ANN ARBOR, Mich. — Trailing 3-1 only a shade past eight minutes into a Big Ten quarterfinal series opener, Michigan coach Mel Pearson said his team should’ve been charged admission with the way it played early on Friday night. The third-seeded Wolverines eventually banded together and cashed in their postseason admission ticket, scoring five goals in a row en route to a 6-5 victory over visiting sixth seed Wisconsin.
“We hadn’t played yet. We were just out there spectating. They should have charged us admission the way we played the first eight, ten minutes. And then we started to play.” Pearson said.
“We played very average in our own zone,” Pearson added of his No. 12-ranked club.
“It was clear that what was going on was unacceptable for how we talked about playing,” said Michigan forward Cooper Marody. “Sometimes its good to get a little wake up call. I think, after that, our team responded fairly well.
Michigan’s Tony Calderone potted four goals for the Wolverines, the last of which came as the game winner at 11:07 into the third period. For a contest that ended as a one-shot game, it started like it was going to be anything but that.
“I thought we were very foruntate to win this game tonight,” said Pearson. “Our power play, that’s been average of late, really bailed us out.”
Calderone lit the lamp at 1:40 of the first on assists by Marody and Joseph Cecconi only 1:01 after the Badgers had a goal by Matthew Freytag was disallowed for goaltender interference. They then responded with goals by Tyler Inamoto, Matthew Freytag, and Ryan Wagner to take a two-goal lead.
With Wisconsin’s Linus Weissbach in the box for a slashing minor at 12:12, Calderone kept it going with a tipped goal on assists from Quinn Hughes and Joseph Cecconi at 13:14. Jake Slaker equalized the scoring line for the hosts with a backdoor, power play blast from the right circle at 16:22 on assists from Sam Piazza and Luke Martin.
“I thought that second goal was critical,” Pearson said.
Hughes scored on the man advantage with the aid of a big screen from Dexter Dancs at 18:09 and then Calderone took a feed from Hughes at the hashes in the slot and slammed it home at 3:20 of the second for a 5-3 lead.
“We took advantage of the calls we got,” said Pearson. Boy, did they ever.
Weissbach scored his 10th goal of the year at 10:00 of the second to cut the hosts’ lead to one and then Ryan Wagner scored just 1:13 into the third to level things back up once more. The teams played level for the next nine minutes, 54 seconds at which point when Calderone stood unchecked at the goalmouth and buried the game winner on assists from Marody and Hughes.
The Badgers, despite allowing five power play goals in the loss, weren’t that far away from being on the other side of the scoring line.
“We’ll look at video, we’ll pick up on what we need to fix and be better tomorrow,” said Wisconsin defenseman Peter Tischke. “The main problem with tonight was that our penalty kill was not as good as it needed to be.”
“It is what it is,” said Badgers captain and forward Cameron Hughes. “They made some good plays… i’d have to look at [the video]. I think we’re still confident in our game.”
Marody and Hughes each contributed three assists each for the Wolverines, with Hughes adding a goal to his tally for a four-point night. Wisconsin’s Seamus Malone and Trent Frederic each turned in two-point nights with Ryan Wagner adding an assist to his two goals for a three-point night.
“Those guys were great tonight. They made my job easy,” said Calderone, referring to Marody and Hughes. “Cooper, Tony, and Dexter [Dancs] really stepped up. “I thought they were unbelievable tonight for us,” Pearson added.
Michigan netminder Hayden Lavigne stopped a staggering 48 shots in his 15th victory of the season, turning away 17 in the final frame. Badgers goaltender Kyle Hayton made 23 saves.s
“Other than one [goal], I thought he played excellent,” Pearson said of Lavigne.
Michigan will look to advance to the single-elimination semifinal round next weekend, but isn’t taking anything for granted.
“I could make a ton of excuses,” said Pearson. “The bottom line is you have to do what you have to do to get ready to play.”
“Everyone’s excited to get at it tomorrow and hopefully get at it Sunday,” Tischke added.
Puck drop for game two is set for 7:30 PM Saturday at Yost Ice Arena.
