Neil's Notebook: Minnesota Skates Past Spartans in Opener
12/10/2016 12:00:00 AM | Men's Ice Hockey
By Neil Koepke
MSUSpartans.com staff writer
EAST LANSING â€" Minnesota was one very selfish hockey team on Friday night at Munn Arena.
The Gophers wouldn't let Michigan State have the puck after the first 10 minutes of the game. It's tough to score when you don't have the puck and, of course, it's tough to win when you can't put the puck in the net.
Minnesota won the time of possession by a wide margin and held an edge in most all of the key moments in the game, and the end result was a solid 4-2 victory over the Spartans in the first game of the Big Ten series.
The Gophers (8-5-2, 2-1 Big Ten) held Michigan State (4-7, 0-1) to three shots on goal in each of the second and third periods, but despite having numerous great scoring chances, Minnesota couldn't put the game away until Darian Romanko's empty-net goal with 61 seconds left in the third period.
Minnesota outshot the Spartans 44-14, and had 11 shots on goal during five power plays, but couldn't solve MSU goalie Ed Minney, who made a career-high 40 saves, with the extra attacker.
Minney and penalty killing were the only bright spots for the Spartans, who saw their three-game unbeaten streak come to an end at the hands of a Gophers' team which seemed desperate to make amends for last Saturday's embarrassing 8-3 home loss to Ohio State.
"The whole night, we were chasing the puck. They had possession all night long,'' MSU coach Tom Anastos said. "They won all the puck battles, all the races, they were stronger one-on-one on pucks and we weren't hard enough to play against.
"I liked the way we started. I liked the first 8-10 minutes of the game. When they got that fluky goal (to tie it 1-1) that seemed to change the momentum, and along with the penalties we took, that took a lot of energy from us and we never recovered.''
For sure, the Spartans got off to a solid start, playing with good energy. They took a 1-0 lead on senior left wing JT Stenglein's first goal of the season just 3:30 into the game. Stenglein fired a low wrist shot from deep in the left circle and the puck went between the legs of Minnesota goaltender Eric Schierhorn.
A few minutes later, MSU had another good scoring chance that could have made it 2-0, but Schierhorn made a save on Stenglein's shot off a 2-on-1 rush with Thomas Ebbing.
The Gophers didn't get their first shots on goal until 6:20 of the period.
About four-and-a-half minutes later, Minnesota tied it after a scramble around the net, with Justin Kloos picking up a rebound near the goal line on the right and shooting the puck off goalie Ed Minney's back and into the net at 10:54.
"The score was close and it was close because of Ed Minney. He had an excellent game,'' Anastos said. "Our penalty killing was also a bright spot against a very good power play.
"But other than that, I'm really unhappy with our grit and tenacity tonight. That's a good team and I give them lots of credit. But I know we can be more tenacious that we were. Maybe that's part of the learning process, but I'm not happy how we played.''
The Gophers dominated the second period, outshooting the Spartans, 13-3. But they didn't take the lead until after the halfway point in the period.
Minnesota, which moved the puck around with great precision most of the game, capped a nice passing play at 12:26 with Tyler Sheehy getting open in the right circle for a perfect pass from the left circle from Kloss. He quickly fired the puck into the top right corner for a 2-1 lead.
Just 1 minute and 53 seconds later, the Gophers got gift goal â€" probably Minney's only mistake of the night â€" to take a 3-1 lead.
Minney went behind the net to handle a puck on a waved-off icing and was pressured by a Gopher forward. He went to clear the puck toward the boards to his left, but instead slid it out into the right circle. Unfortunately for Minney and the Spartans, the Gophers' Vinny Lettieri was right there and he easily hit a wide-open net to give his team a two-goal lead at 14:19.
"I really don't know what I was looking at, honestly,'' Minney said. "The minute the puck left my stick . . . my stick actually broke when I passed it. It cracked right in the middle of the shaft, so it wasn't like it really affected it.
"It was just a crummy play by me and it went right on their stick and right into the net.''
Michigan State got a big lift with three minutes left in the second period when its top forward line combined to make an excellent play in the Gophers' zone to cut the deficit to 3-2.
Mason Appleton forced Minnesota defenseman Jack Glover to give up the puck along the right boards near the goal line. The puck came loose and slid up the boards to MSU's Patrick Khodorenko and he found Taro Hirose open between two defenders in front of the net with a perfect pass. Hirose got the puck on his stick and fired it past Shierhorn into the top right corner at 16:57, and suddenly MSU was back in the game.
The Spartans, trying to keep the momentum in the third period, hurt themselves by taking penalties at 6:10, 9:23 and 15:42. And while MSU survived the Gophers power play, it hurt its chances of possessing the puck and putting pressure on Minnesota's defense.
And despite being outplayed, Michigan State came within a whisker of tying it early in the final period. Defenseman Mitch Eliot's shot from the right point deflected off a Gopher in the right circle and went right to Khodorenko, standing near the left edge of the crease and looking at an open net.
Khodorenko stopped the puck and flicked it toward the net, but it slid through the crease and went wide to the right.
MSU didn't threaten much late in period but still had hopes that one rush might click, until Minnesota's sealed the win with Romanko's empty-netter from left boards near center ice.
"It's hard to shoot when you don't have the puck. You have to win battles and have to think about shooting the puck when you have the opportunities to shoot in a game like that,'' Anastos said. "Somehow, we were still in the game. And yet, Patty Khodorenko has an open net and misses. (If it goes in) it's a 3-3 game.''
The Spartans will try to earn a split of their first Big Ten series when it faces the Gophers in the second game at 8 p.m. Saturday at Munn Arena.
"I know we can compete better than we competed tonight. I know we can be more tenacious than that and I know we can be stronger on one-on-ones and win more battles,'' Anastos said. "I know we can get to the front of the net better than we did.
"I'll give (Minnesota) credit, but I know we can be better.''
MINNEY BUSY: Other than misplaying the puck behind the net that led to an easy goal in the second period, Michigan State goalie Ed Minney had a strong game on Friday against highly skilled Minnesota, which boasts the 9th-best power play in the nation.
Minney, 20, a 6-foot-5, 197-pound junior from Wind Gap, Pa., made a career-high 40 saves â€" 15 in the first period, 11 in the second and 14 more in the final 20 minutes.
The Gophers tested him on the power play, firing 11 shots during five opportunities â€" one power play in the first period, one in the second and three in the third.
But Minney made several big saves and had some good luck going his way as the Gophers couldn't finish on several excellent opportunities.
"They were throwing a lot of pucks at the net and I felt pretty good,'' he said. "It's nice to string some games together where I'm feeling consistent.
"That wasn't our best game. We've been really consistent of late, and although we started strong tonight, we kind of got away from some of the (good) things that we've been doing.
"Everything they did, from the power play on out, was everything we knew they were going to do. This game was strictly on us. We didn't play to our full potential.''
Two of the Gophers goals could be labeled as fluky, especially the first one, midway through the first period, when Justin Kloos banked the puck off Minney's back from behind the goal line 15 feet to the right of the net.
"The original shot was bouncing. I blockered it and their guy missed the rebound," Minney said. "Then, before I could find where the puck was, it hit off my back and went in.''
The puck went behind the net to the left, caromed off the boards over to Kloos on the right along the goal line. He slapped at it and it deflected off of Minney and into the net.
"They scored that goal and got some momentum, and then got some power plays and that got them rolling at the end of the period,'' Minney said. "We came out hard and I thought we dominated the first half of the period, but then they got that fluky goal.'' Minney had no chance on Minnesota's second goal â€" by Tyler Sheehy at 12:26 of the middle period.
Kloos got the puck in the left circle and slid a cross-ice pass to an open Sheehy low in the right circle. Sheehy had plenty space and he got off a quick wrist shot that caught the top right corner for a 2-1 Minnesota lead.
"(The shot disparity) was more lopsided than we want but over the years, our team hasn't really outshot a lot of our opponents,'' MSU senior captain and right wing Joe Cox said. "With Minnesota so deep and talented, we definitely don't want to give up that many shots.
"I thought Ed (Minney) had a tremendous game in net. Without him, it could have been a lot worse.''
Like Minney, Cox believes the Spartans can shrug off the series-opening loss and come back with higher level performance in Saturday's series finale.
"I think our team is pretty good at rebounding,'' Cox said. "I think the guys will put this game behind us and come tomorrow and you'll see a harder working team.''
PENALTY KILL SOLID: Minnesota came into the game with the ninth-best power play in the nation. The Gophers were converting on 22.6 percent of their chances.
Meanwhile, Michigan State's penalty killing was the worst in the nation at 60th overall, killing only 73.1 percent of opponents' power plays.
But on Friday, the Spartans skated off five Gopher power plays â€" one in each of the first two periods and three in the third. Minnesota had 11 shots on goal and just missed capitalizing on several good looks.
The Spartans were hemmed in their zone for more than a minute on a few of those power plays because of Minnesota's ability to move the puck around, get off good shots and retrieve loose pucks to continue the pressure.
"Our penalty killing has been struggling so to shut out a powerful power play, I think it's good for our confidence leading into (Saturday),'' Cox said.
During a Gopher power play midway through the third period, Cox blocked two shots from the point within four seconds.
"One went off the top of my foot and other was on my shinpad, both on my right leg,'' said Cox, who skated to the bench, shrugged off the pain and was back on the ice with the next shift change.
"This was progress,'' Anastos said of the penalty killing success. "When you did a little deeper, we were missing two of our best penalty killers. On defense, Carson Gatt was out (for the game with a lower body injury) and Rhett Holland was hurt early and he wasn't 100 percent through the game, but he did a good job of gutting it out.
"Our forward rotation did a good job. They're a tough team to defend against. They're smart, they're good possessing the puck so it's hard to get on and off the ice against them.''
After Friday's games were completed, the Spartans moved up to No. 57 in the nation in penalty killing at 75.4 (14 goals allowed in 57 chances. Ohio State, ranked No. 10 in the nation overall, is even below MSU on the power play. The Buckeyes are No. 58 at 74.6 percent.
NO. 1 VS. NO. 2: Top-ranked Minnesota-Duluth and No. 2 Denver collided on Friday in Denver and the Pioneers prevailed, holding off the Bulldogs in the last three minutes to earn a 4-3 victory in a National Collegiate Hockey Conference series opener in Denver.
DU built a 3-1 in the second period only to see UMD cut it to 3-2 with six minutes left in the period. The Pioneers boosted their lead to 4-2 early in the final period, but the Bulldogs scored at 17:55 to again make it a one-goal game at 4-3.
Denver (12-2-3, 6-0-3 NCHC) held on in the last two minutes to earn the win and extend its unbeaten streak to 15 games at 12-0-3. Minnesota-Duluth (10-3-2, 7-2-0) and DU meet again on Saturday.
IN THE BIG TEN: Wisconsin overcame a 2-0 deficit in the first period and rallied for a 7-4 victory over Michigan in Ann Arbor, handing the Wolverines their third straight Big Ten defeat.
The Badgers (8-6-1, 1-0 Big Ten, scored five goals in the second period to take a 6-3 lead into the third period. It was Wisconsin's first win over U-M (6-8-1, 0-3) in the last 12 games and first at Yost Arena since 2005, halting an eight game (0-6-2) winless streak in Ann Arbor.
Meanwhile, Michigan dropped to 0-3 in league play for only the second time in program history and the first time since 1956-57 when it was a member of the Western Intercollegiate Hockey League. That league later became the Western Collegiate Hockey Association.
Michigan and Wisconsin meet again on Saturday before entering their holiday break.
No. 3 Penn State and No. 10 Ohio State are off until after Christmas for the Buckeyes and after New Year's Day for the Nittany Lions.
