There’s no such thing as too much offense. The No. 3 Badgers wanted to come out firing against Minnesota State, and the points just kept coming.
Coach Mark Johnson’s squad set a Wisconsin record with 32 shots on goal in the first period on Thursday. Mankato’s junior goaltender Erin Krichiver could only do so much, allowing three goals in the opening stanza.
MSU would get one of their own, but Wisconsin (9-2-1-0 WCHA, 11-2-1 overall) had already opened the floodgates, and the shotskept puring out. The Badgers finished with 116 shots, 67 on goal, in their 8-2 victory over the Mavericks.
Freshman forward Annie Pankowski racked up the first UW hat trick since December 2013, with one goal in the second period and two in the third to put the game away.
“From the last weekend at North Dakota, it was definitely brewing,” Pankowski said. “There was a little frustration so it was nice to finally put one in from a teammate and then just kind of get the ball rolling.”
That performance, along with another goal and assist Friday, put Pankowski at 18 points on the season, one behind teammate Karley Sylvester, a senior forward, for the most in the WCHA.
The series wasn’t about individual performances, though. Ten different Badgers scored goals over the two games, giving the team a nearly unstoppable level of offensive balance. Two defenders, freshman Lauren Williams and senior Katarina Zgraja, scored their first goals of the season.
“When you have multiple people scoring, you just become more difficult to play against,” head coach Mark Johnson said. “If 1, 2, 3 players don’t score on a particular night, you might have 4, 5, and 6 jumping in. If you can have balanced scoring, it bodes well because somebody’s not going to be able to score every night.”
That was the formula for success Friday, as the Badgers won 8-0. Minnesota State stepped it up early in the first period, holding Wisconsin to just 11 shots on goal and getting close to UW’s net, but they could only hold on so long.
Two early second-period power plays resulted in two Badger goals, and from that point, there was no stopping them. UW went on to score six goals in the period from six different sticks, and the Mavericks had no answers on defense.
Sophomore forward Sydney McKibbon scored two of the Badgers’ eight goals in the shutout victory, and she knows the value of the team’s balanced scoring.
“It’s a huge asset for our team when we’ve got 3 or 4 lines that can put the puck in the net,” she said. “When new people are scoring and everyone’s clicking, we get more team confidence and it can roll into next weekend against St. Cloud.”
Wisconsin hopes to do just that as they head back on the road to take on the Huskies next weekend.
