A good night’s sleep and a short memory was all Ryan Massa and the No. 12/13 Nebraska-Omaha Mavericks needed, apparently. The goaltender backstopped his team to a 5-2 on a 40-save effort, securing a series split with the No. 4/5 RedHawks.
The contest took a familiar course in the early going as Austin Ortega was the beneficiary of a beautiful Jake Guentzel feed, which he buried at 6:23 of the opening period to put Omaha on the board. Despite outshooting the Mavericks 15-2 heading into the first intermission, Massa and company shut every potentially open door.
A pair of goals by David Pope and the red-hot Ortega gave the Black and Red a three-goal lead just minutes into the second frame, but the RedHawks weaseled their way back in on a goal resulting from a mad scramble in the front of the Mavericks net. After a lengthy review, the strike was deemed legal and Riley Barber was credited with his eighth of the year.
The action reached a fever pitch at 7:55 of the third period when Cody Murphy ignited the home crowd for the fourth time this weekend on a high-slot rocket that beat a screened Massa on a power play. Miami fed off the energy and launched a salvo of shots in the direction of Massa, but a nifty play by Avery Peterson ended any hope of a comeback. The freshman forced a turnover in the neutral zone before burying a pretty breakaway attempt over the pad of Jay Williams. Jake Randolph added an empty-net exclamation mark in the waning moments and Omaha sealed the win.
“I think that’s what happens when you get beat 8-2 by a good team like Miami,” Nebraska-Omaha coach Dean Blais said. “Our guys have a lot of pride.”
It was the RedHawks who were left to lick their wounds and recover after an ultimately poor showing Saturday. Several turnovers resulted in points for the opposition and play in the neutral and defensive zones just wasn’t up to snuff, errors that weren’t overlooked by coach Enrico Blasi.
“They executed better than we did tonight,” Blasi stated. “They did a better job of finishing off their chances and we didn’t do a good job of taking care of the puck. We needed to be a little more determined with the puck and make better decisions, but give them credit, they outplayed us at times tonight, and they executed way better than we did.”
The win improves the Mavericks’ record to 8-4-2 and 4-3-1-1 in the National Collegiate Hockey Conference, while the loss takes the RedHawks to 11-5-0 and 7-3-0 in league play. The defeat also mars Williams’ stellar record, as it’s just the second dropped contest in 13 starts for the junior.
After being relieved of his duties after allowing four goals on 16 shots the previous evening, the 40-save effort was a return to form for Massa at the other end, who looked much more like the elite college goaltender that everyone — especially his coach — had grown accustomed to seeing between the pipes.
“Ryan Massa made three or four saves that were the difference in this game,” Blais said of the senior’s play. “I mean, we had one shot and one goal. They had about 12 or 15.”
The Mavericks are now 5-0 in games decided by a three-point differential, and have cemented themselves as NCHC contenders with 19 points following wins at North Dakota and Miami the past two weekends. Miami remains tied atop the conference standings with Minnesota-Duluth, which also has 21 points.
