How Does UND Hockey Fix Its Goaltending and Defense?

North Dakota’s Berry gets contract extension through 2025-26 college hockey season https://t.co/1TcT8TuGyn

— USCHO.com (@USCHO) March 2, 2022

Yes, UND has won one NCAA game since 2016, but let’s take a closer look at this. UND had a year canceled due to Covid-19, there’s a good chance UND could have won it all. We will never know. They also lost two 50-50 games that could have gone either way. I don’t believe that coach Berry is on the hot seat.

How UND Stacks Up Statistically

Offensively, scoring goals hasn’t been a problem. Keeping the puck out of their net has been. The Hawks are ranked 7th nationally in goal scoring. On special teams, their power play is ranked 5th nationally. UND’s penalty Kill is also ranked 15th nationally. With that said, UND has gone three games without scoring a goal on the man advantage.

Defensively, UND is ranked 60th place nationally in save percentage, and 51st nationally in goals against (tied with Canisius and Western Michigan). At times, the Hawks goaltenders have struggled with consistency.

Stat line on UND’s goaltenders: Jakob Hellsten is 3-4-2, 3.13 GAA, and has a .859 save percentage. His teammate, Drew DeRidder, is 3-3-1, 3.08 GAA, and a .886 save percentage. They have a single shutout between them, DeRidder on October 7, 2022, against Holy Cross. That has to be better.

How does UND right the ship?

UND’s top defense pairing of Tyler Kleven and Ethan Frisch is a combined minus-14. That needs to be better. Junior d-man Cooper Moore has struggled this season, he’s also a minus-six.

Head coach Brad Berry has given us a few examples of how this can be fixed.

“Puck possession and playing a hard heavy game,” Berry said after last Saturday’s game.

At times, UND has failed to do that. Berry recently talked about simplifying UND’s game. When you look at the problems that are plaguing UND, it’s simple mistakes that can be tidied up. I don’t think they’re all that far off from where they want to be.

“Not managing pucks at the right time,” Berry said following the Saturday loss to Miami RedHawks. “Not managing pucks that ended up in our end of the rink, which ended up in goals. Not boxing out those critical grade-A opportunities when you get a second whack at it. You have to be harder in those areas, in the house area. Just making sure that you know we’re all on the same page.”