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 * * * * * **********************************************************************