It was a momentous Saturday for the No. 3 Wisconsin Badgers (32-3-1), as they defeated Minnesota State (3-29-4) 6-0, earning a series sweep and booking their place at the WCHA Final Face-Off next weekend, along with junior goaltender Ann-Renée Desbiens recording her 18th shutout, breaking the single season NCAA record, all in front of a sold out crowd at LaBahn Arena in Madison.
The sixth edition of Wisconsin versus Minnesota State this season, the Mavericks have done a good job the last two games preventing the Badgers from getting on the board early, but that was not the case Saturday.
About seven minutes into the first period, freshman forward Sophia Shaver cut across the middle of the ice and rifled off a shot towards goal. Her shot was saved but the rebound fell to sophomore forward Baylee Wellhausen, who put it away to open the scoring for the Badgers.
MSU goaltender Brianna Quade has been outstanding against the Badgers throughout the season, but didn’t have her finest game Saturday. With only seconds left in the first, junior forward Sarah Nurse fired a rocket at Quade, who turned it away. But the puck was redirected right to junior forward Sydney McKibbon who pounced on it and put the puck past Quade for the second goal of the first.
Head coach Mark Johnson talked about wanting to carry their third period play from Friday into the first period of today’s game, and that is exactly what they did.
“[The players] had a good jump, Annie [Pankowski] had three good scoring chances in the first shift of the game,” Johnson said. “It sends a message that we are here to play hard the whole game, and we capitalized on our opportunities.”
It was not a smooth second period by any means at LaBahn. A total of six penalties were committed in the period, including four against the Badgers. Despite having to deal with a 5-on-3 for about 20 seconds, Wisconsin did an incredible job all game long on the penalty kill, barely giving Mankato the opportunity to get set up in the Badger zone.
Their defensive efforts were rewarded midway through the second, when junior defender Mellissa Channell took a shot from just inside the blue line, taking a slight deflection before finding the back of the net and giving the Badgers a 3-0 lead heading into the third period.
While the Badgers had a faster start than they usually have against MSU, they continued their pattern of exploding offensively in the third. It took only 20 seconds before Wisconsin put one past Quade, as sophomore forward Annie Pankowski came down with a loose puck and passed it to fellow sophomore forward Emily Clark, who one-timed the puck into the net.
Pankowski was back at it again a few minutes later, as she fired a laser from the left circle that hit the side netting to make it 5-0. Pankowski had an impressive one-goal, two-assist performance, a showing Wisconsin has come to expect from her this year.
“It’s all in a day’s work,” she said. “When you play with people like Emily [Clark] and Sam [Cogan] it makes it a lot easier.”
The scoring was capped off on a power play goal by junior defender Jenny Ryan, and the Badgers sealed their place in the semifinals next weekend.
The six goals scored came from six different players, making the Badgers a balanced and dangerous team going into the semifinals.
“We’ve talked about our chemistry, and when somebody scores all the teammates get excited for that individual,” Johnson said. “Whether it’s A, B, C or D, the object is to try to score and when you do everyone gets excited, which creates energy for us and helps elevate our game.”
But the biggest storyline going into the third was if Wisconsin could hold out for the shutout. Coming into the game, Desbiens had tied the NCAA record for shutouts in a single season with 17. Needing one more game to break the record, achieving her 18th shutout was definitely on the minds of her teammates.
“You could tell the last eight or 10 minutes on the bench, I was mixing lines up just to keep people focused, Johnson said. “But they were just talking about doing the right things on the ice to prevent anything from coming into the offensive zone, or giving them an opportunity to create anything and for the most part they did pretty well.”
The Badgers closed out the game and Desbiens completed her 18th shutout, breaking the NCAA record, and she did so in front of her family who was in attendance.
“It definitely feels good, I don’t know what feels the best about it, breaking the record or seeing my dad’s face in the stands, so I’m really glad my family was here for this moment.
After the buzzer sounded, the team swarmed Desbiens, showing how happy they were for her as well.
“There was a lot of excitement really,” Pankowski said. “Anytime you can break a record, even like earlier in the season, the team just got really excited for [Desbiens], and she totally deserves it the way she works so I couldn’t be more happy for her.”
Next weekend, Wisconsin travels to Minneapolis for the WCHA Final Face-Off, where a semifinal matchup against Minnesota Duluth awaits them. It’s hard to find holes in their games and it could be easy to look to a possible rematch against Minnesota in the final, but Johnson is focused squarely on Duluth.
“We are guaranteed one more game and we’ll be playing Duluth,” he said. “We got an extra day of prep with the games on Saturday, and if you’re fortunate you get to play on Sunday for a championship. It’s a short season, you win two games and now we’re guaranteed one more, so the girls will be excited and it’s a fun atmosphere. It’s always fun to play in the tournament.”
The semifinal game against Duluth is on March 5 at 2 p.m.
