The special teams play of the Wisconsin men's hockey team (7-3-0 Western Collegiate Hockey Association, 10-4-0 overall) has been outstanding halfway through the season. However, the team has done nothing extra to increase its level of play.
\Really, there isn't anything really special about [power play improvement]. We watch a lot of film on it, but really we only work on it a little in practice on Thursdays,"" junior forward and captain Adam Burish said.
Burish and sophomore forward Andrew Joudrey both scored short-handed goals against then-No. 1 Michigan on Saturday, adding to the special teams' success this season. So far, the Badgers have converted on 20.8 percent of their power play opportunities, scoring on 20 out of 96 total attempts. Meanwhile, their opponents have only made 10 percent of their power play shots.
This is a vast improvement from last season, as the Badgers scored a total of 33 power play goals while the opposition sent 34 pucks into the net. Wisconsin had a 10.4 percent shot percentage last year while their opponents shot 13.7 percent. This season, however, the Badgers have upped their percentage to 16.5 while holding their opponents to 8.8 percent.
Senior goalie Bernd Br??ckler attributes his team's success to better unity this season.
""We have different personnel, different guys in our lineup this year,"" Br??ckler said. ""I think people are more skilled and guys are really comfortable with each other. There is a certain chemistry on power play right now, and hopefully we can keep it up.""
The new personnel on this year's squad is dominated by talented underclassmen. Sophomore forward Jake Dowell leads the team with four power play goals on the season. Fellow sophomore forward Ross Carlson and freshman forward Joe Pavelski follow Dowell with three goals each.
Br??ckler stressed the most important aspect of special teams success is that the puck must stay in Wisconsin's gloves. Though the Badgers have not significantly decreased their penalty minutes from last season-in 2003-'04 Wisconsin averaged 18 penalty box minutes per game-only a 0.1 decrease this year-they have also not hurt themselves with penalties.
Though Burish said little attention is focused on special teams, the athletes acknowledged it is an important and necessary part of the game.
""[Special teams] goes hand-in-hand with offense and defense. We need to be a good penalty-killing team and a good power play team to win games,"" Joudrey said. ""We put a huge focus on both killing penalties and scoring goals as a positive factor to our game. If we can be on the plus side each night in that category, it will help us win.""
It has clearly helped Wisconsin win, as the team is currently No. 2 in the WCHA rankings. According to Joudrey, there are two lines of power play units in which six to eight athletes are a part of. They focus much of their time on perfecting little details.
""I think our success is due to our detail to attention in practice,"" Joudrey said. ""We've been a lot more prepared going into games. There is much more focus and we are much hungrier for goals.""
