(photo courtesy Larry Radloff)
When the Wisconsin men’s hockey team began play in the 2013 WCHA Final Five, the magic number was three.
Three wins and the Broadmoor Trophy would be theirs. More importantly, the conference’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament would be theirs. No more crunching numbers. No more scoreboard watching. No more speculation. Three wins, it may not be easy, but it was straightforward.
The Badgers polished off a perfect run through their three-day stint at the Xcel Energy Center with a 3-2 win over Colorado College in the championship game on Saturday night. A victory that capped an incredible stretch of games that saw the Badgers go 21-5-5, including a perfect 5-0 in the league playoffs-pretty heady stuff for a team that got off to a 1-7-2 start.
It could be considered one of the most enjoyable journeys in the Mike Eaves era, at least according to Eaves himself.
"One of the most enjoyable journeys right now," said Eaves. "I think because of where we were, it was tough. There's no two ways about it. It was tough coming to the rink and making tough decisions. A lot of the credit has to go to the guys in the locker room. We are only there 15% of the time."
For the third time in as many games, UW struck first. Tyler Barnes put away a loose puck in the waning moments of the first to give the Badgers a 1-0 edge heading to the first intermission.
Sean Little kept things moving in the right direction for the Cardinal and White when he scored on a deflection at 3:28 of the second.
Minutes later, the Tigers got on the board courtesy of a Charlie Taft goal, his 11th of the season .
The seesaw battle continued as Nic Kerdiles lit the lamp for Wisconsin at the 16:15 mark, extending his points streak to 11 straight games and capping off a Tournament MVP campaign at the Final Five.
For the tournament Kerdiles had 6 points on 3 goals and 3 assists to lead the way for Wisconsin.
Following Kerdiles' goal, CC had an answer yet again. This time it came via Rylan Schwartz who put one home with less than 30 seconds to go in the period.
The Tigers mustered just four shots in the final stanza and none of them were the magical equalizer.
With the win, the Badgers claimed their first Broadmoor Trophy since 1998 and it will be a championship that lives on forever at Wisconsin as they head off to the Big Ten next season.
"It's very special for the fact that this is the last time that this trophy will be played for in this fprmat with these teams, so it's very special," said Eaves. "We'll honor that, it'll be something that we put on the mantel back at Wisco (Wisconsin) and we'll hold it in high esteem."
Joel Rumpel was, once again, solid between the pipes for the Badgers, turning away 20 of the 22 shots he faced.
Rumpel was named to the All-Tournament team along with four other Badgers – captain John Ramage, Tyler Barnes, and Tournament MVP Nic Kerdiles.
It’s off to college hockey’s version of the big dance for the Badgers who will find out their first round match up Sunday night at 8pm CT on ESPNU.
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