Bemidji State finished a season sweep four months in the making with a 2-1 win over Minnesota Duluth on Tuesday at Amsoil Arena in Duluth. It was a makeup game of the season opener on Oct. 9 that was postponed due to a power outage.
Below are my thumbs up and thumbs down from Tuesday’s game, plus my three stars of the night.
Thumbs up to the UMD power play converting again
Yes, the Bulldogs did squander a Bemidji State major penalty in the first period and the ‘Dogs failed to score on a 93-second two-man advantage during that five-minute-plus power play, but earlier in the first UMD scored its second power play goal in three games.
Freshman wing Adam Johnson buried a shot from the left face off circle into the BSU net to tie the game at 1-1. He admitted afterwards he didn’t realize he had scored until his teammates came his way to celebrate.
I suppose scoring on the power play is still a surprise for UMD. The Bulldogs went 10-straight games without a power play goal before last weekend. Now they’re 2-for-12 in their last three games. That’s a 16 percent success rate, which doesn’t sound great until you consider the team has a 14.5 percent success rate for the entire season.
Here’s hoping UMD continues to make progress in that category moving forward.
Thumbs down to taking Bemidji State too lightly
After the Oct. 9 season opener in Duluth got postponed, UMD opened the season the next night in Bemidji and lost 3-2 after giving up a goal in the final minute. That loss dropped UMD to 0-4-1 against Bemidji State dating back to December of 2012.
Despite that recent record — which includes a loss to the Beavers at the North Star College Cup a year ago — and the 3-2 defeat on Oct. 10, Johnson suggested his team thought Tuesday’s game would be an easy one.
“I don’t think we came ready to play,” Johnson said. “We thought maybe it was going to be an easy game and we took them lightly and it came back to bite us.
After that response, I admit I kind of asked a bit of a d*** question. How do you take a team lightly that beat you to start the season?
“It was a home game,” Johnson said. “They’re obviously not ranked very high, but we didn’t respect them like we should have. They’re a good team. They play good defensively. They’re hard to play against. If we came ready to play, we would have had a good chance, but we didn’t.”
I’m not sure what’s more disappointing. That mentality or the lack of emotion junior center Dominic Toninato said his team displayed in what he and many others considered a must-win if UMD wanted a shot at an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament.
“There was nothing,” UMD junior center Dominic Toninato said of Tuesday’s game. “There was no emotion. There was no talk on the bench. Guys were dead and it showed. We didn’t play how we should have.
“We had no room for error. It’s late February. We got six games left and we’re on the outside looking in. We need every (win) right now and that’s going to hurt us.”
Matt’s Three Stars
3. UMD freshman wing Adam Johnson: He scored the Bulldogs lone goal of the night. It came on the power play midway through the first period to tie the game 1-1.
2. BSU sophomore defenseman Brett Beauvais: His goal 1:47 into Tuesday’s game put the Bulldogs down 1-0.
1. BSU senior wing Markus Gerbrandt: He tallied the game-winner exactly at the 10-minute mark of the third period to put BSU ahead 2-1.