Johnston, Denis lead Ferris State to second round

After a CCHA playoff exit earlier than most expected, there were questions of how the Ferris State Bulldogs would respond in the NCAA Tournament.

Any doubts have now been put to rest.

The Bulldogs played a solid 60 minutes to top a skilled Denver squad 2-1 and advance to the regional final. Ferris State will take on the winner of the Michigan vs. Cornell game that will be played later tonight.

Jordie Johnston and Simon Denis scored for the CCHA regular-season champions, while Taylor Nelson made 25 saves in goal.

“I feel very blessed and privileged to continue moving forward,” coach Bob Daniels said. “Obviously I felt like we played a fairly strong game, and that’s typical of how we play in terms of coverage in our defensive zone, and when we made mistakes I thought Taylor Nelson was more than up to the task tonight.”

Drew Shore had the lone goal for the Pioneers, who finish the season with a 25-14-4 record. Meanwhile, the Bulldogs improve to 24-11-5.

“They’re very good at transitioning,” defenseman Chad Billins said. “We just had to make sure we kept our gaps up as a defensemen, and try to make them dump the puck. It seemed like if they had an opportunity, Taylor was there.”

Johnston gave his team the first lead of the contest 4:30 into the second period. Garrett Thompson drove deep into the Denver end, skating along the boards and avoiding pressure from the Pioneers’ defense. With a sweep of his stick on the backhand, he found Johnston driving to the goal, and the senior forward fired a one-timer past goaltender Sam Brittain for the game’s first goal.

Denis added what would turn out to be the game-winner 2:54 into the third period. The freshman defenseman fired a rocket from the slot past Brittain to increase the Bulldogs lead, and eventually earn them a spot in the regional final.

Daniels said that the long layoff for his team – the Bulldogs didn’t make it to the CCHA championship weekend at the Joe due to their quarterfinals loss to Bowling Green – was still evident on the ice.

“To some extent, I know it worked against Denver to play as much as they have been playing lately, but it also worked against us to the extent that we were a little sloppy with passes in the first period, we had some pucks bouncing that we normally would have handled, but I think as the game went on, we improved, and we’ll be a better team tomorrow for the game we got under our belt today.”