Wolverines sweep weekend, season series with Wisconsin
By @SKubus –
ANN ARBOR – Heading off the ice after 40 minutes in Saturday’s afternoon tilt tied 2-2 with the Wisconsin Badgers, Michigan head coach Red Berenson said his team needed their “best period of the weekend” to come away with the victory.
The Wolverines didn’t disappoint.
No. 17 Michigan topped Wisconsin 3-0 Friday night at Yost and, with a 5-2 win Saturday, swept the Badgers for the season series, outscoring them 21-6. Junior goaltender Steve Racine turned aside all 22 pucks he faced Friday night for his first career shutout, and then only allowed two goals on 28 shots to win again Saturday afternoon.
“Once the game progressed the way it did, either way, it didn’t matter,” Berenson said. “It was up to us to have our best period of the weekend and I liked the way we answered the bell in the third period.”
After his nine-game goal-scoring drought came to an end Friday night, sophomore forward JT Compher picked up right where he left off in Saturday’s tilt against the Wisconsin Badgers.
Compher, a product of the U.S. National Team Development Program, recorded an empty-netter with 1:03 to play in the third period Friday to escape the drought, and sometimes that’s it takes for a player to get the proverbial monkey off his back. The Buffalo Sabres prospect followed that up by recording a hat trick to help bury the Badgers.
“It was a good weekend,” Compher said. “I think that we had some good chemistry with me, Andrew (Copp) and Alex Kile. I think we got a lot of chances yesterday and even at the beginning of this game, so it’s nice to feel good out there and to get a couple felt good, as well.”
Click on the image above to see MiHockey’s photo gallery from Friday’s win (photos by Andrew Knapik/MiHockey)
Having a stable backbone between the pipes like Racine has given the Wolverines a confidence boost up front.
“I thought Steve was really good,” Copp said. “That’s something he’s worked for and I think that we’ve needed, so he obviously had a good weekend.”
Wisconsin took a 1-0 lead late in the opening period, as a mad scramble in the crease allowed Ryan Wagner to bang home a rebound goal. That sent the Wolverines off the ice down a goal after the game’s first 20 minutes.
Selman tied things up 4:53 into the second stanza, corralling a drop pass in the high slot and snapping it home in the far corner over the glove of Wisconsin netminder Joel Rumpel.
On the powerplay late in the period, Tyler Motte took a feed at the goal line from Andrew Copp along the half wall to the right of Rumpel. Motte immediately turned and spun a no-look backhand pass to the other side where Compher slid in the back door and buried his sixth of the season. That gave the Wolverines a big 2-1 lead.
“It’s been a work in progress,” Berenson said of the powerplay. “We’ve had some really good moments and then some not-so-good moments, but I think you could just see it getting better month-to-month.”
But with 28.2 seconds remaining in the frame, the Badgers took their turn to knot the game up, as Grant Besse scored for Wisconsin after a lengthy video review. It was a bizarre play, as the puck was tipped on goal, bounced off the crossbar straight up in the air and as it came down, Racine attempted to use his blocker to knock the puck out, but it fell down and eventually bounced off the ice across the goal line. That provided both teams with a clean slate to start the third, with things tied up at two aside.
But Selman potted his second of the game with 7:42 remaining in the final period, a big insurance tally that made it 4-2 for the Wolverines set up beautifully by Detroit Red Wings prospect Dylan Larkin. Compher added the empty-netter to give the Wolverines the 5-2 final and put them back on top in the Big Ten.
“It’s huge, it’s something we’ve worked for all spring, all summer and every day in practice, so we can’t look too much at it right now,” Selman said. “We have a big weekend coming up with Penn State, but it’s nice to end the weekend in first place.”