FARGO, N.D. — In a Huskies-Huskies matchup, only one team could advance to the West Regional championship and be called the top dog of Fargo. Friday afternoon, that was St. Cloud State.
Judd Peterson had the game-winning goal in overtime as St. Cloud completed a late rally to stun Michigan Tech 3-2.
[scg_html_w2015]Charlie Lindgren had another brilliant performance for SCSU, making 36 saves and helping his team advance to its third straight regional championship game.
“They were winning battles,” St. Cloud State coach Bob Motzko said of Michigan Tech. “Lindgren probably is the MVP of the game. He was outstanding.
“Our guys just held tough, and we made the play when we needed to.”
Trailing 2-1 with just 1:28 left, Motzko called his timeout and pulled Lindgren to try to get the desperation equalizer. It worked, as Jonny Brodzinski, injured earlier in the game, scored late to propel the game into overtime.
A shell-shocked Michigan Tech was never able to recover, and its first NCAA tournament appearance since 1981 ended up being brief.
“I’m very proud of my team for the effort they had,” Michigan Tech coach Mel Pearson said. “Extremely proud of this team for all they accomplished. We put Michigan Tech back on the college hockey map.”
St. Cloud State and Michigan Tech, former conference rivals in the WCHA, had not faced each other since February 2013, when they split a series at the National Hockey Center. SCSU now leads the all-time series 54-28-5 after their first-ever NCAA tournament meeting.
Michigan Tech forward Tanner Kero opened the scoring 7:48 into the game when he backhanded a rebound of an Alex Petan shot into a wide-open net to the left of Lindgren. The Hobey Baker Award finalist’s 20th goal gave Michigan Tech (29-10-2) a 1-0 lead after one period.
St. Cloud State (20-18-1), however, was able to get an early equalizer in the second period. After Chris Leibinger was called for tripping with 54 seconds left in the first, most of the power play carried over and Kalle Kossila buried a beautiful pass from David Morley into a wide-open net behind Michigan Tech goaltender Jamie Phillips (17 saves) at 1:06 to tie the game at a goal apiece.
Blake Winiecki appeared to give St. Cloud State the lead with two minutes remaining in the second period after he wristed a puck past Phillips from the slot, but the goal was waved off because St. Cloud State was ruled to be offside.
[photoshelter-gallery g_id=”G0000IDbdH3LXNVA” g_name=”20150327-StCloud-MichiganTech” f_show_caption=”t” f_show_slidenum=”t” img_title=”casc” pho_credit=”iptc” f_link=”t” f_bbar=”t” fsvis=”f” width=”500″ height=”375″ bgcolor=”#AAAAAA” bgtrans=”t” btype=”old” bcolor=”#CCCCCC” crop=”f” trans=”xfade” tbs=”4000″ f_ap=”t” linkdest=”c” f_fullscreen=”f” f_constrain=”f” twoup=”f” f_topbar=”f” f_bbarbig=”” f_htmllinks=”f” f_enable_embed_btn=”f” f_show_watermark=”f” f_send_to_friend_btn=”f” f_smooth=”f” f_mtrx=”f” f_up=”f” target=”_self” wmds=”llQ6QNgpeC.p1Ucz7U.f22AEUD2614E33QbHpOLOEqRPJZMDqS556jTGmJ_qMQGAbpZewA–” ]Despite St. Cloud State coming out faster to begin the third, Michigan Tech broke the tie just over halfway through. CJ Eick buried a beautiful centering pass from Joel L’Esperance to make it 2-1.
Michigan Tech seemed poised to stay on top and escape with the win as time was winding down, but it then saw things get out of hand.
St. Cloud State’s David Morley was called for hooking with 2:18 left, but Michigan Tech lost its potential game-clinching power play when Alex Petan offset it by getting called for embellishment. The craziness was just beginning.
First, Riley Sweeney missed an open net from center ice for MTU. Then, with the extra attacker on for SCSU, Phillips was caught out of position to the left of his net on a scramble for the puck. While on his stomach, the puck went behind the net and around to Brodzinski on a sharp angle from the red line, and he managed to tie the game with 37.3 seconds left after Phillips didn’t get back across in time to cover the empty part of the net.
Just like that, the game was going into overtime after an improbable St. Cloud rally.
“We had to battle back,” Brodzinski said. “It was a big-time goal late in the game.”
Then in overtime, after Sweeney lost possession of the puck on his offensive blue line and fell, Joe Rehkamp picked it up and went in on a two-on-one break with Peterson. The rebound went right back to Peterson and he beat Phillips five-hole to end Tech’s season.
“That can happen to anyone,” Kero said of the Sweeney turnover. “You can’t fault [Sweeney] on that.”
St. Cloud State will face the Quinnipiac-North Dakota winner in the West Regional championship game; it has played both teams this season, going 1-1 against Quinnipiac and 2-3 against UND.
“It’s either gonna be a road game or a neutral-site game,” Motzko said.
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