Looking back through our 2023-24 NCHC season preview, I wrote the following about Minnesota Duluth, before picking the Bulldogs to finish fifth in the league:
“There are only four freshmen, and I like the level of continuity this squad has now, only a year after there was a lot to replace. The issue is that, although I see an improved UMD team this season, much if not all of the rest of the conference is going to be better, too.”
The truth in that statement will have been forgotten about by the fact that UMD finished seventh. When those words were being written, though, back at the start of October, there was no way of knowing just what all would ail coach Scott Sandelin’s squad.
Injuries have affected the Bulldogs (12-18-5 overall, 8-14-2 NCHC), as did sophomore forward Cole Spicer being ruled academically ineligible for the second semester. More recently, UMD was on a 0-7-1 slide heading into last week’s last games of the regular season, at home to 18th-ranked St. Cloud State. But the Bulldogs took both games, 6-5 in overtime on Friday and 4-2 on Saturday.
“We hung in there all weekend, and I give our guys a lot of credit because it’s been a rough year and we’ve been in a lot of close games but haven’t found a way to win a lot of those,” Sandelin said. “This weekend was very similar to that, except that we found ways to win those games. We haven’t won a lot in our last six, seven, eight games, but I’ve been proud of our effort.”
Sophomore goaltender Zach Sandy got a win in his first collegiate start Friday, on a night when UMD twice erased two-goal deficits. Ben Steeves, the Bulldogs’ leading scorer this season, bagged two goals and got the winner with seven seconds left in overtime, 15 seconds after UMD went on a very late power play. That was his 13th goal of the season where the Bulldogs were skating a man up.
They got the win despite losing another forward, sophomore center Jack Smith, to an injury in the first period. Joey Pierce moved into that role, as he had a few times earlier in this season.
UMD then honored seven of its players Saturday for Senior Night. One of them, graduate student Matthew Thiessen, made a career-high 52 saves in the Bulldogs’ 4-2 victory. St. Cloud erased a 2-0 deficit from the second period, but Aiden Dubinsky scored the eventual game-winner with 8:37 left, and Luke Loheit added an empty-netter just before the final horn sounded. Steeves set up the winning goal, and Thiessen had the second assist on Loheit’s.
Thiessen told gathered media after the game that the series against SCSU showed what these Bulldogs are capable of. Speaking on Tuesday, ahead of the Bulldogs’ trip to face second-seeded Denver in the first round of the NCHC playoffs, Sandelin agreed with that statement.
“We’ve been in a ton of games,” he said. “We’ve had 14 overtime games and have been either tied, behind by a goal, ahead by a goal and then at times we’ve shot ourselves in the foot with little detail things that are so important in tight games. Turnovers that lead to goals, bad penalties, missed faceoff assignments, those kinds of things, but we’ve been right there.
“Hopefully this last weekend gave our guys a little bit more belief that, ‘Hey, we can win games if we stick with it and do the right things.’ Obviously, we have a tough task ahead of us this weekend, but we’ll go grind it out like we always do.
“Our fourth- and fifth-year guys have been factors, and we need those guys,” Sandelin continued. “We’re missing some key guys, and those guys really stepped up, but every player is important and they’ve had great value for their program. We’re going to lean on those guys, and we need them to be good for us here this weekend and hopefully beyond.”
