Well, this one had a very similar feel to the Hall of Fame Game last
year, except that the timing of the Gophers' good play was different.
Minnesota jumped out to a 1-0 lead 54 seconds into the game when Dave
Spehar blew around a defenseman and jammed it behind Turco as he cut in
front of the net.  It was a nice move and ended with the requisite face
down slide along the ice by Spee.
 
Michigan went on the power play not long thereafter and was unsuccessful
despite a very nifty drop pass play in the slot.  I didn't see who it
was, but it had the hallmark of a Bill Muckalt play.  DeBus made several
very nice saves during this sequence.
 
The Gophs went up 2-0 on their own first power play chance.  They spent
a lot of time moving the puck around the perimeter, and I had just
finished griping about the amazing passing Gophers, when it finally went
in deep to the left of Turco.  Wyatt Smith passed it to Mike Anderson
standing all alone at the other side.
 
At this point, the two teams looked a lot like I had expected.
Minnesota was really clicking and looked like they were ready for prime
time, while Michigan looked like they had plenty of talent (and a LOT of
speed), but looked as out of sync as a team with that many new faces
should.
 
Before the end of the first, the Wolverines cut into the lead.  Justin
Clark got behind Bill Kohn and Muckalt hit him with a pass.  Clark
buried the breakaway.  Little did I know that I had gotten a preview of
the rest of the night.
 
The first period ended 2-1.  My thoughts were that by January, Michigan
is going to be a very dangerous team.  Minnesota needed to do a bit more
gelling, but that they were largely ready for a very tough early stretch
of the schedule (Maine, Duluth and North Dakota).
 
Well, Michigan left it's youthful jitters in the dressing room during
the intermission.  I had changed seats between periods and was now about
eight rows behind DeBus.  Steve came up with some big saves as the D in
front of him began to disintegrate.  The listed shots for the period
were 10-8 Wolverines, but that gives an inaccurate picture as Michigan
had by far the better chances.
 
Minnesota couldn't get everyone to the same page on the playbook; there
were a lot of passes to no one (at least not to anyone in the really
ugly jerseys Casey Hankinson designed).  Michigan wasn't in full gear
either, but they really stepped up the physical play.  Bubba Berenzweig
in particular was a one man demolition squad; I counted at least four
checks where he completely pancaked someone.
 
The tying goal came on a Michigan power play.  Freshman Mike van Ryn was
credited with the goal on a hard shot from the point through a tangle of
bodies.  I thought that Greg Crozier tipped it at the hash mark, but
either way, DeBus never had a chance to see the puck.
 
Doug Woog changed goalies halfway through, which I had expected, but he
went to Willy Marvin instead of Erik Day, which was a surprise.  Willy
played well, and it was certainly a tough game in which to pick up a
loss.
 
After two periods, I was really worried by the sloppy play of the
Gophers. I now revised my prognosis to thinking that Michigan would be a
very dangerous team by Thanksgiving.
 
The third was mostly more of the same, though Minnesota had several good
chances.  turco came up huge on a Rico Pagel break, giving him
absolutely nothing to shoot at but the side of the net.  He also looked
good on a wicked backhand by Chris Fox from in tight.  I would hope that
Billy Powers takes Fox aside and explains that you shoot at the OTHER
team's goalie.  Turco also got lucky when Wyatt Smith zinged the inside
of the left post and the ricocheting puck did not hit Marty in the back.
 
Muckalt broke the tie when, once again, he came in all alone and
victimized Marvin.  Turco had to make one more big save, and that was
pretty much it.  Minnesota went a man down with four and a half to play
when Kohn hauled Muckalt down after getting beaten again.  The game
ended with 1:11 of perhaps the ugliest 6-5 I've ever seen.  The
Wolverines controlled the puck most of the time and Muckalt came within
a couple of inches of finding the empty net.  At this point, I had
decided that Michigan was already really dangerous and that the rest of
the CCHA might be disappointed if they are counting on some payback.
 
The first star of the game was unquestionably Bill Muckalt.  He had a
goal and an assist and seemed to be everywhere.  Matt Herr may have been
named the captain, but Muckalt is going to be its heart.  On opening
night, he lived up to John Haeussler's hype of him as a Hobey
candidate.  The freshmen need a lot of polishing, but they look like
they'll be able to carry a good chunk of the load.  Van Ryn and #9
(who's name I can'r recall) were the best of the bunch tonight.  The one
down note was that Matt Herr left the game with eight minutes to play
after taking a big hit from Ben Clymer.  He went straight to the
dressing room and never returned.
 
The Gophers, on the other hand, look like they need to be put back in
the microwave for a couple of weeks, because they aren't done yet.
Right now, I'm telling myself that it was just an exhibition game and
they were trying some things as experiments.  Woog only had five
defensemen dressed; highly touted Dylan Mills was a scratch, leading me
to speculate about an injury.
 
Still, there were some definite troubling points.  Ben Clymer and Bill
Kohn had brutal games.  Clymer was out of position a lot and left some
gaping holes in coverage.  Kohn was beat to the outside routinely.
Granted, Billy has never been the most adept defensive defenseman, but
this was scary.  Worse, he seemed to get gunshy as the game went on.
There were a couple of times in the third period when he should have
stepped up to keep the puck in the zone and retreated instead, only to
get toasted anyway.  I have this awful feeling I'm watching the return
of Sean "The Pylon" Fabian.
 
Also worrying were the number of times that the Gophers could not figure
out how to line up for a face off.  Twice in the span of 45 seconds in
the second period, the center was tossed because the whole team kept
jockying around trying to get set up.
 
Brett Abrahamson, on the other hand, looked pretty good.  So did Jason
Godbout and Mike Lyons showed some intention of improving from last
year.  Woog dressed all four freshman forwards, Aaron Miskovich, Erik
Westrum, Matt Leimbeck and Stuart Senden.  Miskovich showed some nifty
little moves and after his first shift where he never stopped moving and
dished out a couple of hits, I decided that I'm going to like Senden.
He's my candidate to follow in the footsteps of Mike Anderson and Nate
Miller as grinding, hustling players.
 
Well, on to the regulkar season and the hope that things improve.
 
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