Mar 6, 2022
From Boys to Men, Huskies Grab Home Ice with Saturday Win over Duluth Bulldogs
by Blake Theisen / Sports Director / @blake_theisen
Both stories from this weekend’s series in Duluth are inside this article. For Friday’s story, please scroll down.
Saturday
Brett Larson called out his team on Friday night. He called them “boys” and implored them to “play like men” on Saturday night. His team didn’t disappoint him.
It was the second of at least four (and up to five) straight games between the Huskies and the Bulldogs. However, this was the one that decided who would finish in 4th place in the NCHC and get to sleep in their own beds next weekend. The Huskies needed all three points. They had to win in regulation.
In a must win game for home ice for the St. Cloud State men’s hockey team, they turned in one of their most complete efforts in a 2-0 victory over Minnesota Duluth on Saturday night in AMSOIL arena.
“I could tell they were ready to play,” Larson said of his team’s Saturday night performance. “I think they were embarrassed with the way they played last night and wanted to prove that’s not them. They came out determined.”
The Huskies buzzed for the first 10 minutes of Saturday’s game. They didn’t score but they did outshoot Duluth 7-1 and they passed the eye test. They were all over Bulldog goaltender Ryan Fanti and pressured their defenseman into turnovers.
“It helped that we had such a good start because I thought the start set the tone for how we played throughout the game,” said Larson. “We did take a penalty later in the first where they got some mojo, but I thought the start was huge combined with playing a patient defensive game where we didn’t give up a ton.”
The Huskies penalty kill and defensive play was superb. Part of that credit may be due to the one change the Huskies made Saturday night. After Friday’s game, Seamus Donohue was ruled out for Saturday. Donohue was described as “banged up a bit” and is expected to be back next weekend. Larson elected to give his alternate captain the night off by prioritizing the long view over the short term.
Luke Jaycox played for just the 11th time this season in place of Donohue. He brought a spark that could be felt right away. His first shift, he laid a heavy hit in the offensive zone. For a team that has played so many games in the last few weeks, Jaycox played with an energy that few players still have left in the tank in March.
“There was an emotional spark in there with him,” Larson said of Jaycox’s return to the ice. “No doubt about it. He’s a glue guy, a culture guy, and the guys love him.”
Jaycox helped kill a 1st period Duluth power play that continued to turn the momentum in favor of St. Cloud.
With time winding down in the opening period, popped the cork on Saturday night. Off a rink wide pass from Kevin Fitzgerald, Hentges corralled the puck and wired a back-pedaling wrist shot past Ryan Fanti to give SCSU the lead heading into the first break.
The offense found the mark again early in the 2nd period. Veeti Miettinen stole the puck from Duluth’s Matt Anderson at center ice to spring a 2-on-0 with his fellow ‘Finn Jami Krannila. Miettinen gave it off to Krannila who went right back across to Miettinen, and he slid it 5-hole past Fanti to push extend the Husky lead to 2-0 just like they had the night prior.
St. Cloud finished the night with just those 2 goals on 24 shots.
“We’ve talked before about the number of shots,” Larson said when asked about quality versus quantity of chances. “You know having 47 at home (two weeks ago when UMD game to St. Cloud) versus just 20 some last night. It wasn’t about that. It was just about being opportunistic. When we had a good opportunity, we needed to bury it and we did that tonight.”
The Huskies weren’t going to let the lead slip away this time. They clamped down, kept Duluth to the perimeter, and strangled the life out of the Bulldogs offense. When the defense did leak, David Hrenak bailed them out with timely saves. This weekend, Hrenak looked like the goaltender St. Cloud had down the stretch of last year’s Frozen Four run.
“I thought it was one of our better games defensively,” said Larson. “I would say on of Hrenak’s best weekends too. Whenever we needed him, he held us in there. Just very calm and poised and looked solid throughout the weekend.”
Hrenak turned away all 34 shots on goal and earned his 3rd shutout of the season and the 4th of his career against Duluth.
It wound up being a fun night for the Huskies. With home ice on the line, they’re just happy to be headed back home. It will without a doubt give them a huge boost next weekend to be at home one last time this season.
“It was a fun room,” Larson after Saturday’s game with music blaring and players hooting and hollering in the background. “The guys were excited. The rallying cry was kind of lets give the seniors and super seniors a couple more games at home. The opportunity to play at the best rink in college hockey and in front of the best fans. Life’s too short. You want another opportunity and I think the guys are excited to get back there and play.”
Up Next
Now the Huskies return home. They’ll look to reset and recharge with Duluth set to make the trip back to St. Cloud for the third time this season for next weekend’s NCHC Quarterfinal. These two teams are becoming very familiar with each other and have played more than any other two teams in college hockey the last two seasons.
“We’ll be meeting with our strength coach Jake Franczek right now,” said Larson. “We gotta make sure we manage the guys. Good work to rest ratio. I thought we did a good job this week and had our legs this weekend. So, that’s a good sign we’re doing the right things.”
“I am really glad we’re not gonna be standing in this hallway again next week. It would have been tough to come back to Duluth in five days. This is a tough place to play. Really had to grind it out and just excited to be headed home.”
The Huskies will need everyone next weekend with the strenuous schedule they’ve had since February. Duluth has had the same situation too. You can tell that emphasis on needing everyone even extended into this weekend.
The Huskies 4th line of Mason Salquist, Joe Molenaar, and Chase Brand got a bevy of ice time all weekend in Duluth. Brett Larson knows that depth is going to be critical in the next series with the Bulldogs.
“They have depth to and they’re not afraid to play their entire lineup,” Larson said. “We need to match that. It’s tough if you try and shorten your bench you can burn too much energy that way. We need to play at a high pace to be successful, so if we’re gonna do that we need to play everyone.”
The NCHC Quarterfinal next weekend is a best-of-3 series. The winner will advance to the NCHC Frozen Faceoff the following weekend in St. Paul. Start times for the series are to be determined, but play will begin on Friday and Saturday, with a third game on Sunday if necessary.
Friday
“I thought we played like boys tonight.”
It was pretty clear Brett Larson didn’t like his team’s effort on Friday night. Despite getting part of the job done in the battle for home ice, there were some glaring issues with the St. Cloud State Huskies men’s hockey team’s performance against the Duluth Bulldogs.
St. Cloud State came into this weekend’s series with Duluth needing 4 points, and they had to come in a specific fashion. Two regulation wins or one regulation win and forcing overtime in the other. Either would give them home ice in next weekend’s NCHC quarterfinal.
The Huskies took a lead and even added to it in the 2nd period Friday. Jami Krannila and Nick Perbix had the Huskies sitting good with a 2-0 lead 9:58 into the 2nd period. But if the first two meetings between these teams this season taught us anything, it was that neither team will die.
Duluth scored the next two goals to force overtime tied at 2. In an odd situation, the overtime meant next to nothing. The extra point didn’t matter for the NCHC standings. The marginal weight it carried was an extra 5% in the Pairwise rankings.
Regardless, had the Huskies just played better all game, they wouldn’t have been in a position to play the overtime.
“I think the biggest thing is we need to be a lot hungrier,” said Larson after Friday’s loss. “I wasn’t happy with our game tonight. I really wasn’t. I thought we played tentative.”
The marginal difference though made no difference for the Bulldogs. Kobe Roth, who tied the game at 2 on a 5-on-3 powerplay chance in the 3rd period, was the one who finished the Huskies off in overtime. It took just 31 seconds.
Roth picked up a puck behind the Husky net, and Husky forward Sam Hentges chased after Roth behind the goal. That left Roth with a ton of space in front of SCSU goaltender David Hrenak to pick his spot and shoot.
The Huskies had ample opportunities to close out Duluth on Friday night. Ahead 2-1 in the 3rd period, they drew a power play chance after Duluth’s Luke Loheit got called for boarding. That chance lasted just 45 seconds. Easton Brodzinski got caught looking back at the puck and skated right into a Bulldog and was called for interference.
Duluth worked through the 4-on-4 and got to their abbreviated powerplay before drawing another penalty. St. Cloud’s Josh Luedtke stepped up to lay a hit and went leg on leg with a Bulldog and was called for tripping.
Roth tied the game for Duluth on the ensuing 5-on-3.
“Our discipline hurt us obviously, taking a penalty on the power play kind of started the whole thing going the wrong direction for us,” Larson said. “They had discipline to not beat themselves tonight. We beat ourselves tonight.”
Despite the disappointing result, the Huskies still had a pretty simple task ahead of them on Saturday. Win a hockey game in 60 minutes and get to return to the Herb Brooks National Hockey Center next weekend.
“It was definitely disappointing,” Larson reiterated.” But at the same time, we get a chance in less than 24 hours to prove who we really are.”
“I’m glad David was very good. Second period I would point to some positives. We held them to two shots, and I thought we did find some legs there but overall disappointed. The only positive out of the whole night is that we needed to at least get one to overtime and we needed to win one in regulation, so we’re still fighting, and we got the chance to redeem ourselves tomorrow with how we play.”
David Hrenak finished with 23 and even an assist. He picked up the primary assist on Perbix’s 2nd period power play goal. It was his 2nd assist of the season and 3rd of his career.
Duluth’s Ryan Fanti finished with 19 stops on 21 shots. Both teams scored once on the power play.
EDIT: It should be noted that Larson did walk back some of his comments from Friday night prior to Saturday’s game. After watching the game back Saturday morning, he said the team played better than he initially led on.
