Wisconsin heads to Grand Forks this weekend with a ton of momentum and looking to gain the advantage in the race to host a WCHA playoff series come the end of the season. Standing in the way are arch rivals North Dakota. Both teams are in a battle for the 6th and final host spot in the WCHA first round and know this series will go a long way in determining who gets home ice advantage. 
History favors the Badgers in this one, at least on paper. Wisconsin (12-10-2, 7-9-2 WCHA) is looking to sweep the season series after 5-4 and 5-3 home victories in October. Overall the Badgers own a 86-62-11 all-time series edge over North Dakota (13-10-2, 9-9-0 WCHA). It’s also interesting that Wisconsin owns a 6-1-1 record in the previous 8 meetings at Ralph Englasdt Arena and are 6-4-2 overall at North Dakota under Mike Eaves. However, both teams are aware that this series won’t be easy.
“It’s going to be a real test for our young guys, ” said Wisconsin Head Coach Mike Eaves. “I think we only got four guys on our roster that have ever played up there… We as a staff are very much interested to see how we respond and see if we can play in that atmosphere because that’s the kind of atmosphere you’re going to play at when it comes time to win, or try to win a championship.”
“Games at home are extremely important,” said UND Head Coach Dave Hakstol. “Splits aren’t good enough. It gets harder and harder as you go through the 2nd half of the WCHA. You have to play extremely well both nights to get wins.”
While Wisconsin certainly has been red hot to start the 2nd half (5-1-0) North Dakota hasn’t fared quite as well, going just 4-2-1 over their last 6 games. They are coming off of back to back splits against fellow WCHA foes in Minnesota and St. Cloud State allowing Wisconsin to creep to just 2 points back in the race for the 6th spot in the conference standings.
North Dakota is lead on the ice by their great forward trio of Danny Kristo, Brock Nelson, and Corban Knight. Kristo and Nelson are on the same line and are tied with the lead in points for UND at 27 a piece. Brock Nelson leads the team with 17 goals while Corban Knight leads in assists with 16, followed closely by Kritso with 15 so far on the year.
The problem for UND has been that they aren’t getting production out of anyone other than those 3 on a consistant basis as they only score 2.9 goals a game this season, just 8th in the WCHA as a team.
Their defense has been strong in front of goaltender Aaron Dell, but his performance has left a bit to be desired. He’s 11th in the WCHA in goals against average at 2.80 a game and an even worse 13th in conference in save percentage at .895 for the season.
UND, (that’s right no more Fighting Sioux nickname even though you’ll see it on their jerseys and center ice this weekend) know the key to stopping Wisconsin lies in stopping the forward/defensman combination onf Justin Schultz and Mark Zengerle.
“Their very good players, obviously,” said Hakstol. “You know, the points, the amount of minutes they play, in particular Schultz. We have to be very aware of them. It’ll have to be one of the things we defend well against.”
He’s right, as Zengerle and Schultz sit 2nd and 3rd in the WCHA and 2nd and 5th nationally in points with 38 and 37 respectively. Zengerle leads the WCHA and the country with 28 assists on the season already. Schultz has 12 goals this season and is 3rd nationally in assists with 25.
But, equally important to the Badgers surge in the 2nd half has been the play of a pair of freshman in Jake McCabe and Joseph LaBate. As we wrote earlier this week both have stepped up big time in the last 6 games and if they can continue that UND will have their hands full.
Wisconsin must find a way throughout this series to gain an advantage on the power play as it’s a battle between two of the better offensive and defensive power play teams in the conference. UND has one of the best penalty kill units in conference as they own an 83.7% penalty kill for the year, ranking them 3rd in the WCHA. On the other hand Wisconsin owns a Power Play unit that scores on 21.6% of it’s chances, good for 5th in conference.
Perhaps the biggest X-Factor in this series will be Wisconsin goaltender Joel Rumpel. For the season he has a 2.44 goals against average and a .920 save percentage, all pretty decent numbers. But since the break he’s been on fire between the pipes, cementing himself as the go to goaltender. In the 2nd half of the season he’s averaging just 1.20 goals against and has a .963 save percentage.
In the end I see this being one heck of a battle and the team that puts less mental pressure on itself could come away with a sweep. Friday night’s game is key and should Wisconsin win it may just be the extra motivation to push them to something really special along the rest of the season. Both games can be found on FSN+ (Fox College Sports Central as well) this weekend so all of Wisconsin should be able to see this series with Friday night’s game scheduled for a 7:30pm CT puck drop and Saturday night at 7pm CT start.
Prediction: Split Series, Wisconsin takes Friday night 4-2 and loses 3-2 on Saturday night.
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