The Gophers (2-0-0 B1G, 11-2-1 Overall) met the Wisconsin Badgers (0-2-0 B1G, 4-5-1 Overall) Saturday night at Mariucci Arena in front of 9,973. In maybe the most entertaining game of the year, Minnesota used late game heroics by Seth Ambroz, to get the 4-3 win, and sweep the Badgers back to Wisconsin. The sweep in hockey, coupled with a Penn State upset of the Badgers in football earlier today at Camp Randall Stadium, makes for a long miserable bus ride back to Madison for Bucky.
http://www.gopherhole.com/news_article/show/314687?referrer_id=388419
Here is what I saw.
* It was nice to see Minnesota overcome more garbage officiating. Not only did the linesman follow up last nights puck by getting in the way of a clearing attempt within’ the first minute of the game, but the referees overshadowed that by making one of the worst calls I’ve seen in…20 hours. On a classic “take em both” penalty scenario after there was a scrum after the whistle, they gave Seth Ambroz an extra roughing penalty, on top of a roughing after the whistle minor. The Badger player only got the roughing after the whistle penalty. And then there were the two they missed near the end of the second period that had the Gopher coaching staff beside themselves. The fans were about as loud booing them off the ice as I’ve ever heard them. Trust me, I’m as tired of bitching about the officiating the last couple of games as you are of reading about it. The comical part, in my opinion, was hearing Wisconsin Head Coach Mike Eaves complaining about the officiating after the game. Perhaps I’m blinded by maroon & gold colored glasses, but I think Minnesota was the one getting hosed by the officials.
* That being said, the Gopher coaching staff has done a good job this year, keeping the team focused when circumstances get frustrating like they did tonight. You rarely here Lucia complaining after a game, win or lose. He’s usually praising the other team, and talking about what his team needs to do better.
* The way the Gopher power play looks at this juncture of the season, you’d almost rather have them playing five on five the entire game, where they look more cohesive. The PP has not been producing a lot of scoring chances. The Badgers had two breakaways on one Gopher PP, and I’m not sure Minnesota even got a shot on net during that same two minute stretch. The crowd actually started booing the power play in the second period.
* One thing Don Lucia has stressed this season is the teams success at getting the puck out of their zone quickly. Minnesota has had trouble the last couple of nights getting the puck out when they need to, and a lot of it just looks like they almost look lazy. When they haven’t been able to clear the zone, it has come back to haunt them.
* Seth Ambroz scored his third and fourth goals of the weekend tonight, including the game winner. He now has seven goals on the season. Tonight he scored his goals from in front of the net, and with a goalie in there! I’m sure it’s a big surprise to most that he has now doubled up on Kyle Rau’s goal total.
* I think Hudson Fasching needs to shoot more. He passed a couple off that he should have taken the shot and let his teammates play the rebound, if there was any. Erik Haula had a similar issue when he was a Freshman. He felt like he had to pass the puck off to the older players, since he was the “rookie”.
* I am losing confidence in Ben Marshall as he struggles to take care of the puck. I hope it’s just a phase. I’ll be interested to see if Lucia sits him in favor of Jake Bischoff next week. Don has made a habit of sitting guys for a game or two, so they can see the games from a different angle. He mentioned last year that sometimes it’s good for a guy to sit and watch a game from the press box.
Here are the post game comments:
Wisconsin Head Coach Mike Eaves:
Regarding the officiating…. “You know, you guys always ask us questions about the referees. And you say to us, well I have to ask the question, you know. And you know that we can’t answer, so here we are again. I would like you to call Steve Petrosky, and talk to him. There lies a pretty good answer. You want some answers, talk to the guy who could talk to you guys. I’d love to say something, but I can’t. Unless you want to give me a thousand dollars that I can give them? I don’t think you’ve got that kind of money. You got a special fund?”
Regarding the game winning goal…. “Well, I didn’t see the play. I was starting to think about the next group to send out, even overtime a little bit. But, apparently it was a poor decision in the middle of the ice. And the young man feels real bad in there right now. Hopefully that’s a lesson learned for everybody, and we move on”
Regarding the game…. “Well, I think we played a very tough team pretty well. I mean it was two to one with ten minutes to go last night, and it was three three here with thirty seconds. So, we said to the boys inside there, when you work this hard, and you get this close, you know when it hurts. I think we have to build on that hurt, we have to get better. Nice thing for us, we’re not on a bye week next week. We get to play again. So we get right back in the saddle”
Minnesota Head Coach Don Lucia:
Regarding the game…. "It was a much harder game tonight, like we expected it to be. There wasn’t a lot of space. You had to fight for your space on the ice. It was gonna be that type of goal. They tied it with a scramble in our blue paint, and I think (Travis) Boyd got the turnover and threw it, and I think Ambroz tipped it in. Great win for us. It’s been a long time since we’ve been able to beat Wisconsin twice in this building. I think we grew as a team this weekend. Well, you get to that point, I mean you hit the last five minutes, it’s essentially overtime almost at that point and time. You just gotta find a way to make a play. I thought we got better as the game went on. I think a couple guys had to try to find their game tonight. And I thought we had a real good third period, taking charge down low and creating some energy for the crowd and our team in the offensive zone. Whether it’s veterans or young guys, they all have to contribute in their own way. We played at home, we’re going to have to go there and play two. That’s one of the beauties of the conference this year. It’s a true round-robin. We’re going to play everybody in each others buildings. It was a good weekend for us. There’s a reason why they were favored to win the league, with how veteran they were, and the great finish they had last year. So, for our young guys, it was a growing experience. For our older guys, to see a guy like Seth Ambroz take charge was great. You have to stay with games. You’re not always going to be in control when you play good teams. There’s going to be periods where they have you on your heals, and then you have to be able to fight back for different segments of the game and just how hard you have to play for sixty minutes to beat good teams. It will be a very pleasant memory. There’s only twenty games, and getting off to a good start is so important. We have one more weekend to go, at Michigan State next weekend. So we’ll enjoy this, and go back to work on Monday”
Regarding Seth Ambroz…. “You know what, going back to last year, Seth scored some goals against Wisconsin, and he just had a terrific weekend. But I thought (Travis) Boyd’s line was really good all weekend long, and a big reason we were able to get two wins. I think Seth worked hard on his game this summer. His skating has improved. We’re playing him a lot of minutes with the power play and penalty kill. He’s just an honest hard working guy, and he’s gonna score some goals by getting around the net, and the blue paint. He’s not pretty coming down the rink, but he’s heavy on pucks, and he scored like we expect him to score this weekend”
Regarding Jake Bischoff…. “It was a hard decision. Going in, you know, he made the case that he should have maybe played the first night. For the first time this year, we made a decision not to change our lineup in game two. He’ll get back in the weekend, no question. He’s a good player, we need him in our lineup”
Regarding setting the lines…. “You know, it all depends. I think that we feel good about certain spots. But up front, if you’re not in the power play, or kill penalties, then you’re going to be vulnerable to be in or out. Same thing on the back end. We have seven defenseman that can all play. We have to just keep rotating guys through to keep guys fresh and ready to go. Because all deserve to play”
Regarding commenting about the officiating…. “The internet age kind of kills that. You used to be able to say things, and it wouldn’t get put in print. But nowadays, you say one wrong thing and it’s plastered all over the chat rooms, and the blogs. It takes about one minute. I mean, there’s things on the internet I didn’t know I told anybody, but our team”
Seth Ambroz:
Regarding his goal…. “It was another grinding one. Boyder (Travis Boyd) made a great turnover play, got the puck to the net, and I was just fortunate enough to be there, get a piece of it, and put it in. You know what, I was a little surprised. They were just skating out, and obviously the turnover happened really quick, and I just went right to the net. So I guess a little surprised. But at the same time, our line has been creating turnovers all weekend, so I’m not surprised we were able to do another one there at the end. I think, for me, the success this weekend came with my line. All three of us were just working hard, causing turnovers, mucking it up, getting some energy and getting pucks to the net. It could have easily went to my line-mates too, scoring those goals. I’ve just been lucky enough to get em. A lot of credit goes to those guys. They’ve been working hard all year. I’m happy to be playing with Tommy (Serratore) and Travis (Boyd), and hopefully we can keep it going. Throughout the night we were able to get some chances, and cause some havoc. I was happy to see that he (Coach Lucia) has the confidence to put us out there in the last minute. It’s probably one of the biggest goals of my career. It does wonders with the lines confidence, with my confidence. Hopefully we can keep it going into Michigan State. We just need to keep our foot on the pedal, keep moving forward, and keep contributing as a line”
Regarding the game…. “Obviously, Wisconsin has a great team. They came off a bye week, so they might be a little bit rusty there in the first game, and they brought it tonight. This is a big win for us, just to see where our young guys were as a whole. Coming into the two-two game there in the third, and then going up, coming back to tie, and just being able to battle. So, I think for us, it was really just to see how our young guns would reply. I think our veterans as well. And we were able to come out on top. It was fun, and hopefully we can keep it going. Michigan State next weekend will be a good team as well. Hopefully we can close out here before the break”
Regarding the schedule…. “It’s only the six teams right now, and they’re all good teams, top to bottom. We’ve got some depth in the league, and every point counts now. So it was good to get it started out on the right foot”
Kyle Rau:
Regarding his face-off success…. “It’s huge. Anytime you can start with the puck, it’s what you want. Better than going to retrieve it. I’m coming along. I mean, I was a wing last year, and not taking them. So it takes time to get back into it. But yeah, I liked how my face-offs were this weekend”
Regarding falling behind early…. “It’s not what we want to do. Anytime you put yourself behind, it’s going to catch up to us at some point. We’ve gotta start coming out better”
Regarding the game…. “It’s huge. It’s good to get started like this. Especially in the first series, to get six points under our belt and get rolling. Seth (Ambroz) had a great game, and a great play at the end there. That was a great game. They’re a good team. I mean, they were picked to win the league. So it’s big just to get some confidence going into Big Ten play”
Regarding Hudson Fasching…. “He’s a big body. He needs two guys on him. I was just fortunate (Sam) Warning saw me backdoor. Actually, I was in the wrong spot. I wasn’t supposed to be there, but it all worked out”
Regarding the play of the Ambroz-Boyd-Serratore line… ”They were huge this weekend. There’s some studs on that line. It’s not like they’re a third line, they could be a first line for any team. They played big”
The Gophers will take on the Michigan State Spartans next weekend in East Lansing, Michigan. Game time is 6:00 PM (Central) on Friday, and 3:00 PM (Central) on Saturday. The games will be broadcast on Fox Sports North and FSN-PLUS.
http://www.gopherhole.com/news_article/show/314687?referrer_id=388419
Here is what I saw.
* It was nice to see Minnesota overcome more garbage officiating. Not only did the linesman follow up last nights puck by getting in the way of a clearing attempt within’ the first minute of the game, but the referees overshadowed that by making one of the worst calls I’ve seen in…20 hours. On a classic “take em both” penalty scenario after there was a scrum after the whistle, they gave Seth Ambroz an extra roughing penalty, on top of a roughing after the whistle minor. The Badger player only got the roughing after the whistle penalty. And then there were the two they missed near the end of the second period that had the Gopher coaching staff beside themselves. The fans were about as loud booing them off the ice as I’ve ever heard them. Trust me, I’m as tired of bitching about the officiating the last couple of games as you are of reading about it. The comical part, in my opinion, was hearing Wisconsin Head Coach Mike Eaves complaining about the officiating after the game. Perhaps I’m blinded by maroon & gold colored glasses, but I think Minnesota was the one getting hosed by the officials.
* That being said, the Gopher coaching staff has done a good job this year, keeping the team focused when circumstances get frustrating like they did tonight. You rarely here Lucia complaining after a game, win or lose. He’s usually praising the other team, and talking about what his team needs to do better.
* The way the Gopher power play looks at this juncture of the season, you’d almost rather have them playing five on five the entire game, where they look more cohesive. The PP has not been producing a lot of scoring chances. The Badgers had two breakaways on one Gopher PP, and I’m not sure Minnesota even got a shot on net during that same two minute stretch. The crowd actually started booing the power play in the second period.
* One thing Don Lucia has stressed this season is the teams success at getting the puck out of their zone quickly. Minnesota has had trouble the last couple of nights getting the puck out when they need to, and a lot of it just looks like they almost look lazy. When they haven’t been able to clear the zone, it has come back to haunt them.
* Seth Ambroz scored his third and fourth goals of the weekend tonight, including the game winner. He now has seven goals on the season. Tonight he scored his goals from in front of the net, and with a goalie in there! I’m sure it’s a big surprise to most that he has now doubled up on Kyle Rau’s goal total.
* I think Hudson Fasching needs to shoot more. He passed a couple off that he should have taken the shot and let his teammates play the rebound, if there was any. Erik Haula had a similar issue when he was a Freshman. He felt like he had to pass the puck off to the older players, since he was the “rookie”.
* I am losing confidence in Ben Marshall as he struggles to take care of the puck. I hope it’s just a phase. I’ll be interested to see if Lucia sits him in favor of Jake Bischoff next week. Don has made a habit of sitting guys for a game or two, so they can see the games from a different angle. He mentioned last year that sometimes it’s good for a guy to sit and watch a game from the press box.
Here are the post game comments:
Wisconsin Head Coach Mike Eaves:
Regarding the officiating…. “You know, you guys always ask us questions about the referees. And you say to us, well I have to ask the question, you know. And you know that we can’t answer, so here we are again. I would like you to call Steve Petrosky, and talk to him. There lies a pretty good answer. You want some answers, talk to the guy who could talk to you guys. I’d love to say something, but I can’t. Unless you want to give me a thousand dollars that I can give them? I don’t think you’ve got that kind of money. You got a special fund?”
Regarding the game winning goal…. “Well, I didn’t see the play. I was starting to think about the next group to send out, even overtime a little bit. But, apparently it was a poor decision in the middle of the ice. And the young man feels real bad in there right now. Hopefully that’s a lesson learned for everybody, and we move on”
Regarding the game…. “Well, I think we played a very tough team pretty well. I mean it was two to one with ten minutes to go last night, and it was three three here with thirty seconds. So, we said to the boys inside there, when you work this hard, and you get this close, you know when it hurts. I think we have to build on that hurt, we have to get better. Nice thing for us, we’re not on a bye week next week. We get to play again. So we get right back in the saddle”
Minnesota Head Coach Don Lucia:
Regarding the game…. "It was a much harder game tonight, like we expected it to be. There wasn’t a lot of space. You had to fight for your space on the ice. It was gonna be that type of goal. They tied it with a scramble in our blue paint, and I think (Travis) Boyd got the turnover and threw it, and I think Ambroz tipped it in. Great win for us. It’s been a long time since we’ve been able to beat Wisconsin twice in this building. I think we grew as a team this weekend. Well, you get to that point, I mean you hit the last five minutes, it’s essentially overtime almost at that point and time. You just gotta find a way to make a play. I thought we got better as the game went on. I think a couple guys had to try to find their game tonight. And I thought we had a real good third period, taking charge down low and creating some energy for the crowd and our team in the offensive zone. Whether it’s veterans or young guys, they all have to contribute in their own way. We played at home, we’re going to have to go there and play two. That’s one of the beauties of the conference this year. It’s a true round-robin. We’re going to play everybody in each others buildings. It was a good weekend for us. There’s a reason why they were favored to win the league, with how veteran they were, and the great finish they had last year. So, for our young guys, it was a growing experience. For our older guys, to see a guy like Seth Ambroz take charge was great. You have to stay with games. You’re not always going to be in control when you play good teams. There’s going to be periods where they have you on your heals, and then you have to be able to fight back for different segments of the game and just how hard you have to play for sixty minutes to beat good teams. It will be a very pleasant memory. There’s only twenty games, and getting off to a good start is so important. We have one more weekend to go, at Michigan State next weekend. So we’ll enjoy this, and go back to work on Monday”
Regarding Seth Ambroz…. “You know what, going back to last year, Seth scored some goals against Wisconsin, and he just had a terrific weekend. But I thought (Travis) Boyd’s line was really good all weekend long, and a big reason we were able to get two wins. I think Seth worked hard on his game this summer. His skating has improved. We’re playing him a lot of minutes with the power play and penalty kill. He’s just an honest hard working guy, and he’s gonna score some goals by getting around the net, and the blue paint. He’s not pretty coming down the rink, but he’s heavy on pucks, and he scored like we expect him to score this weekend”
Regarding Jake Bischoff…. “It was a hard decision. Going in, you know, he made the case that he should have maybe played the first night. For the first time this year, we made a decision not to change our lineup in game two. He’ll get back in the weekend, no question. He’s a good player, we need him in our lineup”
Regarding setting the lines…. “You know, it all depends. I think that we feel good about certain spots. But up front, if you’re not in the power play, or kill penalties, then you’re going to be vulnerable to be in or out. Same thing on the back end. We have seven defenseman that can all play. We have to just keep rotating guys through to keep guys fresh and ready to go. Because all deserve to play”
Regarding commenting about the officiating…. “The internet age kind of kills that. You used to be able to say things, and it wouldn’t get put in print. But nowadays, you say one wrong thing and it’s plastered all over the chat rooms, and the blogs. It takes about one minute. I mean, there’s things on the internet I didn’t know I told anybody, but our team”
Seth Ambroz:
Regarding his goal…. “It was another grinding one. Boyder (Travis Boyd) made a great turnover play, got the puck to the net, and I was just fortunate enough to be there, get a piece of it, and put it in. You know what, I was a little surprised. They were just skating out, and obviously the turnover happened really quick, and I just went right to the net. So I guess a little surprised. But at the same time, our line has been creating turnovers all weekend, so I’m not surprised we were able to do another one there at the end. I think, for me, the success this weekend came with my line. All three of us were just working hard, causing turnovers, mucking it up, getting some energy and getting pucks to the net. It could have easily went to my line-mates too, scoring those goals. I’ve just been lucky enough to get em. A lot of credit goes to those guys. They’ve been working hard all year. I’m happy to be playing with Tommy (Serratore) and Travis (Boyd), and hopefully we can keep it going. Throughout the night we were able to get some chances, and cause some havoc. I was happy to see that he (Coach Lucia) has the confidence to put us out there in the last minute. It’s probably one of the biggest goals of my career. It does wonders with the lines confidence, with my confidence. Hopefully we can keep it going into Michigan State. We just need to keep our foot on the pedal, keep moving forward, and keep contributing as a line”
Regarding the game…. “Obviously, Wisconsin has a great team. They came off a bye week, so they might be a little bit rusty there in the first game, and they brought it tonight. This is a big win for us, just to see where our young guys were as a whole. Coming into the two-two game there in the third, and then going up, coming back to tie, and just being able to battle. So, I think for us, it was really just to see how our young guns would reply. I think our veterans as well. And we were able to come out on top. It was fun, and hopefully we can keep it going. Michigan State next weekend will be a good team as well. Hopefully we can close out here before the break”
Regarding the schedule…. “It’s only the six teams right now, and they’re all good teams, top to bottom. We’ve got some depth in the league, and every point counts now. So it was good to get it started out on the right foot”
Kyle Rau:
Regarding his face-off success…. “It’s huge. Anytime you can start with the puck, it’s what you want. Better than going to retrieve it. I’m coming along. I mean, I was a wing last year, and not taking them. So it takes time to get back into it. But yeah, I liked how my face-offs were this weekend”
Regarding falling behind early…. “It’s not what we want to do. Anytime you put yourself behind, it’s going to catch up to us at some point. We’ve gotta start coming out better”
Regarding the game…. “It’s huge. It’s good to get started like this. Especially in the first series, to get six points under our belt and get rolling. Seth (Ambroz) had a great game, and a great play at the end there. That was a great game. They’re a good team. I mean, they were picked to win the league. So it’s big just to get some confidence going into Big Ten play”
Regarding Hudson Fasching…. “He’s a big body. He needs two guys on him. I was just fortunate (Sam) Warning saw me backdoor. Actually, I was in the wrong spot. I wasn’t supposed to be there, but it all worked out”
Regarding the play of the Ambroz-Boyd-Serratore line… ”They were huge this weekend. There’s some studs on that line. It’s not like they’re a third line, they could be a first line for any team. They played big”
The Gophers will take on the Michigan State Spartans next weekend in East Lansing, Michigan. Game time is 6:00 PM (Central) on Friday, and 3:00 PM (Central) on Saturday. The games will be broadcast on Fox Sports North and FSN-PLUS.