By Sam O’Toole –
KALAMAZOO – After a high intensity battle Friday night that ended in a loss, the Western Michigan University Broncos looked to pick up two crucial points in National Collegiate Hockey Conference (NCHC) play.
Yet Western Michigan (6-7-3) was unable to do so on Saturday at Lawson Ice Arena, as they fell to North Dakota (7-7-2) by the same result as the previous night, 3-2.
Kenney Morrison and Justin Kovacs (Shelby Township) were the goal-scorers for the Broncos. Western Michigan scored both goals with the man-advantage, their first power-play goals against a conference foe.
Three different players scored for North Dakota, and Luke Johnson chipped in with two assists, his second consecutive game with multiple points.
Western Michigan coach Andy Murray said he knew what North Dakota’s game plan would be coming into the series.
“They are a team that hangs around and they battle you,” Murray said. “They have played this way for a long long time. Their program is based on having one outstanding offensive unit, puck moving defenseman, and a bunch of other guys that just battle you all night.”
Goaltender Zane Gothberg stopped 23 shots for North Dakota Saturday, after stopping 36 the night before.
“We gave our opponents credit, their goaltender had a tremendous weekend,” Murray said. “He played very well against us but we can’t keep crediting the goaltender, ultimately we need to take responsibility ourselves. We will battle, fight, scratch and claw to try to score some goals but when you don’t get it done, there aren’t many more victories.”
Nolan Laporte added two assists for the home team, giving him a total of three points in the series against North Dakota.
Frank Slubowski was pulled 6:55 into the second period after North Dakota scored their third goal of the game.
“Taking Frank out of the game was not anything relative to Frank,” Murray said. “It was the fact that we had given up 14 shots and had three goals against and I cannot fault him on the goals. Bottom line is we needed to change something in the dynamic of the hockey game and that is why we changed goaltenders.”
Western Michigan came out on fire and capitalized on their second powerplay of the game with just under five minutes into the first period. Chase Balisy carried the puck into the offensive zone and left it for Morrison who blasted it by Gothberg for the first goal of the night.
Saturday’s game marked the fifth time this season that the Broncos lost despite scoring the first goal.
North Dakota didn’t record their first shot on goal until the 11:36 mark in the first period, but it proved to be vital. Dillon Simpson put the puck home off a Luke Johnson missed shot from the point to tie the game, 1-1.
North Dakota took the lead with 3:15 left in the first period after Paul Ladue’s shot from the point caught the stick of Bryn Chyzyk.
North Dakota extended their lead with just under seven minutes into the second period when Rocco Grimaldi finessed his way through the Broncos’ defense for his six goal of the season.
The Broncos answered in the final period and cut North Dakota’s lead to one goal with 3:26 remaining in with a power-play goal from Kovacs. The junior now has 15 points in 16 games for Western Michigan.
Western Michigan fought for the tying goal in the closing minutes of the contest, but Gothberg made an incredible right pad save with 25 seconds remaining in the game to keep the Broncos from forcing overtime.
The Broncos are now on a four-game losing streak in conference play, and Murray reiterated after the game the quality of his team’s effort, but the effort needs to translate to wins.
“We played a hard working, determined North Dakota team that we knew would battle us tooth and nail all weekend,” said Murray. “We are unhappy that we did not get a win here tonight and that’s the bottom line.”
Western Michigan hits the road next weekend to face-off against conference opponent, Minnesota-Duluth (6-7-1). Puck drops at 8:07 p.m. on both Friday and Saturday.