Michigan State University Athletics
Michigan State University
4-10-1
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Western Michigan
9-5-3
| Team | 1 | 2 | 3 | F |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Western Michigan | 2 | 2 | 0 | 4 |
| Michigan State | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
Spartans Fall to Western Michigan in GLI Semifinals
12/29/2016 12:00:00 AM | Men's Ice Hockey
DETROIT - The Michigan State hockey team dropped its Great Lakes Invitational semifinal matchup with No. 16 Western Michigan, 4-1, on Thursday night at Joe Louis Arena. The Spartans couldn't neutralize WMU's power-play, which struck for all four goals.
Michigan State (4-10-1) will meet Michigan in the GLI third-place game on Friday at 3:30 p.m.
"I liked the compete level of our team. I did think we showed some frustration in that second period, but thought we overcame that a bit in the third period," MSU head coach Tom Anastos said. "They're a good team; they took advantage of special teams, we did not and that was the difference in the game."
The Spartans' Thomas Ebbing hit the post in the opening minutes and a pair of power play opportunities gave MSU some early scoring chances. But with the Spartans failing to capitalize, Western Michigan took advantage of its first power play and poked in a rebound with 8:29 to play in the first period.
MSU goaltender Ed Minney made the initial stop with his left pad, but WMU's Jade McMullen pounced on the rebound and swept it into the net.
Western Michigan (9-5-3) made it 2-0 with another power-play goal in the closing minutes of the opening frame. Sheldon Dries collected the puck on the boards near the hash marks and let a shot go that squeezed through a scrum in front of Minney and into the net.
The Broncos extended their lead to 3-0 just prior to the midway point of the second period on a power-play goal from Griffen Molino.
A five-minute major penalty to WMU's Corey Schueneman allowed the Spartans to push back as Mason Appleton got MSU on the board with a power-play goal at the 12:33 mark of the second.
Appleton took the puck from Taro Hirose near the right circle and beat WMU's Ben Blacker for his team-leading seventh goal of the season.
The Spartans weren't able to cut any further into the deficit during the major penalty and WMU's Matheson Iacopelli made it 4-1 with 3:10 to go in the middle stanza.
"That major penalty gave us an opportunity to climb back into the game. It was nice to get the one (goal), but we really needed to get two," Anastos said.
MSU outshot the Broncos, 9-7, in the third period and had a handful of power-play opportunities, but Blacker didn't let the Spartans get any closer.
Western Michigan outshot the Spartans, 31-30, for the game and blocked a total of 19 Spartan shot attempts.
