Michigan Hockey: MICHIGAN-Ferris Rewind / North to Alaska Next Up
Posted at 4:00pm — 11/5/2010
Michigan Hockey: MICHIGAN-Ferris Rewind / North to Alaska Next Up
#6 MICHIGAN (4-1-3, 3-0-1-0) vs. #15 University of Alaska (5-2-1, 2-1-1-1)
Friday 11/5 7:05 p.m. & Saturday 11/6 7:05 p.m. Carlson Center, Fairbanks, Ak.
TV: None. Streamed on PPV Internet (B2Network) MGoBlue.com
Rewinding Last Week’s Action:
The Wolverines played up at Ferris State last Friday and ended up stealing a point from the Bulldogs. Ferris bolted out to a 2-0 mid-second period lead thanks to a first period goal by Eric Alexander and a second period PPG by Zach Redmond. Michigan awoke shortly after the Redmond goal on Jacob Fallon’s first career goal. Fallon banked a pass from behind the Ferris cage off of a defenseman’s skate past goalie Pat Nagle to cut the lead to 2-1. Both teams struggled to generate any further offense until late in the game when Michigan forced a faceoff deep into the Ferris end. David Wohlberg won the draw and raced to the net. Chris Brown snapped a shot on goal, with the rebound loose. Carl Hagelin had two chances close in, yet it was Wohlberg who finally forced it past Nagle with 12.7 seconds left to tie the game. Neither team scored in overtime. Ferris won the skills competition (better known as the shootout) 2-0 to take an extra point. Michigan is now 0-3 in shootouts, 0-2 in the CCHA all time. Shawn Hunwick turned aside 26 shots in the tie.
On Saturday Michigan returned to Yost arena and turned the tables on the Bulldogs. Scooter Vaughn opened the scoring for Michigan with his team leading 5th goal of the season. (David Wohlberg also has five goals.) He accepted a Fallon pass and roofed a shot past Nagle. A few minutes later Kevin Lynch added a power play goal to stretch the lead to 2-0. Ferris came back in the second period to add two goals (including a PPG of their own) with a Carl Hagelin game winning tally sandwiched between them. Hagelin raced up the near boards and harmlessly wristed a pass to the front of the net which deflected in off of a Ferris skate to give Michigan a 3-1 lead. The Wolverines shut down Ferris in the third, only allowing five shots to secure the victory. Bryan Hogan stopped 22 shots to get the win.
North To Alaska:
Fairbanks in early November is, as Red Berenson compares it to, January in Michigan with snow on the ground and temperatures hovering in the teens. Yet, the coach always looks forward to this trip as a means of developing team chemistry and as way to delve into the history of our 49th state. History of the past meetings of these two teams, though, is not the fairest comparison of what Michigan can expect from the new look Nanooks. (Try saying that fast…)
Alaska is a much better program than it appears on paper. Gone are days when a Michigan squad can expect a weekend sweep with lopsided scores. The Nanooks’ program has been building for several years now, including their first ever appearance in the NCAA tournament last season- a 5-3 loss to eventual national champion BC. But, just for the sake of remembering the good ole days, let me reflect on the past.
Michigan comes into the series with a 39-8-1 overall record with a 9-4-1 mark since 2005. They are 16-4 in the North Country and actually won their first 18 games against the Nanooks. But, they have not won more than four games in a row since that spurt-posting a 3-2-1 record in their last six games and going 1-1-1 last season against UA. This is the first series since 2005 that both teams come in ranked -and both teams won a game in that series.
Tough At Home:
UA has built their program on the shoulders of third year coach Dallas Ferguson. He has produced better recruiting talent from the Canadian northwest provinces and Alaska, as well as talent from Minnesota and the Midwestern US. Ferguson is a former Nanook defenseman and assistant coach, and was named CCHA coach of the year in 2008-09. He has developed a sticky defensive system that the Nooks follow closely and it has paid off the last two seasons. They take great pride in defending their home ice, one of two Olympic size sheets in the CCHA. The Nooks are 4-0 at home this season beating WCHA’s Colorado College and the ECAC’s Union in their annual tournament, as well as BGSU last weekend. Alaska is unbeaten in their last eleven games on home ice and shut out the Wolverines to start the season last year.
The Nooks have only hit the road outside of Alaska once so far, winning a shootout and dropping a game at Michigan State. They have also beaten Air Force and lost to North Dakota in a tournament held in Anchorage. This will be the first of four meetings this season with Michigan as they are in the revamped cluster along with Ferris State and Michigan State. (Michigan will play the other seven conference teams twice.)
Comparing Early Season Stats:
I guess the best way to summarize Alaska is to say that they will put you to sleep offensively and pounce on your team’s defensive mistakes. So far the Nanooks have only tallied 20 goals in eight games, or a meager 2.5 GF average, good for 36th in the country. This is deceiving so far in that eight of those goals were scored against the Falcons last weekend, and of those eight, four were power play goals. Not that their PP is all that effective, either, as they stand 25th in the country at an 18.2% conversion. In most cases that would alarm any fan, since simple math suggests that only scoring two goals a game will not win you many games. But, that is only half the story. This team relishes their defensive play and is only relinquishing 1.75 GPG average- 2nd in the country to BC. They have only allowed fourteen goals in eight games- with five of those games against ranked opponents. The one soft spot appears to be their penalty killing which has yielded seven of those fourteen goals. Their PK is currently at 82.9% or 28th in the country. This is something I think Michigan can exploit since UA is taking more penalties than in the past, averaging 16.5 minutes per game ranking them 15th in the nation.
So, the bottom line is, they don’t score much, but they give up even less. In the end, that is all that matters.
The main guy that the Nooks depend on is Junior goalkeeper Scott Greenham. He sports a 1.73 GAA (7th) and a .928 save % (19th). He’s big, mobile and doesn’t give up many second chances. Michigan chased him last season in the first of two games at Yost, yielding three first period goals in route to a 6-0 win. The next night he was fantastic, yielding three goals, but helping Alaska steal a 3-3 tie and then a shootout win.
Greenham is helped by a big strong defensive core led by Juniors Joe Sova (0-6-6), Aaron Gens (1-3-4) and Scott Enders. Senior blueliner Bryant Molle also is rugged- with each of them standing 6’ 200+ pounds.
The offense is led by Senior Kevin Petovello (5-5-10) along with super sophomores Andy Taranto (3-4-7) and Cody Kunyk (4-3-7). Senior forwards Derek Klassen, Ryan Hohl and Dustin Sather round out the graduating class. Look for a group of hardworking, lunchbucket type players to fill in the bottom two lines for the Nooks.
Wolverine Notes:
Bryan Hogan and Shawn Hunwick have both been solid this season, but obviously have room for improvement. Hunwick is still too overaggressive in playing his angles and is not controlling rebounds effectively. He was victimized last Friday by going down too early allowing a near post shot for the second Ferris goal. Hogan, on the other hand, has had better results this season, albeit against weaker competition. He probably played his poorest game this past Saturday, fighting the puck and giving up dangerous rebounds. Hunwick has yet to face Alaska, where Hogan is 3-1-1 with a 1.58 GAA and a .923 save% against the Nanooks.
David Wohlberg and Scooter Vaughn continue to pace Michigan’s goal scoring, each potting five tallies. Carl Hagelin added his 3rd goal last weekend, giving him 3-5-8 on the season. Louie Caporusso was held off the board and was basically invisible last weekend, except for the numerous defensive and neutral zone turnovers he was committing. He is tied with Hagelin at 2-6-8 on the season. Caporusso actually has good numbers against Alaska, holding a 2-5-7 line in eight games. Matt Rust has also disappeared offensively, although he has been strong in the faceoff circle. He has five career assists against Alaska.
Outside of the obvious offensive short circuiting from the top lines (save Wohlberg), Michigan is also suffering from the same malaise as last season: slow starts and a lack of urgency. So far this season they have managed to pull out points while playing without much cohesion or fire. The next two weeks will challenge them because Alaska can and will sweep Michigan if they do not get the type of execution that is expected from the leaders on this team. They are standing around defensively and have no life on special teams, so far. Michigan is a dreadful 83.3% (24th) in penalty killing, seemingly giving up at least one PPG per game. The power play is even worse, going 1-14 last weekend after going 1-11 the previous weekend. It is at a nominal 21.4% conversion, 16th in the country. It is almost predictable, causing coach Berenson to try a different approach to the PP by implementing an overload in the zone this week in practice, instead of the traditional umbrella offensive zone formation. Overall the Michigan offense is producing 3.5 goals per game, 15th in the country, while the defense is still an average 2.38 GPG, 17th in the nation. Yes, they have played better teams with better offenses- but the defensive numbers will have to continue to improve, while the goal scorers must step up. The silver lining is, the goal scoring has been spread very nicely amongst the roster, with several defensemen adding much needed points.
The one area of improvement to report on is the number of penalties the team took last weekend, which averaged about eight minutes per game. Michigan is now ranked 4th worst overall at an average of 19.9 minutes per game.
Overall, Michigan is not running on all cylinders yet, and, as a casual observer, there appears to be mounting frustration on the shoulders of the seniors. We do not know what Michigan team- the one that slipped to #6 in this week’s USCHO poll (you know-the one that dogged it against Mercyhurst and UNO/hung on at UNH and Ferris) or the one that blew out a good UNO team at Yost- will emerge from game to game or even period to period. Maybe an extensive road trip will turn the trick. If not, then an equally difficult matchup awaits when they return to Yost to Play Notre Dame next weekend. The jury is still out as to the potential of this team, or whether or not they are as good as the media suggests they are.
Keys To The Weekend:
1. Alaska feeds on turnovers, forcing teams to abandon patience with an aggressive forecheck. Michigan must make good defensive zone decisions and effectively breakout in order to counterattack. No more passes in skates, behind players, etc. And please, no cross ice passes in the offensive zone. Alaska will force neutral zone turnovers also, leading to goal scoring chances.
2. Win the special teams battle. Michigan has the advantage on paper, but Alaska appears to have the better goaltending right now. It’s a different game on the big ice, so stay out of the box and take advantage of Alaska’s weak penalty kill.
3. I don’t think Michigan will outskate Alaska, but they have better overall offensive talent that will be neutralized by Alaska’s defense. I think the Michigan defense will have to factor into the goal production this weekend. Get the lead and Alaska will have to open up.
4. No one is asking Hunwick or Hogan to steal games- Alaska isn’t going to be the same offensive threat as say UNO or UNH- but they can score so make them earn their goals. This weekend may decide how Red goes with the goaltending situation up to the holiday break.
Yostmeister’s Prediction:
Friday-Alaska 2 Michigan 1
Saturday- Michigan 3 Alaska 2
Note: The editor will be out of town and unavailable to recap this weekend’s games, nor preview the next series against Notre Dame. Stay tuned for analysis from both weekends of action upon his return.
Written by GBMWolverine Staff
Go Blue — Wear Maize!