Hockey

Denver Loses 4-1 Lead and Falls to North Dakota, 7-5

16 Comments

Denver (10-4-1, 3-2-0) jumped out to a 4-1 lead in the first period but North Dakota came back with four goals in the final period to overcome a 5-3 deficit. A goal by UND’s Riese Gaber gave the Fighting Hawks the lead, 6-5, at 16:25 of the third period and North Dakota’s Cameron Burg buried a goal 30 seconds later to sink DU. The Fighting Hawks were opportunistic and kept DU bottled up on their own end much of the second and third periods. Denver has work to do on both ends of the ice if they intend to earn a split Saturday night.

North Dakota got on the board first when Dylan James solved DU’s Freddie Halyk less than two minutes into the period. Over the next four minutes, Denver poured in three goals by Shai Buium, Carter King and Tristan Broz – all even strength. Denver was off and racing with superior speed against the reeling visitors. UND gained their footing  after the three-goal barrage but Denver answered again at 13:11 when Jack Devine lifted DU to 4-1 lead. A frustrated North Dakota side mixed it up as the buzzer sounded to end the first period.

The teams meet at the end of the first period to discuss Denver’s 4-1 lead.

The ice began to tilt more in the Fighting Hawks favor as they began to play more in the Pioneers defensive zone. At 10:20, Owen McLaughlin cut Denver’s lead in half, 4-2. Three minutes later, on the powerplay, Cameron Berg drew UND within one goal, 4-3. Three minutes after that Tristan Broz appeared to give Denver some breathing room with a goal, 5-3, heading into the final period.

The final period was to be a nightmare for Denver when nearly anything that could go wrong, did go wrong. Sloppy defense, power-play goals and spotty goaltending down the stretch essentially wiped out any chance the Pioneers had to secure a victory. The Fighting Hawks were energized by their success in the second period and showed again in the third period.

Jackson Blake scored for UND six minutes into the third period. The Fighting Hawks started to buzz in DU’s defensive end and David Carle was forced to call a timeout as his defense could not clear the puck. But UND kept pushing until V. Louis Jamernik scored an even-strength goal to knot the score as momentum shifted in North Dakota’s favor. North Dakota delivered the one-two punch at the sixteenth-minute mark with back-to-back goals by Riece Gaber on the powerplay and Cameron Berg even strength. The air went out of the building, drowned out by chants of “Let’s Go Sioux” – a relic of the past that exists only in the heads of their green-clad fans. Time ran out before Denver could solve goaltender Ludvid Persson, 7-5, final.

Denver will need a full 60-minute effort Saturday night against North Dakota to secure a split. They will be without students who are out on winter break and hear from a loud group of visiting fans who have once again invaded Magness Arena for their annual visit to civilization. Game time is 6:00 pm MT on Saturday.

 

 

 

16 thoughts on “Denver Loses 4-1 Lead and Falls to North Dakota, 7-5”

  2. Tonight was a total defensive/goaltending collapse. Wonder who will be starting in goal on Saturday evening…

    Reply

    1. Isn’t Matt Davis hurt? Basically has to be Halyk. That other kid they brought in had some rough numbers in the USHL.

      Reply

  3. Didn’t see any of tonight’s game, but ouch, sounds like the end result was a massive kick in the teeth. Pios cough up a 3-goal lead and ultimately get outscored 4-0 in the 3rd?? Brutal.

    Reply

  4. Freshman goalie and defensive lapse. UND is too good and took advantage of DU’s problems. At 4-1 I was feeling good. Watched on TV and the DU bench seemed tired.

    Reply

  5. Too many soft goals. Too many scoring chances. In most hockey 🏒 universes, 5 goals should get you a W. It is time to start getting concerned.

    Reply

  6. As a long time Sioux fan, I have witnessed the bad blood between these teams for many years now. I was really hoping that we could have all moved on and grown TF up, but that’s obviously not the case. Taking digs at us personally is all the DU fanbase has when their team doesn’t perform for a full 60 minutes. It’s sad – DU is a storied team that is up there with the greats. But your fanbase always finds a way to class down the joint

    Reply

  7. We have no reliable to bad goaltending- at any level of hockey that means no championship. That’s our fate this year. First time in my 24 years of going to games we don’t have a goaltender, we often had two equally good ones, I guess we’ve been spoiled.

    Our offense was flying in the first- a nice glimpse of our high potential. Our D is still young and makes mistakes, I don’t think they can get good enough for this year and you need exceptional goaltending to hide that. Looking beyond this season, priorities 1,2,3 is goaltending

    Still fun to go to the games and while it sucks hearing the Sioux chant so load, I do respect their fan base. Was sitting next to a guy who played for them in early 2000’s , a very nice guy

    Oh well, good thing about college hockey is you play again next night and get another shot

    Reply

  8. Wow. This performance may well be a key turning point of the young season for this Denver team. Can DU respond after blowing three and two goal leads on home ice to a rival school? We’ll see, but I would not count on it. This is the second youngest team in the country, and it really shows right now, as DU has trouble closing out good opponents.

    What we have seen so far this season is a fantastic DU offense that is good enough to put up five+ goals on a nightly basis. That can win you a number games against mediocre and bad teams, and perhaps a few good ones, too. However, this is a wildly erratic young defense that lacks experience, leading to odd man rushes, turnovers and blown coverages. To make matters worse, the goaltending statistically is the worst DU goaltending since the Stephen Wagner era in the late 1990s — some 25 years ago. We DU fans have been spoiled by goaltending excellence for so many years now that a full generation of DU fans have never seen sub .900 saves percentages in December. Having poor goaltending is extremely deflating to a team’s confidence level.

    The question now is are these issues fixable?

    My opinion is that this DU defense is almost certainly fixable to a higher level. The youth on D is glaring – There are no seniors on D, two juniors and the rest of them are underclassmen with limited experience, and while there is some NHL projected talent here, the team cohesion and decision making takes some time, and requires more coaching. There are some depth issues, with injuries and a lack of physicality have hurt this group, too, but I think the development will come in the second half of the season, and that will help the goalies to an extent.

    But I’d be lying to you if I wasn’t deeply concerned about the goaltending situation. These are historically horrendous college saves percentages we are seeing in the modern era, some of which can certainly be blamed on lack of experience at this level, as well as the defensive struggles which lead to goalies getting hung out to dry.

    But I really wonder about the underlying talent level of the goalies here, too. None of these DU goalies were drafted, so we know the NHL’s talent scouts did not think highly enough of any of these guys as 18 year olds to select them. We also know that not every good college goalie was drafted, but the real head-scratcher for me is that none of DU’s four current goalies had outstanding saves percentages in junior hockey, either, and some of them flat-out struggled in junior.A five goal offense can cover a lot of poor defense and goaltending, but good teams will expose you…

    Bottom line: If things don’t improve on the back end of the ice, this DU team will struggle to finish in the top half of the NCHC. With DC soon having to turn his attention to the US Junior team after next weekend into January, the assistant coaches are going to have their work cut out for them…

    Reply

      1. We always welcome opinions of all kinds – even if we disagree. We only screen profanity or direct attacks on student athletes. Otherwise, everyone is free to comment on any of our write-ups and/or share their POV.

Leave a Reply to AnonymousCancel reply