Hockey completes second straight road sweep with 2-1 triumph at Notre Dame
January 22, 2013
Jamie Foland
907-474-6807
Two first-period power-play goals equaled three more points for the Alaska Nanooks as they beat No. 4/5 Notre Dame 2-1 on Saturday night at the Compton Family Ice Arena and completed a Central Collegiate Hockey Association series sweep for the second consecutive weekend.
The Nanooks (10-8-4, 8-7-3-1 CCHA) got man-advantage markers from senior Nik Yaremchuk (St. Albert, Alberta/Business Management) and freshman Tyler Morley (Burnaby, B.C./General Studies) and freshman netminder John Keeney turned aside 19-of-20 UND shots in helping Alaska capture their fourth straight victory.
"Their team came out pretty hard and had a real strong push but we weathered the storm," Alaska head coach Dallas Ferguson said. "I think for two periods it was pretty even but our guys played hard and I thought they did a really good job."
All of the goals were tallied in the first 20 minutes of play and Notre Dame's Mario Lucia opened the scoring with the lone Irish strike of the contest at 11:50.
Both Alaska goals were notched during a five-minute major (hitting from behind) whistled against UND's Thomas DiPauli at 14:46. Senior Jarret Granberg (Foremost, Alberta/Business Administration) got the puck from sophomore defenseman Trevor Campbell (Kansas City, Mo./Mechanical Engineering) and fired a shot on goal that Yaremchuk redirected mid-air past Irish goalie Steven Summerhays at 16:24 to tie the game 1-1.
Just 35 seconds later Granberg set up the Nanooks' second score of the period in similar fashion, putting the puck on net from center ice. This time Summerhays got a piece and made the initial stop, but Morley jumped on the loose rebound and flicked it into the back of the net to make it 2-1 at 16:59. Rookie defenseman Josh Atkinson (Spruce Grove, Alberta/Petroleum Engineering) fed the puck to Granberg, picking up his second assist of the weekend.
After a high-scoring shootout that saw nine goals scored in Friday's contest, both teams clamped down defensively the rest of the way and the goalies shut the door at each end to keep the game locked 2-1 for the final 40 minutes.
The Irish outshot Alaska 20-17 in the game and the Nanooks were 2-for-6 on the power play and 6-of-6 on the penalty kill.
Alaska travels back to Fairbanks on Sunday and will take the day off on Monday before returning to practice on Tuesday. They host Northern Michigan, who swept Ohio State in Marquette, Mich. this weekend, next Friday and Saturday, Jan. 25-26 (7:05 p.m.) at the Carlson Center.
"It's been a great two weekends for our guys, but it's only four games out of our schedule and we know that Northern Michigan is a team that's always played hard against and they've had our number over the last couple of years," Ferguson said.
"We'll enjoy the moment and feel good about what we've done but it's about putting it all together for the rest of the season and playing weekend by weekend and being prepared each time we come out."
Nanook Notes:
- The back-to-back weekend road sweeps marked the first time since joining the CCHA that the Nanooks won four straight to start the second half of the season. The last time Alaska was 4-0 to start a New Year was 1994, when they swept a road series at North Dakota and followed with back-to-back wins at home against Ferris State.
- The only other time in program history Alaska has gone 4-0 on the road to start the second half of the season was in Jan. 1984 when they picked up a string of wins at St. Olaf, St. Mary's, St. John's and Saint Cloud State.
- The Nanooks beat Notre Dame twice in South Bend during the regular season for the first time since Feb. 1-2, 2002, when they won 7-5 and 6-5. Alaska swept Notre Dame in South Bend 3-1 and 1-0 during the first round of the CCHA playoffs Mar. 3-4, 2006.
- Senior forward Jarret Granberg finished the weekend with five points, via two goals and three assists to improve his team-leading totals to 5-12--17 in 20 games this year. He is two points shy of matching his career best of 19 points (9g, 10a) in a season, which was achieved as a sophomore during the 2010-11 season through 38 games.