UND Splits Series with Miami

(Photo Credit: Russell Hons, UNDSports.com) — This past weekend, the University of North Dakota split their important two-game NCHC conference series with the Miami University. In game one, the Hawks played well for two periods and then the roof fell in on them.

After Friday’s embarrassing 6-3 loss to the Miami University RedHawks, the Fighting Hawks were looking to reclaim home ice advantage. To beat the surging RedHawks, the Fighting Hawks needed to play a full 60-minute game. They did. On Saturday night, the 11,858 UND fans who filled the Ralph left with a much better feeling after a 3-1 win.

Second, losing 6-3 on Friday night gave UND a much-needed wake-up call.

“Coming into the second half, you can’t lay off a period,” freshman forward Dixon Bowen said. “Teams are going to capitalize if we take the foot off the pedal.”

Deja Vu. The start to Saturday’s game was eerily similar to Fridays’ game, the Fighting Hawks raced to a 3-1 lead, but this time they didn’t relinquish the lead. In the first period, Dixon Bowen and Austin Poganski gave the Fighting Hawks a 2-1 lead going into the first intermission. In the second period, Rhett Gardner scored a shorthanded goal to give UND a 3-1 lead. With that goal, Gardner broke a 10-game goalless streak. From there, UND locked it down and won the game going away. I thought UND played almost flawless defense in game two.

Game One

After the Gersich goal, the RedHawks fought their way back and at one point outshot the Fighting Hawks 16-1. The RedHawks would score five unanswered goals and break the game open. The RedHawks would chase junior All-American goalie Cam Johnson from the game. Sophomore goalie Matej Tomek would enter the game for the first time as a Fighting Hawks goaltender. Tomek would suffer the same fate as the starter, the RedHawks would score two more goals on five shots, spoiling the young goaltender’s debut. It was also a tough situation to throw Tomek into.

I want to be clear, goaltending wasn’t the problem on Friday night. The Hawks left their goalies high and dry from most of the second half of the game. They had a lead and tried to sit on it and it blew up on them. It sounds cliché, but it all comes back to playing a 60-minute game and playing the game the right way. You can’t take shifts off against hungry teams.

“I thought the last five minutes of the second period we got away from what we were doing,” head coach Brad Berry said. “Early in that period, we were out changing them. I thought we had some sustained OZP (offensive zone pressure) on them and then we got away from that. We tried to play laterally. We didn’t to get some pucks in. They got some momentum out of the last five minutes of the period and it carried over into the third.