ORONO, Maine — The University of Minnesota at Duluth may have lost five of its top six scorers and its workhorse goalie off last year’s NCAA runner-up team, but you don’t need to throw a pity party for coach Scott Sandelin.
The Bulldogs, with eight freshmen in their lineup including five defensemen, used a first-period, power-play goal by Parker Mackay, a second-period even-strength goal by Riley Tufte and 26 saves from sophomore Hunter Shepard to complete a sweep of the University of Maine on Saturday night, 2-0, at Alfond Arena.
The 10th-ranked Bulldogs improved to 4-2-2 while UMaine fell to 2-4. Duluth had beaten UMaine 2-1 on Friday night.
Minnesota Duluth had a sizeable edge in puck possession and attacking zone time over the first 40 minutes and outshot the Black Bears 30-15 while building a well-deserved 2-0 lead.
UMaine freshman goalie Jeremy Swayman made 12 Grade-A (high-percentage) saves among his 28 over the first two periods to keep his Black Bears within striking distance. He finished with 35 stops.
The desperate Black Bears, thanks to three power plays including a 17-second five-on-three, attacked the Duluth net in the third period but Shepard came up with eight Grade-A saves among his 11 in the period to record his first collegiate shutout.
“I thought our team played great,” Sandelin said. “I can’t say enough about the effort from our guys. The guys did a helluva’ job. It was a good character win for our team and we deserved to win.
“It was a hard-fought game. We knew it would be a war,” Sandelin added. “We had a much better night as far as [offensive] zone time. Defensively, the guys did a much better job in coverage. We played a little loose on Friday night so the guys needed to tighten it up. We had five freshmen defenseman and they did an outstanding job all night.”
“They’re a great team,” UMaine junior defenseman and alternate captain Rob Michel said. “They’re in the top ten 10. Hats off to them. They’re really structured, especially in the [defensive] zone. They block a lot of shots. It’s hard to get shots through [to the goalie].”
The Bulldogs blocked 12 shots, limited UMaine to very few odd-man rushes and effectively cleared rebounds to prevent Shepard from facing many second opportunities.
“It was a hard-fought hockey game,” UMaine head coach Red Gendron said. “We played our best period in the third period but the bottom line is we didn’t find a way to bury our chances. We had several good ones that would have gotten us back into the game or won it for us. Full marks to their goalie and to their team for sifting a couple by [Swayman]. He played very, very well for us.”
Junior right wing Mackay scored what turned out to be the game-winner with 5:32 left in the first period and Ryan Smith in the penalty box for interference.
Defenseman Scott Perunovich had the puck near the left wing boards and found the open Mackay in the middle of the slot. Mackay took Perunovich’s pass, took a few strides to his right and wristed a 20-footer over Swayman’s glove.
Peter Krieger also picked up an assist.
Krieger and Perunovich set up Tufte’s goal off a two-on-one with 1:13 remaining in the second period.
The Black Bears were in the middle of a line change when Perunovich sent the puck up the left wing side in the neutral zone to Krieger.
Krieger raced down the left side and slipped a precise pass over to Tufte and he snapped a 22-foot wrister into the short side corner before Swayman could scramble across.
Gendron explained that one of his forwards tried to “make a move” on a three-on-three rush, but he made a “pretty bad turnover” and it was compounded by the fact another forward was “tired” and had come off the ice on a change and one of his defensemen had jumped up into the attack.
That left them susceptible to the two-on-one.
“To beat a good goalie, you’ve got to get your shot away quick,” said Sandelin, who felt both Mackay and Tufte did that on their goals.
In the third period, the Black Bears had two glorious rapid-fire chances on a power play midway through but Shepard got the nob of his stick on Nolan Vesey’s wrister through a congested net front from the he right circle and then flashed out his pad to rob Eduards Tralmaks off the rebound.
“That was a turning point. He came up with big saves at the right time and they capitalized on two mistakes we gave them and that’s what good teams do. They make you pay for those mistakes,” said Michel.
UMaine will return to action at 7:15 p.m. Friday and 4 p.m. Saturday when it visits the University of Massachusetts at Lowell for a pair of Hockey East games.
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