Ferris State falls short in NCAA title game
By Derek Berry –
TAMPA – The Ferris State Bulldogs felt like a team of destiny.
They came into the NCAA tournament on a down note, having lost a tough series to last place Bowling Green in the CCHA playoffs.
Then the tournament began and the Bulldogs got on a roll which unfortunately hit a tough turn in the national championship game. But Ferris State is on the map now, when many didn’t know who they were.
The Bulldogs fell to the Boston College Eagles 3-1, in front of 18,819 fans at the Tampa Bay Times Forum, the site of the 2012 NCAA Frozen Four. They were looking to become the first team to capture a national championship game in its first appearance since Maine pulled the trick in 1993.
With the Eagles clinging to a 2-1 lead late in the game, BC forward Johnny Gaudreau broke free from Ferris State defenseman Brett Wysopal, a Colorado College transfer, and used a sweet backhand to go top shelf on Bulldogs senior goaltender Taylor Nelson, to make it 3-1 and seal Ferris’ fate.
Ferris State head coach Bob Daniels was extremely proud of the way his team played.
“I thought it was a perfect game for us,” said Daniels, who won CCHA and national coach of the year honors. “I have zero regret about this, other than the fact that I would have liked to obviously have had the title for the players.”
Ferris showed some early spunk and nerves too when sophomore forward Garrett Thompson, of Traverse City, led an odd-man rush down the ice but lost the handle. Thompson, junior forward Matthew Kirzinger and senior forward Jordie Johnston, the Bulldogs scoring leader, were the big catalysts for Ferris State creating the most traffic and headaches in front of Parker Milner, Boston College’s outstanding goaltender, particularly Thompson.
Not long after that break for Ferris, their defense couldn’t corral a bouncing puck and the Eagles made them pay, with Steven Whitney knocking home a big, juicy rebound given up by Nelson.
Two minutes later, the Bulldogs attacked relentlessly and tied it. Thompson was again involved in the play, slipping around the Boston College defense, attacked the net and banged in the rebound past Milner and the large contingent Ferris fans that made the trip down I-75 from Big Rapids, went crazy.
While Ferris State continued to attack and had some good puck movement, they drew a penalty, something they didn’t do much against Union College in their semifinal win.
The result was a shot from the point by BC junior defenseman Brian Dumoulin, deflected at waist level by Eagles senior forward Paul Carey, giving Boston College a 2-1 edge heading into the first intermission.
If it weren’t for some early mistakes and soft shots and passes, the Bulldogs may have ended the first period tied or even ahead. But BC takes advantage of opponents who make mistakes. Just ask the Minnesota Gophers who made six too many in a lopsided defeat to the Eagles in their semifinal match.
The second period was played fairly evenly. Boston College had a few dangerous chances, in which Nelson stood tall, while Ferris’ chances were rather limited. The Bulldogs even drew four power plays but the Eagles penalty killers never allowed many scoring chances and disrupted Ferris State’s passing lanes.
The third period began with a power play for Ferris on a roughing call to BC sophomore forward Bill Arnold. But it was those power plays – four of them to be exact – that will leave Ferris State wondering what might have been if they had converted.
Johnston said not converting killed his team’s chances in such a big game.
“Probably would have changed the outcome quite a bit,” said Johnston, when asked about the power plays making a difference in the game. “We made some plays, {got} some pucks to the net, but it just didn’t go in.”
But perhaps it was less Ferris State’s ability to convert on those power plays and more Boston College’s s aggressiveness on the penalty kill. They didn’t give the Bulldogs much room to maneuver. In some ways, Ferris’ power plays didn’t even feel like man advantages.
“They’re so aggressive and they’re so quick,” said Daniels of BC’s penalty kill.
Still, the Bulldogs refused to be beaten, even in defeat. There were no tears. And Ferris State felt like it put itself on the map just by making it all the way to the championship game.
“What a year we’ve had, and I’m extremely proud of every individual in that locker room,” said Nelson. “I can honestly look at each player in that room and know that no one left anything on the table.
“All season long, we sacrificed for one another. We bled for one another. And as far as what it means to the program, I mean, I think in our minds, it’s made history.”
Senior defenseman Chad Billins of Marysville was equally satisfied with the Bulldogs season, despite their falling short in the final game.
“We’re not going to try to hang our heads or anything like that,” he said. “Obviously, it’s a tough loss. BC came to play tonight, too. We just didn’t get the outcome that we wanted.”
The question on some minds following the loss: Is Ferris State’s hockey program for real or one and done? If you asked the players and Daniels, they would tell you no, not at all.
“There’s so much leadership in that room,” said Johnston. “There’s a lot of guys that will step up, even more next year. We’re so proud to have been on a team that kind of started the ball rolling, I think, for this program.”
Daniels reminded everyone of the dynamics of college hockey, getting to the brink like Ferris State did, is not an easy task for any team, especially navigating the always rough waters of the CCHA.
“College hockey is so hard right now,” he said. “There’s so many good, quality teams. We’ll gladly try and do it again next year. But it’s really tough. Our conference, just to get out of that, it seems like it’s a monumental task.”
Daniels said maybe someday, when the pain of the loss wears off on his squad, they’ll all get back together and remember this historic run, which would’ve been the school’s first major national championship of any kind.
Thompson, who had a superb game himself, added, “Even with this loss, I still feel proud of everybody on this team. Years to come, we’re still going to be a close group.”
Boston College coach Jerry York, no stranger to the CCHA having coached Bowling Green for several years back in the 1980s and leading the Falcons to a national title in 1984, said he knew Ferris State wasn’t going to be easy to defeat.
“We knew Ferris State was going to be outstanding as a team,” said York, who has led the Eagles to three national championships in the last five years, including the 2010 title played at Ford Field in Detroit. “They don’t have the name recognition. Generally, when we get to Frozen Fours we’re playing Michigan State, we’re playing Wisconsin, North Dakota, but we really analyzed how Ferris got here and they won a league that sent five teams to the NCAA {tournament}. We knew right away, looking at their history, they have an excellent club. You don’t just throw sticks out and win that league.”
NOTES
No such thing as a small school: York said he understood Ferris State’s situation going into the game saying it wasn’t true they had nothing to lose. “So, everybody’s got something to lose at this point,” he said. “Unless you don’t want to win a trophy.”
Almost gone: York and Daniels both talked about how Ferris State actually dropped its hockey program 21 years ago. Daniels said community support was strong to bring hockey back. Repackaging and reselling the Ferris brand to potential recruits took a very long time, hence the success of the Bulldogs program now. “It took a little bit of time to get over the perception that the program had been dropped,” said Daniels. “We might have lost a few hockey games (during the rebuilding years) but we never lost our fans.”
National awards: The Hobey Baker ceremony, which took place at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, was won by Jack Connolly, senior forward from Minnesota-Duluth, which defeated Michigan in the 2011 national championship game in St. Paul, Minn.
The Hockey Humanitarian Award was won by Aleca Hughes, senior forward for the Yale University women’s team. Hughes founded the Mandi Schwartz Foundation named in honor of her former teammate who passed away after a three-year battle with leukemia.
2012 FROZEN FOUR ALL-TOURNAMENT TEAM
F – Kyle Bonis, Ferris State
F – Paul Carey, Boston College
F – Steven Whitney, Boston College
D – Chad Billins, Ferris State
D – Brian Dumoulin, Boston College
G – Parker Milner, Boston College (also named Most Outstanding Player)