Needless to say, I was not present at this game in St. Cloud.  However,
there doesn't seem to be anyone from St. Cloud on the list, and since
the Marquette newspaper carried a pretty good summary of the game this
morning I thought I'd pass it on for those interested in Wildcat--or
Huskies.
 
The Northern Michigan Wildcats took the lead about as early as it's
possible to do so, but the St. Cloud State Huskies tied the score at 1-1
three quarters of the way through the first period.  St. Cloud took a
2-1 lead early in the second period, but the Wildcats tied it again at
2-2 late in the stanza, then almost immediately afterward forged a 3-2
NMU lead.  Three straight unaswered goals in the early and middle parts
of the final period gave the Huskies a 5-3 lead, however.  The Wildcats
closed the difference to 5-4 at the 16:29 mark, but the Huskies scored
an empty net goal to seal their win at 19:09.
 
Corwin Saurdiff again kept the Wildcats in the game, with 35 saves.  I
was distressed to see that the shots on goal (or at least the goalie
saves plus goals) show a St. Cloud advantage of 41-24.
 
Rick Comley, Wildcat coach, said "We can't get down after this game.
There are positive aspects that happened during the game.  We worked
really hard and battled. It was a hard-fought game."
 
The loss left the Wildcats with still just one win in the WCHA and
overall.  Their WCHA record is now 1-4-2; overall is 1-6-2.  At least we
seem to be past the blowouts which characterized the first two series of
teh season.  Also, the 'Cats are playing a large number of road games
early, so fans can hope that the looked-for improvement at midseason,
coinciding with a more heavily home-slanted second half schedule, will
have a salutary effect on the final record and standing in the leage.  I
HAVE been impressed with the way Greg Hadden, Brent Riplinger and Jason
Hehr have stepped up, and, of course, with Saurdiff since shaking off
his first two terrible starts.  Hadden scored the first two NMU goals
last night, and missed numerous chances for a hat trick by inches, if
the radio announcers are to be believed.  Maybe most important: the
Wildcatspecial team play has improved drastically since those first four
disastrous games.  St. Cloud was held scoreless during all four of its
power plays last night.  I believe that makes 20 straight power plays
killed, and 24 of the last 27.  In the meantime, Northern scored on 3 of
its 6 power play opportunities.
 
Scoring
 
First period
 
1.  NMU, Hadden (7) (Harding), 00:20
 
2.  SCS, Lund (2) (Santerre), 14:06
 
Second period
 
3.  SCS, Hagen (4) (Moser, Knipscheer), 4:17
 
4.  NMU,Hadden (8) (Johnson, Shim), ppg, 16:08
 
5.  NMU, Shim (1) (Hehr, Carpenter), ppg, 17:25
 
Third period
 
6.  SCS, Gruba (2) (O'Shea, Lund), 2:27
 
7.  SCS, Moser (1) (Schmidt, Gasseau), 11:28
 
8.  SCS Hagen (5) (Santerre), 12:07
 
9.  NMU Carpenter (1) (Johnson, Hadden), ppg, 16:49
 
10.  SCS Schmidt (2) (O'Shea), eng, 19:09
 
Power play opportunities: NMU 3/6; SCS 0/4
 
Goalie saves: NMU, 35, Saurdiff (9-16-10); SCS, 20 Sjerven (6-10-4)
 
Better luck to the 'Cats tonight!
 
                      ***********************************
                     *      Steve Christopher, NMU       *
                    *  "Go 'Cats!''Goin' for it again in  *
                    *     '93--With a lot less "O"        *
                    *       but a little more "D"!        *
                     *        [log in to unmask]         *
                      ***********************************