After two close losses to No. 2 North Dakota, Wisconsin head coach Mike Eaves accurately summed up the weekend in one line.
“Sometimes the branch just breaks off,” Eaves said.
The Badgers (0-6-0 overall) took on North Dakota (2-0-0 NCHC, 7-1-1) at the Kohl Center for a two-game series, dropping both games 4-3 and 5-1 Friday and Saturday respectively.
In game one, the Badgers lost 4-3 despite solid play by senior goalie Joel Rumpel. After an uneventful first period, senior defenseman Chase Drake scored on a power play at the 3:36 mark of the second period, his first goal of the year and the Badgers’ first lead of the year. However, just three minutes later, UND senior forward Connor Gaarder netted a power play goal of his own to tie it up.
With just over a minute left in the period, senior winger Joseph LaBate fed the puck to sophomore winger Jedd Soleway, who banged it in to put the Badgers up 2-1, a lead that would last until intermission. The goal served as the first points of the year for both of the first-line wingers, breaking a scoring slump that was hanging over the first line like a black cloud.
“As hockey players, your goal is to stay as even keeled as possible, no super highs, no super lows. We get excited after goals, but it’s right back to work,” sophomore forward Grant Besse said.
In the third period, the branch broke. UW allowed three straight goals, including a shorthanded goal to UND senior forward Michael Parks, to go down 4-2. A late goal brought the Badgers within striking distance, but they ultimately fell 4-3. The Badgers’ had trouble getting anything going in the period due to a number of penalties called on them.
“The penalties that we had, if they were penalties, that’s fine, but there were a couple of calls that I thought they could’ve made just as easily and didn’t, and it broke up the rhythm,” Eaves said.
The worst part of the 4-3 loss for the team was an injury to junior defenseman Eddie Wittchow, who left the game with a broken finger, and it is currently unknown when he will come back.
“Obviously it’s tough back there with only 5 defensemen, especially when we were killing so many penalties. Eddie is such a big body, good at blocking shots, getting the puck out, it’s not an easy loss,” Besse said.
The second game wasn’t much better, as the Badgers were only down 2-1 halfway through the third period and getting scoring chances left and right. In the second and early third period, the Badgers’ offense looked as good as they’ve been all year, putting consistent pressure on North Dakota goalie Zane McIntyre. However, the junior was stellar all weekend, racking up 40 saves in the series.
Again, halfway through the third the wheels fell off, starting when Drake accidentally knocked the puck past Rumpel into the UW goal. Both players took blame for the costly friendly fire, but the Badgers seemed like dead men walking after that, allowing two more goals to bring the final score to 5-1.
While the box score seems bleak, the team found many bright spots. The three goals in the first game doubled the amount they had scored in their first four games. The team was ahead and down by one going into the third period against the No. 2 team in the nation; their only problem was closing it out.
“We play good teams like North Dakota and it draws us up to a higher level,” Eaves said.
With Wisconsin now at 0-6, their bad start is solidified, but this isn’t the first time the team has had a rough start.
“I think we are all frustrated, but we have experience with this, we can look back on 2 years ago when we started off 1-7-2, and kinda just learn from our mistakes from that … We got to just be able to play a full 60 minutes,” Drake said.
The Badgers next take the ice Nov. 21 against Colorado College.
