TIGERS HAVING FUN IN POSTSEASON
By Ken McMillan
ALBANY, N.Y. – Goalie Jared DeMichiel is making the most of his championship run with Rochester Institute of Technology and having fun at the same time.
DeMichiel extended his playoff win streak to five games with a season-best 39 stops as fourth-seeded RIT stunned No. 1 Denver, 2-1, in the NCAA East Regional semifinals at the Times Union Center on Friday afternoon.
“Jared looked calm and poised and was just hitting his spots,” RIT coach Wayne Wilson said. “He looked very, very comfortable tonight. He came up with a couple big saves, which you’re going to have to do every game in order to win, particularly at this level.”
Afterward, DeMichiel provided some laughs during the post-game press conference, reminiscing about his junior hockey days in Boston and lobbying for a coach of the year award for Wilson three years after the fact.
“It is a great opportunity (to play in the NCAAs) but at the same time I lost the opportunity to go out on spring break so I am pretty disappointed about that,” DeMichiel joked. “I would rather be in the NCAA Tournament, and playing with these guys is definitely great.”
RIT, the only Division I school to win its regular-season crown and conference tournament, is the hottest team in college hockey, winning its last 11 games. Next up for the Tigers (27-11-1) is a regional final date with New Hampshire at 6:30 p.m. Saturday.
Freshman defenseman Chris Tanev scored at 5:02 of the first period and sophomore Cameron Burt scored on the power play at 12:36 of the third, staking RIT to a 2-0 lead. Denver’s Joe Colborne scored on the power play at 14:34, putting DeMichiel on the spot again. The senior made three stops in the closing minutes, and shed his composure at the final horn, thrusting both arms to the sky and pumping his fists as he leaped off the ice before getting mobbed by his teammates.
The biggest win in RIT’s five-year Division I history also marked Atlantic Hockey’s third opening-round triumph in five seasons. Holy Cross knocked off Minnesota, 4-3 in overtime, in the 2006 West Region semifinals. Air Force blanked Michigan, 2-0, in the 2009 NCAA East Regional semifinals.
It was a crushing loss for second-ranked Denver (27-10-4), which lost its last three games and bowed in its NCAA opener for the third year in a row.
“It hurts more than I can even explain right now,” Colborne said. “We had the team. … I came here with one goal in mind and that was to go to Detroit (for the Frozen Four). We didn’t get that done.”
Tanev broke the scoreless draw five minutes into the afternoon contest. He gathered in a clearing attempt at the blue line and got ahead of Denver’s Brandon Vossberg. Tanev was not distracted as another Denver player slid across his path and he went top shelf to the left side past a shocked Marc Cheverie for his 10th goal of the season. Tanev’s goal helped set the tone for the game, giving RIT a needed confidence boost and putting a bit of pressure on Denver.
“In these one-game shootouts, scoring the first goal is very critical in order to give you an emotional jump,” said Denver coach George Gwozdecky. “They were the ones that got it. Even though we were able to generate some offense throughout the game, their goaltender DeMichiel was very, very good.”
Denver had the speed advantage and seemed to win most 50-50 battles, but RIT did a good job of keeping the Pioneers to the outside during the opening 40 minutes. Denver started to make headway in crashing the net midway through the final period but DeMichiel was up to the task, making a kick save on Vossberg and holding his ground as Patrick Wiercioch and Kyle Ostrow each crashed the cage during a short flurry.
When Jesse Martin was whistled for an elbow to the head at 11:35 of the third, RIT seized the opportunity. Andrew Favot spotted Burt open near the right goal post and his hard pass was one-timed into the net at 12:36.
Denver’s pressure on the RIT net finally resulted in a goal two minutes later. With Mike Janda in the box for holding a stick, Tyler Ruegsegger fired a shot from the right point which DeMichiel made a kick stop on but the rebound found Colborne in front and he tallied his 22nd goal of the season.
Denver was buoyed by the goal but could not produce the equalizer.
“We were excited to break the barrier and confident that we would get another one,” said Denver all-star Rhett Rakhshani. “Their goalie stood (his) ground. It’s tough in a game like that when a goalie is playing so well.”
SECOND-PERIOD SWING SHIFTS GAME FOR UNH
By Joe Gladziszewski
A stoppage came with 2:29 remaining in the second period and Cornell leading New Hampshire 1-0 in the East Region semifinal Friday night in Albany. But when there was actually 2:29 remaining in the second period, New Hampshire had a 2-1 lead. The Wildcats went on to a 6-2 win and will face RIT in the East Region final Saturday night.
The first stoppage at 17:31 of the second was the first whistle after a potential goal. It was reviewed by video and revealed that UNH’s Bobby Butler’s wrist shot whistled through the net and the clock was reset to the time of the actual goal. The clock was reset to 3:13. Mike Sislo scored New Hampshire’s go-ahead goal, 26 seconds after the Butler tally, and the Wildcats went into the dressing room with a lead when it seemed they might be facing a deficit after 40 minutes.
The scoring came from the game’s two best forwards in Butler, a Hobey Baker finalist, and second-line winger Sislo. They were the difference makers. Each finished with two goals and were dangerous almost every shift. UNH’s six-goal night followed two straight shutouts of the Wildcats by Vermont in the Hockey East quarterfinals.
“The second goal was huge,” UNH coach Dick Umile said. “Sislo’s goal going into the second period (intermission) was huge and I think at that point, that was all behind us about not being able to score.”
Cornell controlled the second period before the late swing. They possessed the puck more and outshot New Hampshire for the first 16 minutes. The Big Red worked the boards and generated chances in the UNH zone. It was a reversal from the first period, in which New Hampshire outshot and out-chanced Cornell.
“Getting out of that period 1-1 would have been awesome but they capitalized on a turnover on a 2-on-1,” Cornell head coach Mike Schafer said. “The more we pressed in the third for chances, the more we gave up and the more we gave up the more they scored.”
For a Big Red team that prides itself on making disciplined plays and taking care of the puck, turnovers caused its downfall. Shots in traffic that fell in the slot ended up on New Hampshire sticks, as they were quicker to loose pucks in high-traffic areas.
“One big thing was we had great stick positioning tonight,” Sislo said. “There were a lot of times when they tried to make passes where we had our sticks in the lanes and were knocking down pucks. We were able to transition and get some offense off that.”
The Wildcats had 17 shots in the third period and kept up the pressure. Paul Thompson stretched the lead to 3-1 with a tally at 2:52 of the third period and Butler scored on a breakaway four minutes later to give UNH a three-goal cushion.
That lead stood up for New Hampshire. They play Saturday for the chance to go to the Frozen Four for the first time since 2003.
SEEN AND HEARD AT TIMES UNION CENTER
• Thompson joined Butler and Sislo as two-goal scorers for the Wildcats, even though he tried not to. Thompson had the puck and was credited with the empty-net goal. He tried to pass the puck across for Butler – it would have been Butler’s hat trick goal – but the puck was deflected by a Cornell defenseman into the empty net.
• “We had a 1-0 lead with three minutes left and our guys all year have been pretty good at taking care of that. Tonight we didn’t,” Cornell coach Mike Schafer said.
• As we’ve seen in recent NCAA Tournaments, anything can happen when you get two of the 16 best teams in the nation together. “RIT and every other team in this tournament deserves to be here,” Denver coach George Gwozdecky said. “RIT played very, very well and I give them full credit for their effort.”
• RIT is one of the loosest teams in the tournament and has played with a relaxed mindset. No pressure, no over-thinking of what’s at stake. It’s a team that just wants to go out and play hockey. That poise showed in the third period.
• Ben Scrivens’ shutout streak of 267 minutes, 11 seconds is the third-longest in NCAA history and the longest ever by an ECAC Hockey goalie.
PLUSSES AND MINUSES
All four teams played a disciplined style and a total of just eight minor penalties were called over the two games. RIT had three minors, Denver and New Hampshire two each and Cornell had just one infraction.
The stands in the Times Union Center had a particular RIT flavor with hundreds of orange-clad fans cheering on the Tigers. Rochester is located 230 miles west of Albany, and a large contingent made the drive along the New York Thruway. Times Union Center’s section 107 was the home-away-from-home for RIT’s Corner Crew and they stood throughout the early game.
It ended up not having an impact in the result, but UNH’s Greg Burke took a cross-checking penalty with 11:11 remaining in the third period and his team holding a 4-1 lead. The cross check was committed on the Cornell goalie as Burke went to the net. An offensive zone infraction that gave the Big Red a power-play opportunity and a chance to revive itself was a poor decision.
INCH’S THREE STARS OF THE NIGHT
3. RIT’s Defense – The defensemen and backchecking forwards did a nice job keeping Denver to the perimeter most of the game and limiting grade-A chances against.
2. Mike Sislo, New Hampshire - Butler gets lots of attention, but Sislo was UNH’s best in the win over Cornell. The second line came through with scoring punch after the Big Red focused its best checkers on the top line.
1. Jared DeMichiel, RIT – The senior netminder posted a season-best 39 saves, including 13 in the final period, for his first NCAA tournament triumph.
WHAT’S NEXT
RIT and New Hampshire go to Saturday’s game with a chance to make this great season even better and earn a trip to the Frozen Four. The Wildcats tallied five goals on the nation’s top-ranked goalie and added an empty-netter. They’ll have to solve RIT and a sound defensive team that plays well in front of goalie Jared DeMichiel, he of the 39-save performance in the Tigers’ win over top-seeded Denver.
Two teams with legitimate national title hopes were eliminated on the tournament’s opening day and will have a long summer to think about what happened, despite having tremendous regular-season records.
