Friday, November 29, 1991 at Volpe Complex, North Andover, MA NONCONFERENCE GAME Alaska-Anchorage Seawolves (8-2-0) 1 2 1 - 4 Merrimack Warriors (5-7-0) 0 0 2 - 2 FIRST PERIOD AA-MC 1. AA1, Steve Bogoyevac #3 (Derek Donald), 3:54. 1-0 SECOND PERIOD 2. AA2, Mitch Kean #2 (Jim Mayes), 5:25. 2-0 3. AA3, Bogoyevac #4 (Brad Stewart), 7:18. PPG 3-0 THIRD PERIOD 4. MC1, Bryan Miller #5 (Claude Maillet, Dan Gravelle), 4:05. PPG 3-1 5. AA4, Martin Bakula #4 (Keith Morris, Donald), 8:37. PPG 4-1 6. MC2, Maillet #2 (Gravelle), 10:47. PPG 4-2 SHOTS ON GOAL: Alaska-Anchorage 11-16--5 = 32 Merrimack 3--6-15 = 24 GOALIES: Alaska-Anchorage, Paul Krake (6-2-0, 60:00, 24 shots-22 saves). Merrimack, Steve D'Amore (3-6-0, 60:00, 32 shots-28 saves). POWER PLAYS: UAA, 2 of 4. Merrimack, 2 of 7. PENALTIES: UAA 8/16. Merrimack 6/12. REFEREE: Ned Bunyon. LINESMEN: Chuck Wynters, Jeff Bunyon. ATTENDANCE: 987 (capacity 3,617). THREE STARS: 1. Steve Bogoyevac, Alaska-Anchorage (2-0--2). 2. Derek Donald, Alaska-Anchorage (0-2--2). 3. Steve D'Amore, Merrimack (32 shots-28 saves). Alaska-Anchorage won its second straight game on this Hockey East road trip, completely dominating Merrimack through the first two periods in building a 3-0 lead and then holding off a ferocious onslaught in the third to win, 4-2. Center Steve Bogoyevac had two goals to lead the Seawolves. UAA outshot Merrimack, 11-3, in the first period as the Seawolves shut down Merrimack's potent offense and showed some of their own. Bogoyevac scored the only goal of the period at 3:54 when he banged in the rebound of linemate Derek Donald's shot. UAA's defense was just as stellar as it was on Wednesday against UNH, blocking shots and creating turnovers. The Warriors also looked pretty flat after a demoralizing loss to Notre Dame and faced a team that came right at them and was sky-high after a great win at UNH. The second period saw more of the same with UAA outshooting Merrimack, 16-6 (27-9 for the game), capitalizing on Merrimack miscues for two more goals. Fourth-liner Mitch Kean took a feed from Jim Mayes after the Warriors coughed up the puck in UAA's end, and Kean marched down and beat D'Amore at 5:25 to make it 2-0. That was a big goal because until then, despite the disparity in play, UAA only led by one. Less than two minutes later, after Merrimack had cleared the zone while shorthanded, Brad Stewart intercepted a cross-ice pass and saw that Merrimack had already begun moving out of the zone in anticipation of a shorthanded bid. Stewart fed Bogoyevac at the offensive blue line, and Bogoyevac shifted into fourth, blew by the remaining defenseman, and walked in on D'Amore for a shot through the pads to make it 3-0. Shots attempted was a pretty good indication of the UAA domination as they led, 30-9. As I said in my response to Kevin Yetman's message, rather than pack it in, Merrimack came out in the third and turned the game around completely. Krake was forced to make several great stops early on against Casale and Gravelle, and then Merrimack went on the power play when Trent Pankewicz drew a penalty for cross-checking. For the first time in 16 chances, the PP clicked. As they moved into the familiar umbrella rotation, Gravelle down low fed defenseman Claude Maillet at the circle, and he fed Bryan Miller alone at the blue line whose shot found net behind Krake. It was Miller's fifth goal of the year and only Merrimack's second goal in 174:16. The Warriors continued to press, and Teal Fowler drew a hooking penalty on Kevin Brown when he knocked the puck away from Brown and started to take off on a possible breakaway, but Brown hooked him down on a good penalty. The PP lasted only 15 seconds until Gravelle was called for holding to even it up again. On the 4x4, Casale had a great rush when he took the puck from his end, determined to make something happen, and he sped up the left side, cut in and got off a shot that looked like it had beaten Krake - but the superb dufflebag had come up big again. UAA went on the power play after a penalty to Jeff Massey at 8:24, and just 13 seconds later they reestablished their three-goal advantage on a very big goal. Martin Bakula, the brilliant defenseman from Czechoslovakia, fired a bullet from the point that appeared to deflect off a Merrimack player and past D'Amore. D'Amore really couldn't be faulted on any of the UAA goals, all were either deflections or the result of Merrimack defensive mistakes. As with the UAA-UNH game, the difference was UAA's superb defense which gave away little to the Warriors. What Merrimack got in the third, they earned. At 10:47, again on the power play, Gravelle won the draw to Krake's right and drew it back to Maillet, whose shot from the left point made it 4-2 and kept Merrimack's hopes alive. The difference in the power play in the third seemed to be that Merrimack decided to shoot the puck more instead of being pretty with it. As I said on the air, nine shots through two periods isn't going to get you enough chances to score, and at least we didn't see as much you-take-it, I-don't-want-it on the PP in the third. That coupled with the hell-bent attitudes of Casale and Fowler was a positive sign that will hopefully carry over. UAA buckled down and played Merrimack evenly to hold on for the win, but I'm sure the Seawolves felt a little lucky to come out with two points. EPILOGUE Seeing the Seawolves these two games and in the NC** series against BC last year hasn't changed my opinion of them. They're a solid defensive team that has a strength of getting consistent play from all four lines at both ends of the ice, great goaltending from Krake, and will pounce on any mistakes you make. And players like Bogoyevac, Larson and Donald can make chances of their own. Like I told Brad Falduto from the Anchorage Times, I don't care if there was no Independent bid this season, UAA deserves a serious look and right now is probably one of the best 12 teams in the country. UAA plays its final game on this trip tomorrow night at UMass-Lowell which should be an interesting battle of two teams with similar styles. UAA then plays two games at Kent next weekend, following which they will play *ALL* their remaining games in Alaska. The Seawolves will have 17 of their remaining 20 regular season at home in Anchorage, with the other three coming at Alaska-Fairbanks. In all, UAA will play 23 of 33 games at home. The top remaining opponents will be Colorado College and either Northern Michigan or Ferris State at the Nissan/Jeep Classic, and two-game sets at home with Providence, Brown, and Michigan Tech, plus four games with Alaska-Fairbanks. It looks as if the Independent bid is UAA's to lose. On top of that, I'd be surprised if they don't end up with at least 25 wins, and they could do well enough to be the first Independent to be seeded higher than sixth in their region. Merrimack, now 5-7-0, hosts Dartmouth Tuesday night in a game that will be shown live on NESN. RADIO NEWS Technical difficulties forced us to go on the air right after the national anthem, which was too bad since I had worked long and hard getting ready for the pregame. That ended up being postponed to the first intermission. It was a little difficult since I had to do color while also taking care of my regular duties, so if you happened to hear the game, much of the time while John Moran (play-by-play) was talking, I was pulling off my headphones and either yelling assists or trying to get scores, etc. Of course we were so smooth, you never heard any of this. :-) I have to add thanks to Dave Josselyn, sports editor of the Argus (Merrimack paper), who helped out by doing a couple of stats I usually do. Special thanks to writer Doyle Woody of the Anchorage Daily News who provided us a great interview for the second intermission. Just FYI, both he and fellow Anchorage writer Brad Falduto do not expect UAA and UAF to be admitted to the WCHA in January; however, they are hopeful that some sort of scheduling agreement will be worked out to ensure the Alaska schools are guaranteed some games against WCHA competition. So how did it go? I'm never happy with much of anything that I do; I just finished listening to the tape, while typing this, and as usual I picked out 1001 things I thought I did wrong. But overall I'd have to say that except for too many "you knows", it went well. I've been asked back to do the Dartmouth game Tuesday and Army next Friday, so tune in on 800 AM...we will see if my losing (0-2) record as a Merrimack color man will change. :-) Oh yeah, you can tune out Bob Kurtz and Bob Norton on NESN and listen to our broadcast on Tuesday if you like. :-) SCORES BC 4, Army 1. Maine 5, Notre Dame 1. That's all I know (no wisecracks). --- Mike Machnik [log in to unmask] [log in to unmask]