> More down than up, Huskies are in doghouse
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> By Steve Page
>
> Bob Mancini says he can live without his hockey team's ups and downs.
>
> "It's a bad roller-coaster ride right now," the fourth-year Michigan Tech
> coach said of his club, which is 2-4 in the Western Collegiate Hockey
> Association, 3-6 overall and preparing to do battle with the nation's
> second-ranked club, Colorado College, this weekend.
>
> "We've been inconsistent," Mancini said. "Our goal-scoring production isn't
> where it's supposed to be. It all depends on what day we're talking about.
> One day, we show we can score a few goals; the next day, we can't score
> any."
>
> In last weekend's WCHA split at Alaska Anchorage, the Huskies snapped a
> four-game losing streak with a 3-1 win Friday but lost 7-0 Saturday.
>
> Tech averages 2.83 goals per game, seventh in the WCHA. The Huskies are
> ninth in power plays (10.7 percent, 6 for 56) and penalty-killing (76.5
> percent, 52-68).
>
> "We've got to have production out of a guy like Pat Mikesch," Mancini said
> of his senior center, a second-team all-WCHA selection last season. Mikesch
> is fourth on the club this year with four goals and two assists. "He'll get
> there," Mancini said. "It'll happen."
>
> Mancini, who scored 131 career points while playing for CC from 1978-82,
> says the Huskies are aware of the Tigers' lofty status.
>
> "It's an important weekend coming up," he said. "CC has great momentum out
> of the blocks. They have an outstanding team.
>
> "It's too early in the season to do anything special for a team like that.
> We're just worried about us. We need to do the best we can and see what
> happens."
>
> WESTERN WANDERINGS: Alaska Anchorage had the WCHA's offensive and defensive
> players of the week after splitting with Tech: Junior center David Vallieres
> had five goals and one assist; freshman goaltender Doug Teskey came off the
> bench midway through Friday's game and didn't allow a goal thereafter in
> either game, stopping 37 shots. . . . Denver's 5-1-0 start is the program's
> best since going 7-1-0 in 1992. . . . Minnesota-Duluth's 6-2-0 start is its
> best since winning its first eight games in 1989.
>
> Northern Michigan's 0-6-0 start in WCHA play is its worst since it entered
> the league 12 seasons ago. Going back to 1994-95, the Wildcats have lost 10
> WCHA regular-season games. They host Anchorage this weekend. . . . Wisconsin
> has scored just one power-play goal in its past 17 chances.
>
> IN THE POLLS: The top four teams in the GT composite poll were ranked in
> that order by all four individual polls. Though Boston University is the
> unanimous No. 1 selection, the Terriers did not get all the first-place
> votes in the individual polls. BU had 10 votes to two for CC in the WMEB
> rankings, topped the Tigers 9-1 in USA Today/American Hockey Magazine, 26-3
> in the Troy (N.Y.) Record, and 11-1 in the WMPL/WZRK (Houghton, Mich.). No
> other teams received first-place votes.
>
> ELSEWHERE: This is the first week this season all four major conferences --
> WCHA, Central Collegiate Hockey Association, Eastern College Athletic
> Conference, and Hockey East -- will concentrate solely on league games. . .
> . BU forward Jay Pandolfo scored four short-handed goals as the Terriers
> scored a Hockey East-record five short-handed goals in a 10-2 win over
> Northeastern last Saturday. . . . Neither team scored in the third period as
> Maine and New Hampshire skated to 4-4 and 3-3 ties last week, then split the
> shootouts that followed. Hockey East is the lone conference that uses
> shootouts as overtime tiebreakers. . . . Merrimack had the country's longest
> Division I overtime unbeaten streak snapped at 18 games in a 5-4 loss
> Saturday to Massachusetts. Until then, the Warriors were 8-0-10 in sudden
> death.
 
charlie shub   University of Colorado at Colorado Springs
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