame Preview

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 05:54:00 +0000

What the hell is the matter with me? Three posts in one day?

Anyway, the teams that are tied for fifth in the Pairwise rankings square off this weekend as #7 Notre Dame takes on #10 Michigan at the new Compton Family Ice Arena in South Bend.

Notre Dame will play Friday night's game without third-leading scorer (and Red Wings prospect) Riley Sheahan, as he was suspended one game for a hit to the head against Western Michigan.

Notre Dame is 13-8-3 on the season and 8-5-3-0 in the CCHA. They've been struggling as of late, going 3-6-0 in their last nine, though two of the wins were against Minnesota and Boston University. They were swept 3-2 and 3-1 by WMU last weekend.

The Irish have played a tough schedule this season. Their non-conference slate has featured two games against Minnesota-Duluth, Boston College, Boston University, and Minnesota. They're actually 4-1 in those games, yet somehow got bitch-bombed 9-2 by Northeastern.

Notre Dame has been uncharacteristically weak in between the pipes this year. While they rank a middle-of-the-pack 27th in goals against average (2.75), their goaltenders are 62nd and 67th out of 76 qualifying goalies in save percentage. Steven Summerhays has an .893 and Mike Johnson has an .887. Johnson has 18 GP to Summerhays's 10, but it's been Summerhays more often than not lately. Johnson has lost five straight starts after being unbeaten in 10. In the 9-2 loss to Northeastern, he was pulled after giving up goals on the first three shots of the game. His start in a loss to WMU last Saturday night was his first start since 12/9/11. In his five-game losing streak he has a 4.55 goals against and a .792 save percentage. In two games against Michigan last season, Johnson was 1-1 and gave up 6 goals on 57 shots (he stymied Michigan one game and gave up 5 on 33 the next night).

Summerhays has been better. He's 6-2-0 on the season and made 30+ stops against Minnesota and BU within his last 3 appearances. He, too, got shellacked by Northeastern (4 goals on 12 shots), but he's been much more sound than Johnson overall. Last year he had a 3.04/.863, so this is an improvement. Summerhays gave up 3 on 22 shots in a losing effort at Michigan last March.

The Irish are also middle-of-the-pack in offense. They rank 25th in the nation, scoring exactly 3 goals per game. They've got some talent up front, though. TJ Tynan has a 9-22--31 line in 23 games this season to rank in the top-10 nationally in points per game. He's actually ahead of his point-scoring pace from last season, when he had 54 points as a freshman. Tynan has been held off the score-sheet on just 5 occasions this year and he has 3-3--6 in his last four games. He started the year with 14 points in his first seven games.

Anders Lee has 14 goals and is just a tick off his point-a-game pace from last season. Lee has cooled off significantly after a scorching-hot start. He had 10 goals in the first seven games of the season (and he scored at least once in all of them) and had 12 in his first 11. In the 13 games since then, he's scored just twice, both in one game against BU. He has just 3 assists over that span as well. Lee and Tynan have combined for 11 power play goals.

Sheahan has 21 points on the year, and they've got 5 others with 10+ points, including 3 defensemen.

For a team that hasn't lit up the scoreboard, the Irish are strong on the power play. They've tallied at least one power play goal in 19 of their 24 games this year. They only rank 17th in PP (20.7%) but they've been effective. Only Minnesota, Union, Maine, and Connecticut have more tallies with the man-advantage. Then again, only Minnesota-State, Quinnipiac, Clarkson, and Vermont have had more chances on the power play. The PK is 28th in the country at 82.4%.

The special teams edge goes to Notre Dame. Michigan is -4 on special teams. Notre Dame is +9. They've been short-handed 16 fewer times and have had 21 more power play opportunities.

Michigan has 6 players with 3-career points against Notre Dame. Glendening and Wohlberg are the only players with multiple goals. Shawn Hunwick is 2-2-0 in his career with a 2.64 goals against and a .914 save percentage.

Tomorrow night's game airs at 7:35 on NBC Sports (formerly Versus). Saturday's game is at 7:35 and will be on CBS College Sports. (Edit: I originally went with the USCHO times. NBC Sports lists it as a 7:35 faceoff as does Michigan, so we'll go with that. USCHO had it as 7:05.)

Yost Renovation is a Go

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 05:05:00 +0000

The Regents authorized bidding out and rewarding construction contracts for a $14 million renovation to Yost Ice Arena following this season. The seating areas on three of the four sides will be replaced, the press box will be converted into luxury seating and a new press box will be built above that (I can't wait to see how they pull this off!).

Additionally, it is possible that the covered up windows on the south side of the arena will again be uncovered. Window technology has improved to the point where sun could shine through and not harm the ice.

Here was an artist's rendering from back in June.

That's pretty darn cool if you ask me. Gotta find somewhere else for the GLI, Frozen Four, and National Champions banners!

The renovations should be complete by next hockey season. I really love the commitment by the athletic department to keeping Yost functional for as long as possible. It's going to be a sad, sad day when the hockey team has to move to a new facility.

Having a Seat Over There: Kyle Connor

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 18:28:00 +0000

It appears that Michigan has a new commitment for the incoming class of 2015: Kyle Connor, a forward from Belle Tire. BradyThomas posted on The Wolverine hockey board that the rumor at the U16 tournament in Boston was that Connor had committed to Michigan. I did some hunting on the internet and found that HSP Athletes, a division of ASP Athlete, listed Connor as a client, and also as a U of M verbal.

I sent a Tweet to Dylan Larkin, another Michigan commitment and a teammate of Connor's, asking if he had heard anything and he responded, "Yes committed for the 2015 year!".

Connor appears to be a big get! He has 13-37--50 in 36 games for Belle Tire this season, which puts him first on the team in points (by 9), fourth on the team in goals, and first in assists (by 16). He also has 5 game-winners. He's tied for second in the league in points, and leads everyone in assists.

In BradyThomas's post, he said that Connor is 6'0" and cited his speed and acceleration. He also had him as a probable NTDP player.

Connor recently had an eight-game point streak snapped. In that span, he collected 3-16--19 and had six-straight games with multiple assists. Stay tuned. I'm sure there will be more info about him in the near future!

Sweep of Ohio

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 05:20:00 +0000

The outfield crowd looks ugly, but the baselines were packed. Photo: Tim Williams

The Wolverines went to Ohio this past weekend for a pair of games against the Buckeyes and came out of the weekend with their unbeaten streak in tact (and now up to 9 games). After a 4-0 win on Friday night in Columbus, Michigan absolutely dominated the Frozen Diamond Faceoff to draw within 5 points of the Buckeyes in the CCHA standings.

On Friday, Michigan got a career-high 46 saves from Shawn Hunwick en route to a 4-goal win that was closer than the final score. Alex Guptill's shot in the middle part of the first period was kicked out to the right by Cal Heeter. The puck went right to Lee Moffie who sent a laser into the open net to give Michigan a 1-0 lead.

Late in the first, AJ Treais sent a shot through traffic one second after a Michigan power play had ended. That was all the offense Michigan needed. Hunwick was perfect on the night, stopping 19 shots in the first, 14 in the second, and 13 in the third.

Michigan would add empty-net goals from Luke Glendening and Alex Guptill for the final margin of victory.

My notes are pretty brief since I got home from my hockey game at 10:30 or so and still had to pack for Cleveland. I made it a goal to watch the game on the DVR in an hour. I did note that I thought both PDG and Wohlberg had quite a few chances. PDG, in particular, was buzzing even though he was held off the scoresheet.

Jon Merrill had two assists and was +3 in the game. He also rang a shot off the post late in the game as a power play was ending. Guptill had 1-1--2, was +2, and drew a pair of penalties in the third period as the Buckeyes were trying to mount a comeback. Treais had a goal and had several really nice passes. One in the first period set up Glendening beautifully in the slot and a Buckeye back-checker probably saved a goal.

I thought the shot totals both ways were somewhat inflated. Maybe not, but OSU was credited with 19 in the first period and that seemed really high. Don't get me wrong, Hunwick was certainly tested in this one--he earned that shutout, particularly with a stop on Angelli in the first period and Dries in the third--but it didn't feel like 46 saves. Then again, I swore his career high in saves was something like 162 in the North Dakota game last year.

On Sunday, Michigan played their 3rd outdoor game in as many years and it wasn't so dissimilar from the most recent outing in The Big Chill. Michigan got out to a lead and pretty much cruised. Hunwick was strong between the pipes, and the top line put on an absolute show. Check out these numbers:
Chris Brown: 1-2--3, +3
David Wohlberg: 1-1--2, +4
Alex Guptill: 1-1--2, +4

On the blueline, Mike Chiasson and Kevin Clare were both +3 and Clare added a pair of assists.

Jon Merrill's only impact on the stat sheet was a single shot on goal. He had no points and was even on the night, but OSU Coach Mark Osiecki saw enough to call him the best defenseman in the country.

Brown kicked off the goal scoring. A shot from Clare hit him. With his back to the goalie, Brown collected the puck, spun around, and shot. Before the puck even left his stick, you could tell that one was going in. Shots like that are hard for a goalie to track, and we were sitting right behind the OSU net and could tell Heeter wasn't going to be able to get his legs closed.

Michigan made it 2-0 six minutes later on as pretty of a pass and shot as you might see all year. Heeter made the initial save on a Mac Bennett shot that probably going wide. He left the rebound out a couple of feet in front of him. Brown picked it up and threw a nifty little no-look drop pass to Guptill who just sniped one into the top corner over Heeter's glove. Guptill did a little "called strike three" motion after the goal.

The puck from that goal is actually going in my puck case. They were selling game-used pucks, including the Michigan goal pucks. I gave them my contact info and got a call today giving me first crack at which goal puck I wanted. As a puck collector, I'm really excited about that one! Not only was it the prettiest goal of the night, it was the game-winner to boot.

OSU drew back within one on a power play goal early in the second period. They nearly tied it a few minutes later, but a great shoulder save by Hunwick and a diving play by Pateryn to break up a 3-on-1 after a turnover kept Michigan ahead. The Wolverines iced the game with goals 28 seconds apart in the middle part of the frame.

The Buckeyes tried wrapping a puck around the boards and out of the zone, but Wohlberg stopped it on the sideboards. He shot it in front where Derek DeBlois was waiting to tip it past Heeter.

If that goal didn't take the wind out of the Buckeye sails, the next one surely did. David Wohlberg drove hard to the net and the puck kind of rolled off his stick, right underneath Heeter. That was it for the Buckeye goalie.

OSU outshot Michigan 11-10 in the third, but never really seemed like they had a prayer of getting back into the game. A couple of very late penalties gave them a 5-on-3, but the Wolverines were able to kill off the remaining time and head home with a 4-1 win.

Guptill and Wohlberg each have 3-5--8 lines in their last four games. Brown has 3-4--7. Between having a true top line, getting the best defenseman in the country back in the lineup, seeing Kevin Clare's confidence continue to rise after the GLI, and having Shawn Hunwick in net, it's easy to see why the Wolverines were able to sweep a highly-ranked opponent on the road. If the pucks start going in for the second line at some point--PDG has been all over the place lately and hasn't been rewarded--they're going to be a really dangerous team. If they aren't already.

The wins take Michigan up to #5 in both the PWR and the RPI. They're now in third place in the CCHA, but things have gotten a little thrown off because of games in hand.

It doesn't get any easier with the road games. Michigan will now head to South Bend to take on the co-#5 Fighting Irish. Friday night's game will air on the NBC Sports Network (fka Versus). Saturday will be on the CBS College Sports Network. Notre Dame is coming off a pair of losses to Western Michigan, but recently beat Minnesota and Boston University. More on them later in the week.

One thing to mention: I know people have made a lot of jokes about the crowd, but I thought the Frozen Diamond Faceoff was a really great event. The announced attendance was probably pretty close to legit, Progressive Field is beautiful, the weather was perfect, and so was the outcome. I don't know for sure, but I'd imagine that they made pretty good money on that one. The rink was already installed for their Snow Days, so to have an even with ~25k (especially at those ticket prices) isn't bad at all. I'd go back again. I'd also like to give a tap of the stick to Angel in the pro shop for helping me out in landing the goal puck.

Winter Classic Closer to Reality; NHL Midterm Rankings Released

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 02:08:00 +0000

Picture this, but with Wings/Leafs maybe?
Photo: Tim Williams

As the Wolverines prepare to take on Ohio State outdoors this weekend, another outdoor game at the Big House may be drawing closer to reality.

Jeff Arnold, formerly of AnnArbor.com, reported for Yahoo that the NHL is in "advanced discussions" with the University of Michigan to host the Winter Classic at Michigan Stadium in 2013.

One source told Arnold that Dave Brandon was initially against the idea but "something happened to make it go from looking like it could happen to [a point where] it probably will."

It was also reported that the NHL will make an announcement by January 29th and that they said next year's event will "break records". It's hard to think of any non-sarcastic record that a game at Comerica Park would break, so it's sounding like the NHL at the Big House is a very real possibility.

A source also told Arnold that if the game does happen at Michigan Stadium, it will be the only event played. That makes sense, given that the GLI would be just a couple of days earlier, and that's a Detroit event.

In other news, the NHL released their midterm rankings for the 2012 draft. Seven future Wolverines appear on the list, with the highest-ranking player being Jacob Trouba.

Here is the list:
North American Skaters:
9-Jacob Trouba (6'2", 193 defenseman from the NTDP)
28-Phil Di Giuseppe (You know who he is)
31-Cristoval "Boo" Nieves (6'2.75", 184 forward from the Kent School)
82-Alex Kile (5'11", 189 forward from the Green Bay Gamblers)
157-Connor Carrick (5'11", 185 defenseman from the NTDP)
175-Justin Selman (6'0", 190 center from the Sioux Falls Stampede)

North American Goalies:
36-Jared Rutledge (5'10.5", 171 from the NTDP)

LSSU 2, Michigan 2

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 03:10:00 +0000


Despite 34 saves from Adam Janecyk, the Wolverines fell in another shootout. Photo credit: Bill Rapai

Adam Janecyk made 34 stops in his first career start, but it wasn't enough to get a win. Michigan led 2-1 after 2, but Buddy Robinson scored 2:58 into the third period and neither team was able to break the tie. The Lakers won the six-round shootout by a 2-1 margin to pick up the bonus point in the standings.

David Wohlberg scored his 50th career goal on a shot that deflected in off a Laker defender to give Michigan a 1-0 lead. The Lakers tied it up on a Ben Power goal, but Michigan regained the lead 13 seconds later on a Guptill back-hander.

Shots in the game were 37-36 Michigan. Janecyk made 13 stops in the third period to preserve the point for Michigan. According to some people on Twitter, Michigan had a lot of chances out of the gate in overtime but were unable to capitalize. Luke Moffatt scored the lone goal for Michigan in the shootout. Nick McParland had the shootout winner and was the #1 star one night after being LSSU's best player in a losing effort.

The Wolverine power play continued to struggle, going 0-for-3 on the night and managing just two shots on goal. According to Red, the unit is "a work in progress, but there is not a lot of progress".

Michigan now sits in a 3-way tie for ninth in the PWR and is 10th in RPI. This weekend they'll take on the #2 Ohio State Buckeyes. Friday night's game is in Columbus and will be on the Big Ten Network. Sunday's game is the Frozen Diamond Faceoff at Progressive Field in Cleveland. That game will air on Fox Sports Detroit Plus.

In other news, David Wohlberg and Alex Guptill were awarded CCHA Player of the Week honors. Wohlberg's 2-3--5 was enough to win the offensive player of the week award, while Guptill was the freshman of the week with his 1-3--4 effort against LSSU.

Boo Nieves's rights were traded to Saginaw as part of a deal for Jamie Oleksiak. It's not Windsor or Kitchener, at least!

JMFJ scored a goal last night and Tebowed after he put the puck in. (See the link for the video.)

Red told The Michigan Daily that both Hunwick and Guptill should be ready for this weekend. Guptill took a "vicious slash" (no penalty, of course) during Saturday's game.

With the 4-point weekend, Michigan sits 7th in the CCHA, 1 point out of fifth, two points out of fourth, and just four points out of second (though the two teams in second have two games in hand). Also Ferris State is one point behind the Wolverines and they have two games in hand. That makes for quite a log-jam in the middle of the pack, and quite a race for the final byes in the first round of the CCHA Tournament. (I previously said there were 3, but there are 5. I forgot that 4 plays 5, but it's in the second round.)

Michigan 4, LSSU 2

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 07:19:00 +0000

Maybe the Wolverines just like being on TV where I can watch? Michigan ran their unbeaten streak to 6 games with a 4-2 win over the Lake Superior State Lakers.

Chris Brown had the final two goals for the Wolverines, David Wohlberg had 1-2--3 and had a noticeably great night, and Alex Guptill added two assists in a great performance out of the top line. Adam Janecyk played the third period after Hunwick was unable to go after making 20 stops in the first 40 minutes. He wasn't feeling well, but we didn't get any additional details. Janecyk made 7 stops, and didn't have a chance on the one goal he allowed. He won't get credit for the victory, but it had to feel good to preserve the win.

The Wolverines were also aided by the return of Jon Merrill, who was reinstated after missing the first 22 games of the season. Merrill was very solid on the blueline, helped the PK immensely, and added a great assist on Wohlberg's ninth of the year. He was +3 on the night. It's hard to overstate how important he is to this team and how much of a difference his return will make. Merrill is the best player on the team, and arguably the best defenseman in the conference. That bodes very well for the Wolverines in the second half of this season.

Michigan opened the scoring 9:50 into the opening frame. Mac Bennett sprung Travis Lynch on a breakaway and the freshman tucked it between the legs of Kevin Kapalka to give Michigan a 1-0 lead.

Five minutes later, it was another odd man rush to put the Wolverines up by a pair. Merrill absorbed a big hit from Nick McParland and sent a long pass to Guptill. Guptill also shrugged off a check to give the Wolverines a 2-on-1 down low. He slid the puck over to Wohlberg, who had basically an empty net to shoot at and he made no mistake.

The Lakers closed within one on a McParland shot that snuck through Hunwick's legs. He was probably screened by Mike Chiasson on that one, but it was on the ugly side. LSSU nearly tied it short-handed a few minutes later. AJ Treais, I think, made a poor decision at the blueline and it led to a Cassiani chance. He hit the goalpost, however.

The Wolverines regained their 2 goal cushion at 17:10 of the third period. Guptill took a shot that was kicked wide. Wohlberg tried to jam it home and it bounced way up in the air, hit the top of the crossbar, then bounced down. Chris Brown was right in the slot jamming at it--actually, he may have hit Kapalka in the face with one attempt--and apparently got his stick on it on the way in. It looked like it was Wohlberg's, but they've given it to Brown for the time being.

The Wolverines had two great penalty kills in the early-going of the third period, which were huge in the outcome of the game. LSSU has the #2 PP in the CCHA and Michigan gave them absolutely nothing. Wohlberg had the best chance on either of the Lakers PPs. He had a partial breakaway, but just had the puck poked away as he was breaking in.

Just past the halfway point in the frame, the Lakers made it 3-2. McParland was behind the goalline and tried to throw it to the front of the net. It hit the side of the goal and deflected into the slot, right onto the stick of Ben Power. Power roofed one before Janecyk could react. No chance for the Michigan netminder on that one.

The Lakers wouldn't come all that close the rest of the game. Michigan had several chances to ice the game--PDG hit the bar off another great breakout pass from Bennett, Pateryn led a 3-on-1 and rocketed a slapper from about 40 feet, and Brown and Kevin Lynch had cracks at the empty net. Eventually, Merrill flipped one high in the air to spring Brown and he put it into the empty net to seal the deal.

I thought McParland was a pretty impressive player for the Lakers. He was active all night on the forecheck, added a goal and an assist. You heard his name pretty regularly.

One of the unsung heroes for the Wolverines was again Andrew Sinelli. I don't know where he's been hiding, but he sure doesn't look like he wants to come out of the lineup anytime soon. He was fantastic in the defensive end again--one backcheck late in the game prevented what could have been a good scoring chance. I really like that kid.

The scariest moment of the game was almost a repeat of what inadvertently set the Shawn Hunwick to Michigan plan in action. Back in juniors, Hunwick was hit in the mask during a rapid-fire drill and was hit again by the next shot. His concussion caused the Division 1 interest to dry up and he eventually was set to go to Adrian College before getting the call from Michigan. LSSU took a shot through traffic and Hunwick stopped it with his face. His mask flew off and none of the officials noticed. The puck came back to LSSU for another slapper, but luckily it went wide and we finally got a whistle. The Children of Yost, of course, immediately broke into a "Handsome Goalie" chant.

The win moves Michigan into a tie with Ferris State for 5th in the CCHA, though the Bulldogs now have one game in hand. LSSU is one point ahead in 4th. In the Pairwise, the win (and, I'd assume, some other happenings) rocketed Michigan up to eighth. Michigan's RPI also climbed up to 8th from 11th.

MGoBlog had some good stuff today about what the upcoming stretch of games will/could do to the PWR rankings. Ignore the Merrill stuff, since that part of the post was almost immediately outdated by the surprising reinstatement of him today. Earlier in the week, Red had indicated that Merrill wouldn't play this weekend. I sure am happy that someone changed their mind. I still can't believe how quiet they've kept what happened. I guess it's not really our business. I'm just more curious than anything else.

Same two teams tomorrow. The game is on Comcast. I will be pretty light on Twittering. I'm going to watch the sub-.500 Badgers (tear) take on RIT. I sadly don't think I have any orange to wear.

LSSU Preview

noreply@blogger.com (Packer487) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 02:55:00 +0000

Michigan's run through the gauntlet begins with a pair of games at home against the LSSU Lakers. The Lakers are having a good season by most teams' standard, but a fantastic season by their standard. Jim Roque's team hasn't made the NCAA Tournament since Jeff Jackson left after the 1995-96 season, but right now they sit in a tie for 13th in the PWR.

The Lakers are 12-8-2 on the year and a solid 6-3-2 on the road. They were 8-2-0 in the first ten but have hit a bit of a rough patch since then. Not quite Michigan November rough, but they won just two of their next nine games (not counting a shootout win). They've won two of the past three, not including an exhibition win over Western Ontario their last time out.

They swept Michigan State, they swept Miami at Miami, they split with NMU, and they split with Notre Dame. So they've had some good performances against some good hockey teams. They got swept at Ohio State, but one of the losses was 2-1.

They've been cold more often than not offensively. They average 2.68 goals per game, which is 36th in the country. They've been held to two or fewer goals in 10 of their last 14 games. They're 14th nationally in team defense, though, giving up just 2.45 goals per night.

As usual, they're very rarely penalized. They only take 9 PIMs per night, which is 57th out of 58 teams. They've only been shorthanded on 79 occasions this year, and they're very effective when they are shorthanded. They rank 5th in the country in PK at 88.6%. The power play is middle of the pack at right around 20%. So LSSU has a definite advantage on special teams, at least if the rest of the season is an indication.

They're led offensively by Domenic Manardo, who has an 8-12--20 line. Four of his eight tallies have been game-winners. Only four players in the country have more game-winners. LSSU also has a pair of 10-goal scorers in Nick McParland and Kyle Jean. Defenseman Zach Trotman has 6 goals (4 on the PP) and 14 points.

It's been Kevin Kapalka in net most of the way for the Lakers. He's 11-6-2 with a 2.45/.916. Sophomore Minnesota State transfer Kevin Murdock doesn't have the record (1-2-0) but he has a 2.02 goals against and a .927 save percentage. He was strong in the 2-1 loss to Ohio State and played in the Catamount Cup championship game against RIT in their last game that counted. I would think that we'll see Kapalka, but it wouldn't be a major shocker to see Murdock either.

In the series, the Wolverines have won the past 13 meetings. The Lakers haven't beaten Michigan since February of 2007. Let's hope that continues. Prior to this most recent winning streak, the teams were tied in the all-time series.

David Wohlberg has 3-5--8 in 8 career games against the Lakers. Luke Glendening has seven points over that span. Shawn Hunwick is 3-0-0 with a 1.33/.947 in his appearances against LSSU. Kevin Lynch had 3-1--4 in the two games last season.

Friday night's game will air on FSN Detroit+. Saturday's game will be on Comcast.