The games this weekend between the Northern Michigan Wildcats and the
Minnesota Golden Gophers werea refreshing change from the previous
weekend's series between the 'Cats and the Michigan Tech Huskies.  I
completely agree with Bob Gilreath's and Walt Olson's comments on the
way the penalty-calling disrupted both NMU-MTU games.
 
This weekend the officials allowed both teams to play, and the result
was a lot of very smooth, fast and exciting hockey.
 
Friday's 3-1 Wildcat win was due to the dazzling performance of
sophomore goalie Paul Taylor, who made 30 saves.  The statistics
indicate that the Gophers had the better of the offensive chances,
getting 31 shots on goal to the 'Cats' 23.  But Taylor stopped
everthing, often with acrobatic moves, except for a very long shot from
the neutral zone which dropped in front of him, took a skip and just
handcuffed him.  That came very late when the game was pretty much won.
The crowd, in a very nice touch, gave Taylor a standing ovation after he
gave up the goal.  Actually, Taylor got most of his work in the second
period, when the Gophers put something like 15 shots on goal.  Rick
Comley (Wildcat coach) said later that the entire team played its best
defense of the season in the final period.
 
Scoring details:
 
NMU took the lead early when Greg Hadden scored his second of the season
with assists from Scott Green and Shayne Tomlinson at 5:16.  This was a
tremendous individual effort, who if the hockey scoring rules weren't so
mechanical would have been given an unassisted goal on this effort.  He
took Tomlinson's pass at mid-ice, skated in without any support,
maneuvered around two Gophers--the second of whom managed to shove him
to the ice--and stetched out and shovelled the puck over Jeff Moen's
glove.
 
The Wildcats immediately doubled their lead in the second period when
Steve Carpenter whistled in a slap shot from the point at 0:37 after
taking a nice draw back from Jason Hehr on a faceoff in the Gopher zone.
 
Later in the period there were some frigtening moments when Moen was the
victim of a collison with Carpenter.  Carpenter was pushed into the
Minnesota netminder.  However, he did not make a good enough attempt to
avoid the collision with Moen, and also used his elbow, so he received a
minor penalty.  Moen's helmet was knocked off as a result of the blow he
received from Carpenter, then his unprotected head struck the crossbar
and he was knocked out for several seconds.  He was later diagnosed as
having a mild concussion.  He was interviewed on MSC prior to the
Saturday game, and seemed to be in good shape; he commented he'd be
seeing a physician for some more observations when he returned to the
Twin Cities.  Dan(?) Callinan took over in goal for the Gophers, and
also played most of Saturday's game. It was the second half of this
period which featured Taylor's heroics in goal.  In the third period the
'Cats made it 3-0 at 8:05 when Kory Karlander scored his fourth goal of
the season with assists from Jehr and Darcy Dallas.  The Gophers closed
out the scoring with the goal I described earlier; it was scored by Eric
Means with an assist from LaFleur at 18:39.
 
Power play opportunities: Minnesota 0/5; Northern Michiang 0/5
 
Penalties: Minnesota 18-47; Northern Michigan 17-37
 
Goalie saves: Minn 20 (Moen, 7-3-x; Callinan, x-5-5)
 
Attendance (paid): 3,937
 
Saturday's game was a much higher-scoring affair, with the 'Cats again
coming out on top, this time 7-3.
 
Minnesota's offense was held to far fewer opportunities this time;
Taylor only had to make 15 saves during his stint in goal.  Comley
replaced him with freshman DieterKochan with 8:13 left in the game.
 
NMU jumped out to a very quick 3-0 lead and the Gophers never caught up,
although they closed the difference to one goal midway through the
second period.  The scoring featured NMU's Mike Harding's first college
hat trick.
 
The Wildcats really dominated play in the first ten minutes and got
three goals out of excellent pressure they put on Callinan, who really
(I thought) couldn't be faulted for any of those scores.  All three came
out of repeated-shot rallies in front of the Gopher net.  Harding got
the first two of his three for the night in this flurry, following the
opening score by Scott Green.
 
In the second period Jeff Nielsen of the Gophers made it 3-1 at 4:57.
Then Greg Zwakman scored for Minnesota at 13:04 to make it 3-2.  At this
point the Gophers seemed to have reversed the momentum of the game.  But
a few minutes later freshman Dean Seymour got his fourth goal of the
season on a hard slap shot over a Gopher defenseman that Callinan
couldn't completely stop.  This was a power play goal, with assists from
Tomlinson and Bill MacGillivray, at 15:31.  Then Harding got his hat
trick at 18:19 when he took a rebound from a shot by Seymour and nudged
it into the corner behind Callinan.
 
In the third period Don McCusker got his first goal of the season (first
of his career?) on a backhander off a beautiful pass from Harding, with
yet another assit from Seymour as well.  Then Greg Hadden, who had
unselfishly passed to teammates on several earlie rushes, took a
tremendous pass from freshman Hillock, playing in his first game, and
got a clean breakaway which resulted in his beating Callinan to make it
7-3.  At this point Comley rested Taylor and brought in Kochan.
Unfortunately for the latter, who had a terrible start to last
Saturday's NMU-Michigan TEch game and was pulled after yielding three
goals in eight minutes, the Gophers were on a power play and they
immediately scored on Kochan.  The goal went to Chris McAlpine, with
assists from Magnusson and Means at 12:03.
 
Both teams were playing this weekend with a large number of freshmen.
The Wildcats have not had the services of senior Bryan Ganz all season,
who was injured in the preseason, and high-scoring Brent Riplinger has
been out since the second game of the season.  Saturday night they were
also without another good scorer, Karson Kaebel, who was serving a game
disqualification from Friday night due to a fighting incident which also
resulted in a DQ for a Gopher.  Finally, in Friday's game Chad Dameworth
was also injured and is out for at least 2-3 weeks.
 
Given all the above, seeing the 'Cats 5-1 is VERY reassuring.  Of course
 they have had the advantage of an early season schedule the exact
opposite of what they endured last year (and Minnesota is suffering
through this year).  Five of the first six games have been in
Marquette's Lakeview Arena, and they've won all five.  NMU is now 18-1-1
in its last 20 home games.  (Reminiscent of the tremendous home-unbeaten
streak they had over nearly all of the 90-91 NC$$ national championship
season!)
 
Now the 'Cats have to take their act on the road for the next four games
with Alaska-Anchorage and St. Cloud.  They know they'll have their work
cut out for them.
 
 **********************************************************************
 *  Steve Christopher, NMU  [log in to unmask] - GO CATS!  * * * *    *
 *  NCAA Division I Hockey National Champions  1990-91   * "WE'VE *   *
 *  NCAA Division I Hockey Final Eight 1991-92           *  ONLY  *   *
 *  NCAA Division I Hockey Final Eight 1992-93           *  JUST  *   *
 *  WCHA League Champions 1990-91                        *  BEGUN"*   *
 *  WCHA Playoff Champions 1988-89/1990-91/1991-92         * * * *    *
 **********************************************************************