Game Gab - Nightly Post-Game Analysis
Come here after the games for analysis and insights from CHN Staff members.
Sunday, March 17, 2013
Friday, March 15, 2013
Denver 5, Colorado College 3 - Friday, March 15, 2013
Eleven different players had points for Denver, as it held off intra-state rival CC in a wide open game. The win clinches a 12th consecutive 20-win season for the Pioneers, the longest streak of any program. Denver has also only been defeated once over its last 11 games on the Magness Arena ice.
Sunday, March 10, 2013
Denver 6, Alaska-Anchorage 1 - Sunday, March 10, 2013
Shawn Ostrow scored twice as Denver took care of the hapless Seawolves in a two-game sweep. Anchorage now gets to play at St. Cloud in next week's playoffs. Denver will host cross-state rival Colorado College for two.
Saturday, March 2, 2013
Minnesota 5, Denver 1 - Saturday, March 2, 2013
It took a while to get going on the weekend, but when it did, it really did. Minnesota was shut out at home Friday by Denver, and was being stymied again through the first period Saturday. But the Gophers finally broke through, then took the lead on a power-play one-timer by Nick Bjugstad, and rolled to the win. That gets Minnesota back within two points of first, tied with North Dakota for second, with one weekend remaining. St. Cloud State has the toughest scheduled of the three, having to travel to Wisconsin.
Saturday, February 23, 2013
North Dakota 6, Denver 1 - Saturday, February 23, 2013
North Dakota gets the split. After losing a close on Friday, ND throttles Denver in the rematch to move within one point of second-place Minnesota with two weekends remaining. Denver, meanwhile, winds up the weekend in a tie for the final home-ice spot in the WCHA with idle Wisconsin. Nobody was happy on North Dakota with Friday's 5-4 loss, in which it gave up 41 shots and Zane Gothberg was pulled early in the second period. Saturday, Clarke Saunders got the start and the defense held Denver to a more reasonable 29 shots. Denver actually scored first, but Danny Kristo (20), Carter Rowney (8) and Rocco Grimaldi responded for a 3-1 lead after one, and that was it.
"Obviously a big bounce-back win after last night," forward Mark MacMillan said. "Last night wasn't good enough. We came out today and special teams were great, and that's what you need to do this time of year to win games." ... said UND coach Dave Hakstol: "It was a game with so much specialty teams play that there were a lot of guys that didn't get a lot of minutes. The difference from last night is every time we had guys on the ice, they were contributing in one way or another. That was what I thought we were missing in last night's game."
Juho Olkinuora played brilliant for Denver in net Friday, but was pulled after allowing three goals on eight shots in favor of Sam Brittain. It was a chippy game throughout, and then Denver really got frustrated late, as defenseman Scott Mayfield took 14 minutes in penalties with nine seconds left.
"No matter who's playing in net you're going to try getting pucks and bodies to the net," said MacMillan. "He's been phenomenal against us all year. The more you go to the net on a goalie the more you're going to get to him and today we just happened to get to him."
Saturday, February 9, 2013
Colorado College 6, Denver 5 - Saturday, February 9, 2013
It hasn't been the greatest of seasons for Colorado College, but this is why rivalries are great -- they bring out the best in everyone. After the tie in Denver on Friday, a 1-1 affair, this was more wide open as the scene switched to Colorado Springs. CC freshman Hunter Fejes scored two goals, including the game winner with 10.5 seconds remaining in overtime, giving the Tigers three points for the weekend, and playing a bit of spoiler to the Pioneers, who had been playing well coming into the weekend.
Saturday, January 19, 2013
St. Cloud State 5, Denver 1 - Saturday, January 19, 2013
St. Cloud moved into a tie for first place in the WCHA with a glowing performance on the weekend, sweeping Denver. Defenseman Nick Jensen had a pair of goals in Friday's 5-2 win. Everyone got involved all weekend, with goals on Saturday from Dave Morley (2), Drew Leblanc and Ben Hanowski. Because its non-league record isn't very good (the Huskies have been swept in series against New Hampshire and Northern Michigan, and split with RPI), they are just No. 14 in the Pairwise, but being in first place in the WCHA at this point is huge. “We felt, not that our season was slipping away from us, but we were in a slide and needed a big weekend to jump start us,” LeBlanc said to the St. Cloud Times. “Both nights, we were just attacking and flying around and buzzing. It came down to we out-competed them, a good, hard-working team.”
Denver has been a mercurial bunch this season, hot and cold. But over the last four years, the team has been the mark of consistency in league play. This was the first time in 60 series that Denver got swept, dating back to Nov. 14-15 against St. Cloud as well. “It was fairly obvious if you were behind the bench, in the stands, in the press box as that the dominant team this weekend was the home team,” Denver coach George Gwozdecky told the St. Cloud Times. “They wanted it very badly, executed very well and put a tremendous amount of pressure on the forecheck on our defensemen. ... Our defensemen struggled mightily to transition the puck up the ice and that’s been one of our strengths. They took it away.”
Saturday, January 12, 2013
Nebraska-Omaha 3, Denver 3 - Saturday, January 12, 2013
These two teams battled hard all weekend, and when it was over, came away in a tie for first place in the WCHA, one point ahead of Minnesota and Nebraska-Omaha. "Certainly I thought we controlled the puck a lot better tonight than we did last night," Denver head coach George Gwozdecky said. "We served up three gifts tonight that anybody would take advantage of, especially a good offensive team like UNO. It was a typical game between two teams that were battling for first place."
Read more about Friday's game in our blog, a wild 7-4 win for Denver.
Saturday, January 5, 2013
Denver 2, Cornell 1 - Saturday, January 5, 2013
Sophomore Larkin Jacobson broke a 1-1 deadlock by scoring his first career goal with 12:15 remaining in regulation to lift Denver to a two-game sweep of the weekend series against Cornell. The win marked the third straight for the Pioneers. “To be able to win a two-game series against a quality opponent like Cornell is huge confidence builder for us,” Denver head coach George Gwozdecky said. “Mike Schafer and his staff do a great job every year. They are one of the top teams in the East and the ECAC. I thought at times we played better tonight than we did last night. That doesn’t necessarily mean you’re going to have a better score. To be in the position that it was anybody’s game in the third period and to find a way to score and to defend it from that point on is a good experience for our guys.”
Cornell coach Mike Schafer wasn't too pleased with the WCHA officiating, between penalties and goals disallowed, and his frustration spilled over to the players at the end of the game. Cornell got 45 minutes in penalties after the final buzzer. “I’m looking at the sheet now, and we’re the ones that were assessed all the penalties,” Schafer said. “You’re supposed to hold your guys at the end of the game. That obviously didn’t happen. It’s just really disappointing on the calls. ... It’s disgusting. That’s all you can say. I won’t come back to the WCHA.” ... Of course, Schafer doesn't have to go back to the WCHA. The premiere WCHA teams he's played in recent years, won't be in the WCHA next year. Also interesting to note that Colorado College's Scott Owens was saying a lot of the same thing after his team lost two games at Cornell's Lynah Rink earlier this season.
Cornell'a travails, meanwhile, have mirrored that of its ECAC brethren. A week ago, Cornell had a 4-0 non-league record, with wins over CC (2), Michigan and Ferris State. The league as a whole had the best intra-conference record, a great first half, and unprecedented for the ECAC. But then Cornell inexplicably blew a 3-0 lead to Maine in the championship of the Florida tournament, and then lost two games in Denver. Meanwhile, the rest of the league -- outside of Quinnipiac -- started struggling suddenly. Teams like Dartmouth, Union, Harvard, RPI and St. Lawrence suffered one tough non-league loss after another just over the last week.
If Cornell -- and the ECAC -- had looked, when the season began, at its record at this point in non-league games, it would've been fairly OK with it. But given the start, it's kinda painful to look at it now. This is, of course, the danger of looking at the Pairwise too early, but just a couple of weeks ago, five ECAC teams were threatening to get NCAA bids. Now, individual team's losses, combined with the league's losses as a whole, have dragged things down in a hurry. Cornell has plummeted all the way to No. 21. Union is also out of the picture, while Yale (which just tied Boston College) and Dartmouth are teetering. It doesn't help Cornell, too, that the teams it has beaten, Colorado College and Michigan, in particular, have done poorly, and aren't currently even Teams Under Consideration, making the wins over those teams look less impressive to the computer and everyone else.
Of course, as we always say, there's plenty of time, and Cornell has been known to get hot in second halves. But so far, suddenly, things look disappointing.
Saturday, December 8, 2012
North Dakota 6, Denver 3 - Saturday, December 8, 2012
Denver was No. 2 in the country not that long ago, but has now gone winless in six straight games, with a tie and loss this weekend in Grand Forks, its longest such streak since 1999-2000. Friday was a hard-fought game in which Juho Olkinuora made 31 saves. Saturday, Denver went to Sam Brittain, and Brittain was not able to hold the fort as well. North Dakota heavily outshot Denver both nights, but capitalized better on Saturday.
Carter Rowney had three goals on the weekend, including two in Saturday's win; while Rocco Grimaldi, who made some dazzling plays only to fall short of a game winner Friday, had four points Saturday, making more dazzling plays along the way.
North Dakota was cruising with a 4-1 lead and outshooting Denver 22-9 late in the second period until sophomore wing Dan Senkbeil drew a 5-minute major and game misconduct for checking from behind. Denver scored two goals in 17 seconds in the first minute of the 5-minute major to draw within 4-3 on goals by Ty Loney and Joey LaLeggia. UND regrouped and iced it with goals by Danny Kristo and Corban Knight (High River, Alberta) at 19:00 of the closing period to lock up the win. "Past couple of weekends, I was having my chances, but they weren't going in the back of the net," Rowney said. "Friday night, I kind of got a greasy one, but I felt like I got a monkey off my back. Today, I was lucky enough they started rolling in bunches."
Said Grimaldi, "Obviously that was a little bit of a bending for us, but we didn't break. The guys in the (dressing) room, we stick together through thick and thin. I went over to Senks (Senkbeil) before the third, and said, 'you know what, we're going to play for you. We got you. The team took the penalty, not you. That's on us. We're going to win this game for you.'"
Saturday, November 17, 2012
Denver 6, Colorado College 2 - Saturday, November 17, 2012
Chris Knowlton scored two more goals Saturday, and now has eight on the season, as Denver got a two-game home-and-home sweep with the rival Tigers. It was the first weekend sweep of CC since December 2005. Denver has won five in a row, and Knowlton, a Colorado Springs native who peaked at 12 goals as a junior, but is already closing in on that. "I'm just really finding my spot right now," Knowlton said. "It's one of those things, when you're hot, you're hot and you want to just keep shooting pucks."
Friday, Denver staved off a furious third-period rally by CC to hold onto a 6-5 win. As the game ended, Denver goalie Juho Olkinuora got into a fight with CC star Rylan Schwartz, and both players were DQ'd for Saturday's game, which hurt CC more, since Olkinoura wasn't scheduled to play anyway. ... Joe Howe started in net for CC on Saturday, after coming on in relief of Josh Thorimbert on Friday, but didn't fare any better.
“We were really able to establish how the game was going to go by the way we played in the first period,” Denver head coach George Gwozdecky said. “We played well, we dominated puck possession, and we scored three good goals. We gave up a pretty easy goal on a miscommunication between our goalie and defensemen, but other than that it was the best opening period we played all year. And it set the tone for the way we wanted the game to be played.”
Saturday, November 10, 2012
Denver 3, Minnesota State 2 - Saturday, November 10, 2012
Denver gets the sweep, with a pair of one-goal wins. Sam Brittain stopped 33 shots on Friday. J.P. Lafontaine scored a late shorthanded extra-attacker goal to bring Minnesota State within one, but 30 seconds later, he was tossed from the game for a hit from behind. Back in there Saturday, he helped the Mavericks get within one late in the first period. In the second, MSU had three power plays but couldn't convert to tie, but finally got a power-play goal early in the third. That set up Chris Knowlton for some late heroics for Denver, giving the Pioneers the sweep. ... “It was one of those games that we knew was going to be a real tough test for us,” said Denver head coach George Gwozdecky. “We weren’t able to generate a lot of offense, a lot of it because we were in the penalty box more than we were playing even strength. I’m really proud of the way this team played. They played hard and battled like crazy. Some people would say that it wasn’t a very pretty game, but it was a game where we had to just keep fighting."
Juho Olkinuora picked up the win this time. “Olkinuora was very strong in goal, very consistent for us tonight,” Gwozdecky said. “Probably one of the unsung heroes, aside from Chris Knowlton who scored two goals, was Gabe Levin who had an outstanding game. It was one of those night for Ty that he would want to have back, as he spent more time in the penalty box than he did on the ice. We decided to make a change and even thought Gabe went in cold, he made some great plays in the offensive zone to give us an opportunity and help us win the game.”
Said Minnesota State coach Mike Hastings, "There's no 'Let's get 'em tomorrow.' At the end of the day, tonight is not acceptable because we're at home. Yes there are things that were positive, but not positive enough, because at the end of the day, the scoreboard is really all that matters. ... I do see some things there with this group and I don't want to -- the effort was there. ... We want to achieve more and we expect to achieve more."
Saturday, November 3, 2012
Denver 6, St. Cloud State 1 - Saturday, November 3, 2012
St. Cloud used a growingly-familiar combination to win Friday -- two goals from Nic Dowd (6) and a shutout from Ryan Faragher. But Denver earned a hard-fought home split, bouncing back from its first loss of the season, getting a stellar game from a less familiar source -- senior Chris Knowlton. A grinder who put up a career high 12 goals last season, earned his first career hat trick. But more importantly, the Denver defense got back to work and clamped down, as Juho Olkinuora, making his first start of the season one night before his 22nd birthday, needed just 20 saves.
"We came out in a bad mood," Denver coach George Gwozdecky said. "We knew that we'd embarrassed ourselves (Friday). That's a good team we played this weekend, but we used (Friday's game) as a teaching moment. ... We had a completely different mind-frame, which helped us start (well), but also respond to a very unusual first goal which let them tie it up. ... We can be a tough team to compete against when we play like that. We have to be emotionally ready to play with the intensity, discipline and eagerness to win those battles, and tonight we wanted to win the fight.”
Olkinuora emerged last season as a capable replacement when Sam Brittain went down and Adam Murray initially faltered. Now Denver has three goalies to try to keep happy. Expect Brittain to get the bulk of time, but it will be interesting to see how Gwozdecky handles it. For now, with Adam Murray hurt, short-term, it makes things a little easier.
Saturday, October 27, 2012
Denver 5, Michigan Tech 2 - Saturday, October 27, 2012
Denver followed up two non-league wins by sweeping its WCHA opening weekend series. In four games, the Pioneers have scored five goals in every game for a total of 20. Joey LeLeggia and Daniel Doremus each scored their third in this one. Early on at least, Denver looks like a very complete team, as much as any team in the conference when you consider Minnesota has untested goaltending while Denver has three experienced ones. "We're getting good balance," Denver coach George Gwozdecky said. "Adam Murray’s teammates didn't make it easy on him tonight. He earned that win. I was pleased with the way we started the game. I thought we dictated the pace early, kind of like they did to us last night. We had some avoidable penalties in the second period, and we never really got back into sync after that. They had their chances, but our penalty kill, including Adam Murray, did an outstanding job tonight."
Colorado College 4, Denver 3 - Sunday, March 17, 2013
Probably the last team Denver wanted to play this weekend was CC, and that turned out to be for good reason. Denver squandered a 2-0 lead, as CC came roaring back, taking the lead on a shorthanded goal by Rylan Schwartz in the second period. After Denver tied it in the third, Charlie Taft responded with the game winner with about 10 minutes left in regulation. Joe Howe has had his ups and downs, but he was phenomenal on the weekend, out-dueling goaltenders who have gotten more accolades this season. Denver will likely make the NCAAs anyway, but it was a bitter pill to swallow for the Pioneers.
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