Michigan State University
7-19-2, 3-9-0-0
Michigan
17-4-4, 8-2-2-1
Spartans Fall at Home to No. 5 Michigan
2/6/2016 12:00:00 AM | Men's Ice Hockey
EAST LANSING - The Michigan State hockey team fell to No. 5 Michigan, 4-1, on Saturday evening at Munn Ice Arena, giving the Spartans a split in the two-game weekend series with the Wolverines.
Michigan put 20 shots on Spartan goaltender Jake Hildebrand in the opening 20 minutes, pressuring MSU for most of the period. Hildebrand turned away all but one, a shot by Justin Selman in the slot 8:10 into the period.
Despite having only a handful of shots in the first period, MSU nearly tied it on a couple of occasions.
The best chance of the first period for MSU came with just under 7 minutes to play off a 2-on-1 with Joe Cox and Mackenzie MacEachern. Cox slipped a perfect pass to MacEachern who one-timed the puck from the left side, but the puck chipped off the post.
The Spartans had another prime scoring chance just over a minute into the second period on another 2-on-1. Matt DeBlouw headed into the U-M zone with the puck and snapped a shot that beat U-M goaltender Steve Racine, but bounced off the cross bar.
MSU kept the pressure on the Wolverines in the second period, outshooting them 12-1 at one point during the stanza, but it was the Wolverines that were able to get the next goal as JT Compher converted on an odd-man rush with 6:00 to play in the second, making it 2-0 U-M.
Michigan sealed the game with two goals in the opening 3:06 of the third period. Selman made it 3-0 1:52 into the third with his second goal of the game and Tyler Motte scored on the power play 1:14 later.
The Spartans got on the board with 7:26 to play in the third with a power-play goal courtesy of Villiam Haag. Haag screened Racine on a shot from the point by Travis Walsh and then batted the rebound into the net for his fifth goal of the season.
After being outshot 20-3 in the opening period, MSU outshot the Wolverines over the final 40 minutes by a count of 31-22.
"We dug ourselves a hole and in spite of that I thought coming out of the first period only giving up a goal after playing poorly, you have chance," said MSU head coach Tom Anastos. "We hit a couple goal posts, had few good opportunities, Hildy was playing well, but we couldn't make the plays when we needed to."
MSU went 1-of-4 on the power play, while U-M went 1-of-3.
The Spartans will host Penn State in a pair of games next weekend at Munn Ice Arena.
