MSU Hockey Falls To Michigan In CCHA Tournament Championship
3/17/2002 12:00:00 AM | Men's Ice Hockey
March 17, 2002
DETROIT, Mich. - Michigan's Jed Ortmeyer scored his second goal of the game 4:39 into the third period to lead the Wolverines to a 3-2 win over Michigan State in the CCHA Super Six Championship final at Joe Louis Arena in Detroit this afternoon. The win snaps the Spartans' 11-game conference postseason winning streak and kept State from winning its third straight league crown.
A few hours after the game, the Spartans (27-8-5 overall) were named the NCAA West Region's third seed. The Spartans take on sixth-seed Colorado College in an opening-round game at Yost Ice Arena in Ann Arbor Friday. The winner of that game plays second-seed Minnesota in a quarterfinal match in Ann Arbor the following day. Denver, the West Region's top seed, plays the winner of Friday's Michigan-St. Cloud State first-round contest at Yost Saturday.
"I'm looking forward to the NCAA Tournament," said senior wing Adam Hall. "We get another crack at it and winning the last game of the season is always a goal. Going up against a team like (Colorado College) is a great way to get things started."
The West Regional bracket features six teams ranked in the top 10 in the latest U.S. College Hockey Online national poll. The East Regional, played Saturday and Sunday in Worcester, Mass., consists of four top-10 teams and two unranked squads.
"I'm glad to be in the West Regional," said coach Ron Mason. "It would be really unusual to be in the East Regional. We've played at Yost, we've played Minnesota, we've played Michigan and now we'll play Colorado College."
Ortmeyer's game-winning goal came during the team's fourth power-play opportunity of the game. Freshman wing Eric Nystrom fired a pass across the low slot and Ortmeyer, stationed just to the right of MSU goaltender Ryan Miller (East Lansing, Mich.), one-timed the puck into the net.
Michigan (26-10-5 overall) opened the scoring 3:43 into the first period on a goal by Mark Mink. The Wolverine junior slipped past a MSU backchecker and got off a close-range shot that Miller stopped, but Mink gained control of the rebound and flipped the puck into the net.
MSU evened the score a little more than three minutes later thanks to the duo of Ash Goldie (London, Ont.) and Brad Fast (Fort St. John, B.C.), who teamed up for the game-winning goal in Saturday's CCHA semifinal victory against Northern Michigan. With Michigan's John Shouneyia serving a minor penalty for boarding, Fast kept an errant Wolverine clearing attempt in the offensive zone and ripped a shot from the high slot that Wolverine goaltender Josh Blackburn tried to glove but couldn't control. Goldie got the puck at the bottom of the near faceoff circle and wristed a shot over Blackburn's left shoulder for his ninth goal of the season at 6:53.
"One of their players got caught down low," said Fast. "Somebody threw it out through the point and one of their forwards went sprawling for it. He missed it and it gave me a lot of time to walk in from the point into the high slot. I tried to rip one top glove and Blackburn made a nice save. Lucky for us, Goldie was going to the net hard."
Ortmeyer gave Michigan a 2-1 lead midway through the second period on a rebound goal at 8:54. Ortmeyer won a faceoff in the MSU end back to linemate Mike Cammalleri. Miller stopped Cammalleri's shot, but Ortmeyer crashed the net and was able to sweep the puck past the sprawling Spartan netminder.
Junior wing Steve Clark (Mississauga, Ont.) evened the score just prior to the second intermission with his first goal of the season. Senior defenseman Jon Insana (New Baltimore, Mich.) held a Michigan clearing attempt at the far point and dumped it to Clark, who made a centering attempt that caromed off Wolverine defenseman Mike Roemensky and past Blackburn with 1:04 left in the period.
"I stopped down in the corner and tried to go out front to (junior wing Troy) Ferguson," said Clark. "It went off (their guy) and into the net."
