Winning It All Giant Step From Reaching Tournament
ST. PAUL, MN. --- It’s been a long, long year for Duluth East to return to Xcel Energy Center with the main objective being to go one notch beyond last year -- when the Greyhounds lost an excruciating triple-overtime game to Eden Prairie in the championship game. Battling a surprising number of injuries, the Hounds have played the toughest schedule in the state, and are primed to prove coach Mike Randolph right, that this is the best team in East’s history.
Minnesota State High School Hockey Tournament week couldn’t be a bigger attraction for Duluth-area hockey fans, with East joined by Hermantown and Marshall in reaching the select field that will fight it out for the Class AA and A state championships at St. Paul’s Xcel Energy Center. The stunning thing for Duluth is that Hermantown, the state’s lone undefeated team -- and which also lost in the championship game last year, to St. Thomas Academy -- was ranked No. 1 among smaller Class A schools going into Wednesday’s opening round of the A tournament, while Duluth East, 27-1, has been the No. 1 ranked team among Class AA teams since mid-January.
In the state tournament, the coaches vote to rank the tournament entries, and the top four seeds are placed in the brackets, then a draw is made of the other four to select their opponents. East’s first foe was to be Lakeville South, a team that flexed its scoring muscle to romp through the remainder of the section that reaches from Rochester to Lakeville. For those who find a Reader before Thursday night, the treat of the week is still ahead, with East facing Lakeville South at 6 p.m. followed by what should be a spectacular finale between Edina and Benilde-St. Margaret’s. The afternoon session had Maple Grove against Hill-Murray, and Moorhead testing Eagan.
In Duluth, fans’ hopes ride on the Greyhounds playing up to their potential, staying with the game plan carefully concocted by Randolph, which means creative, free-wheeling offense but also dedicated team defense to springboard that offense. Sometimes, this season, the Hounds have been their worst enemy when a few players get caught up in their eagerness to attack while overlooking defensive responsibility. If they stick to their plan, heed their coach, and hold their poise, the Hounds could bring home the big trophy Saturday night.
If you’re watching in real life, or on television, you will admire East’s entire team. In their 4-1 7AA final victory over Andover, the third defensive set was East’s best. Offensively, Ryan Lundgren’s goal ignited the Hounds, proving once again that any of the East forward lines can sting any foe. Then their big senior line took over, with Dom Toninato scoring twice and Jake Randolph once, while Trevor Olson settled for two assists. Without question, the Toninato-centered line with Randolph and Olson is the most creative and the most fun to watch forward unit in the state. And the state tournament will be the last time the three play together.
“As it gets closer, I think about it,” said Toninato, who will play junior hockey in Fargo next season, and maybe for two seasons, before coming to UMD. “We work well together, and playing together for so long helps, because we feed off each other. We’ll take it one game at a time, but I know that I’m definitely going to miss playing with those two.”
With Hermantown and Marshall both having played already, their fans can only hope that the thrill of reaching the state tournament doesn’t obscure them playing their best. We’ll know, if they’re playing one each in Friday’s 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. semifinals. Going into the tournament, there would be a chance, albeit slim, that the two could face each other in the Saturday noon final. Marshall made it through 7A by beating a hustling Hibbing-Chisholm outfit 2-1 Saturday at AMSOIL Arena, while Hermantown roared through 5A without much difficulty.
Marshall’s game with Hibbing was supposed to be last Wednesday, but the biggest snowstorm of the winter postponed the game to Saturday -- when we had the second-biggest snowstorm of the winter. Marshall won 2-1 in a tight battle, with Cameron McClure scoring the winner by rapping in his own rebound after Luke Pavelich fed him in front out of the right corner. The big story was that Christian Coffman, a senior, made his comeback after missing a month with mononucleosis, and coach Brendan Flaherty made the choice to throw him in for his comeback in the 7AA final.
“He’s a senior, with a 92 save percentage, and I had to make a tough decision,” said Flaherty, “because Caden Flaherty has played well for us. But he’s a junior, and I decided to go with the senior.”
Hair will be a factor for the Toppers. The players dyed their hair blond, after goal-scoring leader Judd Peterson came up with the teamwork idea, but the challenge to the players was whether they could get coach Flaherty -- he of the “Marshall Mullett” -- to go along with it and turn his Prince Valiant-style hairdo golden.
Going By The Ratings - UMD
Ranking high school teams is fun, and for fun, but when it comes to college hockey for both men and women, ratings can be puzzling because of the NCAA’s insistence on using a “Pairwise” formula for determining strength, based a lot on opponents’ strength.
The UMD men’s team has had a fitful finish to the regular season, which makes it a lot like the end of last year’s regular season. If you recall, the Bulldogs had a chance to win the WCHA title but went 2-4-2 over their last eight games, then they barely got past St. Cloud State to get to the Final Five, where they were forced to play their way into the semifinals but instead fell to Bemidji State. Losing dropped the Bulldogs nearly out of NCAA contention, but they made it by just enough to get sent out East for regional play. The rest, of course, was sweet history, as the Bulldogs whipped Union and Yale, then went to Xcel Center and beat Notre Dame and Michigan to claim their first-ever NCAA title.
The irony, of course, is that if the Bulldogs had played better through the league finish and playoffs, they would have ranked higher and probably been sent to a Western regional where they might have had much greater difficulty reaching the Frozen Four.
This year, the Bulldogs were tied with Minnesota for first place, and seemed likely to win the title from the struggling Gophers. Instead, UMD wound up out-struggling the Gophers to the end, and finished three points behind, in second place, by going 5-4-3 through the final 12 games. Clearly, third-place Denver is the hottest team right now in the league, but the Pioneers have had their own issues. Remarkably, UMD stayed No. 1, then slid to No. 2, and only this week dropped to No. 3 in the national ratings.
Minnesota led by two points going into the final weekend, but the Gophers got socked 4-1 by Wisconsin at home before rebounding for a split. That left the door open for UMD, but the Bulldogs lost and tied at St. Cloud State, and finished three points out. The News-Tribune reported that UMD rallied to gain the 3-3 tie Saturday, a novel approach to a game in which the Bulldogs fell behind 2-0, rallied to gain a 3-2 lead, but couldn’t hold it against the aroused Huskies.
All of that puts UMD at AMSOIL Arena this weekend to face MSU-Mankato in a best-of-three series. The Bulldogs should win it in two, just as they should have done against St. Cloud State last year. Jack Connolly, UMD’s senior center, won the WCHA scoring championship, and remains a favorite to win the Hobey Baker Award. Connolly has had an amazing season, but it’s far from over, and the Bulldogs desperately need him to play his best, bring the power-play to life, and lead the ’Dogs to tournament glory.
WOMEN RATINGS CURIOUS
The UMD women’s hockey team had its struggles and inconsistencies through the first half of the season, and had to make a furious closing rush to finish fourth and gain home-ice for the league playoffs. Wisconsin and Minnesota were the runaway 1-2 teams all season, with North Dakota emerging as fourth.
But it was UMD that fought its way into the spotlight. The Bulldogs lost only five games since Christmas, and three of those were to teams ranked No. 1 at the time. When they had to play their best, coach Shannon Miller did an amazing job of glueing one of her most talent-thin teams in a decade into a lean and disciplined machine.
The NCAA invites only eight teams to the women’s tournament, and UMD ranked No. 8 going into league playoffs. But here’s where the totally pragmatic but cold and unfeeling computer breaks down. Other leagues seem to rank as high as the WCHA, even though three WCHA teams have won all 11 NCAA tournaments held so far. The WCHA has never asked for favorable treatment, even though it deserves it -- or at least a small dose of it.
But by stretching the criteria among all leagues “fairly,” a team with a good record but against inferior competition gets the breaks from the computer, while a strong team in a tough league has a problem. UMD, while winning nine of the last 11 games, swept a strong Ohio State outfit in two games to open the league playoffs -- and dropped from No. 8 to No. 11.
That put the Bulldogs into the WCHA’s Final Faceoff where they stunned No. 1 Wisconsin 3-1 with an open-net goal embellishing a magnificent 2-1 game -- and they STAYED No. 11! Had UMD beaten Minnesota in the final, the ‘Dogs would have gained an automatic berth in the NCAA’s magic eight. Instead, UMD lost 2-0 in a 1-0 game that also ended with an empty-net goal.
In the final ratings, Wisconsin was knocked out of No. 1 to No. 2 by UMD, but regained No. 1 by not playing when Cornell -- No. 1 for a day -- lost its playoff final. Minnesota is No. 2, and UMD -- after beating No. 1 Wisconsin and narrowly losing to No. 2 Minnesota -- stayed on the outside of the eight.
The thing UMD fans can take away from the Final Faceoff, is that the Bulldogs truly played their best hockey of the year in those two playoff games. As Miller said, they “emptied the tank” with their dedicated play on the ice.
Jennifer Harss was absolutely brilliant in goal, and Haley Irwin, always the team’s offensive inspiration, was outstanding. Those two, along with defenseman Mariia Posa and winger Kacy Ambroz, are the four seniors on this year’s UMD team. The sad thing is that we all thought we’d get another chance to see them play -- maybe even in the NCAA Frozen Four, held next weekend at AMSOIL Arena.
The NCAA regionals are this weekend, with No. 8 Mercyhurst (19-7-3) at Wisconsin (29-4-2); North Dakota (21-11-3) at Minnesota (31-5-2); Boston University (23-13-1) at Cornell (29-4); and St. Lawrence (24-9-4) at Boston College (28-9-3).
Consider that UMD finished 21-14-1, and with no apologies, the Bulldogs were their own biggest problem on several occasions. Early in the season, knowing they were thin on talent, the Bulldogs went to Minnesota, and both teams were going to lose several players a week later for the Four Nations Cup. But Haley Irwin, UMD’s captain, and offensive catalyst, left a week early to join Canada for that tournament. Without her, UMD made a valiant showing, losing 4-1 and 3-2 without their top star. Had she played, UMD might well have split that series.
Way back in October, UMD opened the season against Boston College, the No. 4 ranked team in the nation. The Bulldogs whipped the Eagles 7-2 in their opener, before that inconsistency thing bit them. Leading the second game 2-0, the Bulldogs gave up a shorthanded goal in the second period but still led 2-1 with 2:51 remaining, but BC tied the game on a screened point shot, and the Eagles made a huge rally at the finish, despite being shorthanded again. A UMD clearing attempt didn’t make it out of the zone, and Alex Carpenter blocked it, and scored with the clock showing 0:00.4 -- officially, at 19:59.6 -- to beat UMD 3-2. Obviously, a sweep there instead of a rude split would have lifted UMD a couple slots, just as one more victory at Minnesota.
Regardless, the Bulldogs 21-14-1 record includes a 2-8 record against Wisconsin and Minnesota -- 10 games that NCAA entrants Mercyhurst, BU, BC, Cornell and St. Lawrence didn’t have to play. If the Bulldogs didn’t have to play the nation’s top two teams, they would have a 19-6-1 record. Apparently the NCAA’s computer couldn’t calculate that sort of thing.
The NCAA Frozen Four for women will still be fun to watch next week. My picks are that Minnesota and Wisconsin will play in the title game, and it will be one of the great finals ever seen in women’s hockey. As good, let’s say, as any of UMD’s five national championship finals.
