Sunday, March 15 1992
 
	St. Cloud State		0  2  1  0  -  3
	Wisconsin		0  2  1  1  -  4
 
			      First Period
Penalties:
	Holum, SCS, 4:48
	Plante, W, 4:48
	Kennedy, SCS, 6:17
	Moser, SCS, 12:17
	Rahn, SCS, 17:48
	Schier, W, 17:58
 
			     Second Period
Scoring:
	Wisconsin - Richter 10 (Macdonald, Zent), 2:57, (pp)
	St. Cloud - Gruba 15 (Schmidt), 4:32
	Wisconsin - Shier 8 (Zent, Macdonald), 13:16
	St. Cloud - Hanus, 17 (O'Shea, Hultgren), 14:27
Penalties:
	Shier, W, :54
	Moser, SS, 2:45
	Ross, SCS, 7:26
	Zent, W, 7:26
 
			      Third Period
Scoring:
	St. Cloud - Pojar 4 (DelCastillo), 2:26
	Wisconsin - Nelson 4 (unassisted), 19:01
Penalties:
	Hanus, SCS, 6:26
 
				Overtime
Scoring:
	Wisconsin - Rafalski 3 (Macdonald), :21
 
Saves:
	Sjerven (SCS)		10  13  10  0  -  32
	Michelizzi (W)		10   6   6  0  -  22
 
Power Play:
	St. Cloud State:	0-for-2
	Wisconsin:		1-for-5
 
Attendence:	6,629
 
=============================================================================
 
It was a wild one!!
 
Wisconsin overcame a tenacious effort by the Huskies, lots of bad luck,
sloppy play at times, and robbery by the official to win game 3 of the
best-of-three series against the St. Cloud Huskies, 4-3 in overtime.
 
This was the 5th straight game between these two teams, in Madison. In
all seven games this year, the third period has started tied or with a
one-goal difference.
 
FIRST PERIOD
Wisconsin came out with a lot more energy and better concentration than
they showed either Friday or Saturday night. The save in the first
period were even, but Wisconsin controlled the period, and had several
good chances.
 
SECOND PERIOD
In the second, Wisconsin again had the better of the play, but every
Badger goal was answered within 2 minutes. The first major controversy
of the game came on a disallowed goal by Jason Zent.
 
At 2:45, in a scoreless game, He took a nice breakout feed down the
middle, and got a shot off as he was tripped by Moser. The momentum of
his trip slid him into Sjerven, who did not control the puck, which
ended up (as the replay clearly showed) behind him, in the net. Sjerven
was also in the net. I was quite sure that they would NOT award the
goal, since Buzzy was at the other end of the ice and couldn't see what
had happened. However, he did skate down and peer through the netting as
if he might actually give the Badgers the goal. He never explainmed why
it wasn't a goal, and didn't give a washout signal, nor talk to the goal
judge. He did call the trip, however, and Wisconsin scored on the
powerplay.
 
St. Cloud got right back into it, as Wisconsin got caught with just
about everyone in the area between the net and the faceoff dots, but
unable to control the puck. A rebound came out to Gruba toward the top
of the circle. Zent was on him as he crossed to center, but didn't take
him out of the play. Gruba reached past Zent's stick check to fire one
through all the traffic in front, and the game was tied.
 
Wisconsin's second goal was good proof that if you put the puck on the
net, sometimes you score. Shier got a nice feed from Zent at about the
blue line. He shot a kinda week shot from about the top of the circle as
he was being harrassed by a Huskie defender. Zent followed the puck
toward the net, but didn't touch it. The defensemen slid backwards, into
Sjerven (who was also down and sliding), and the puck trickled in.
 
A minute later I should have known that Buzzy was the ref (more on this
later) , since he missed yet another interference call (this one on St.
Cloud), and a few seconds after that, Hanus had tied the game again.
The puck came loose on the near side boards, and then got kicked toward
the corner. The Wisconsin defenseman was clearly interfeeared with as he
tried to get to the corner -- the St. Cloud player was doing a perfect
basketball box-out. As Hanus took the puck behind the net, the Badger
(Nelson?) and the St. Cloud player went toward the front of the net,
where the Badger defender turned away from the net to keep tangling with
the Huskie. Hanus then came back to the near side for the wrap-around.
I'm not saying that the interference led *directly* to the goal, but if
it had been called, things would have been different. Of course, if the
Wisconsin player had stopped sparing and turned back to the puck, he
might have done his job too.
 
By the end of the second period I was sure that we'd see at least one
fight duing the game, as both teams started making big hits, and Buzzy
continued to let anything go.
 
THIRD PERIOD
In the third, St. Cloud scored early, on a blast from the point after a
faceoff. Again, Wisconsin was caught not covering properly, and St.
Cloud took the lead.
 
Wisconsin put the pressure right back on St. Cloud, and a few minutes
later, appeared to have tied the game. After several shots on net, St.
Cloud failed to clear the puck, and with just about everyone down, and
VERY CLEARLY NO ONE IN THE CREASE, Doug Macdonald got the puck to the
right side of the net, with Sjerven on his knees at the left. Macdonald
put it in, and Buzzy signalled a goal, and then immediately waved it
off. After much arguing, the explanation was given: Buzzy had blown the
whistle before the goal. Why, he never said. No one was in the crease,
the puck was never out of sight (and Buzzy was in perfect position to
see that), the goalie never came close to covering the puck.... but the
goal was not going to count. The 6,629 fans sounded like 60,000 as they
let him know what they felt.  I watched on the replay, which showed the
whole thing from 4 different agles, and I still have no idea why he blew
it dead. I suppose if he did blow his whistle, then he had to wave off
the goal, but (if you'd seen it you'd agree) the whistle couldn't
possibly have effected the play anyway -- there was no defender,
including the goalie to "let up" when the whistle blew....
 
The fans stayed loud as they urged the Badgers to overcome and get the
goal back. They had many good chances, and St. Cloud coach Craig Dahl
used his timeout at about the 10:00 minute mark to give his team a
resst. From that point on, every time they could, St. Cloud dumped the
puck, either taking an icing, or just delaying things. They also set new
records for slow line-changes and long faceoff delays... but thats what
it took for them to try and fight off the Badgers, so that's what they
did.
 
NELSON TIES IT
At 19:01, just as Michelizze reached the bench, Nelson got the
game-tying goal on a shot from the point that hit Sjerven and bounced
in. The goal came after Wisconsin had put tremendous pressure on the St.
Cloud net, and kept the puck in the zone for several good shots.
 
OVERTIME
Twenty one seconds into the overtime, freshman defenseman Brian
Rafalski put up a wobbly shot from almost the same spot, which sailed
over an unmoving Sjerven's left shoulder and into the net. The Badgers
errupted to the ice, mobbing Raflaski, and the St. Cloud bench sat,
stunned. The crowd went pretty nuts too. After a bit of that, the teams
did their handshake to a standing ovation (it did get louder when the
did the handshake, but I suspect most of the fans probably were just
cheering for the badgers). After the handshake, the Badgers remained on
the ice, saluting the crowd, who saluted them back. The senors seemed
particularly relieved to have won their last home game, and continue
their season in the WCHA final four in St. Paul this weekend, and
hopefully in the NCAA tournament as well.
 
=============================================================================
 
NOTES:
 
The WCHA has a rule that if a playoff series goes to three games, the
ref and lineman change. This is good, but must have made for some fun
travelling Sunday, with three of the four series going to three games.
 
I wish the WCHA would put names or numbers on the ref's shirts, or
announce the officials before the game. As I said before, I should have
figured out the Buzzy was the ref, since he *NEVER* calls interference
if he can help it (and I didn't know about the change-refs rule 'til I
watched the replay).
 
The third game of the series had poor attendence, because single tickets
didn't go on sale until Sunday morning (when it was obviod it was
needed), the students were just returning to town from spring break, and
not all non-student season ticket holders ordered the extra game
(student season ticket holders weren't offered the game).
 
============================================================================
 
Now the only question is should I go to St. Paul for the WCHA Final
Four, and who can I talk into going with me?
 
	--david
 
--------
david parter				university of wisconsin -- madison
[log in to unmask]			      computer sciences department