Spartans finish first half with 3-1 win over Bulldogs at Munn

By Stefan Kubus –

EAST LANSING – A team prone to dry offensive spells broke the cycle on Saturday night to win its first game in over a month.

This season, the Spartans are 0-10-1 when scoring two goals or fewer. The Spartans found the offensive spark tonight to score three goals – courtesy of Matt Berry, Chris Forfar and Tanner Sorenson – on the Ferris State Bulldogs for a 3-1 victory in front of 6,484 fans at Munn Ice Arena. That snapped an 0-6-1 winless skid and four-game winless run against the Bulldogs.

“I was happy with our 60-minute performance tonight,” said Spartans head coach Tom Anastos. “I thought that, as far as the type of game we wanted to play, we executed it pretty darn well all night.

“I thought we were very strong defensively… I thought [Jake Hildebrand] again played outstanding. He made some huge saves… It was nice to see the puck go in the net a little bit tonight and get the kind of result we got.”

The first period saw the Spartans pepper Bulldogs sophomore goaltender CJ Motte – 7-6-3, 2.20 GAA, .930 save percentage – with seven official shots, but most of those were also quality scoring opportunities. Meanwhile, Ferris State sent four shots the way of Michigan State freshman netminder Jake Hildebrand, including a couple good chances early.

But alas, both teams would head into the dressing rooms scoreless.

Early on in the second frame, after killing off a Greg Wolfe minor penalty, the Spartans constructed some tremendous pressure in the Ferris State zone that would set the stage for them to strike first.

At 6:52 of the second period, the Spartans would get that crucial first goal, courtesy of sophomore Berry.

Entering the zone on clean breakout passes from senior alternate captain Matt Grassi and sophomore Brent Darnell, Matt DeBlouw pulled up to buy some time for his teammates to get traffic in front of Motte. He then put a puck on net that Berry tipped through Motte’s five-hole to make it 1-0.

Berry increased his team lead in points; he now has nine goals and 16 points on the season.

Wolfe, the Spartans’ captain said it was that kind of offense that his team had been searching for.

“I think definitely coming up the ice, a line with three or four guys together as one, we’ve kind of been lacking,” Wolfe said. “We’ve had one guy trying to beat two guys or a two-on-two that nothing really comes of it. I thought tonight, the whole game we had a lot of odd-man rushes and we had a lot of numbers offensively, so I think that was the biggest positive. We were able to generate a lot more scoring chances off the rush.

“I think that’s the most pressure we’ve put on a goalie since the Michigan game. We kept wearing them down and wearing them down, and eventually the puck started going in.”

The Bulldogs would not sit back, however, responding with a goal of their own at 15:49 of the second stanza.

Ferris State forward Cory Kane sent a pass back to defenseman Jason Binkley at the point, who ripped a slap shot through some traffic in front and past Hildebrand to tie things up at one aside.

Things would stay that way after two periods, with Ferris State taking the edge in shots, 12-11.

In the third, Michigan State would take control to dictate the remainder of the game, lighting the lamp twice on goals by Chris Forfar and Tanner Sorenson, Saturday night’s second and first stars of the game, respectively.

First, Wolfe won a draw back to defenseman RJ Boyd – he tallied two assists on the night, good for the third star of the game – who ripped a slap shot from the point that Forfar tipped home past Motte.

Next, it was Sorenson at 11:24 of the third period, when he entered the Ferris State zone and pulled up to buy time much like DeBlouw did on the Berry goal. This time, the Bulldogs’ defense backed in toward its own goal. Untouched, Sorenson walked in and ripped a slap shot past Motte from the top of the left circle for a 3-1 lead.

After the game, Sorenson said that goal was dedicated to a teammate going through surgery.

“Well, if I was lying I would say it went straight in, but it got tipped by their ‘D’, so I got kind of lucky,” Sorenson said. “But if you throw it to the net, you get lucky like that sometimes. So I guess the bounces were going for me. Connor Wood was going through surgery this week, so I told him I’d score a goal for him, so luck was on my side.

And despite late penalty trouble, Hildebrand and the Spartans’ PK held down the fort to secure the desperately-needed victory.

“It was important to get a good result out of this game,” Anastos said of the victory.

Notes: For the fourth-straight home game, Munn Ice Arena has housed 6,000 fans or more… Saturday night was the annual Teddy Bear Toss, in which fans threw teddy bears onto the ice following the Spartans’ first goal. Those bears are being donated to local Sparrow Hospital for the children… Saturday night’s game marked RJ Boyd’s first multi-point performance of his Spartan career.