It’s New Year’s Eve, a few hours before midnight, and I’m watching my Buffalo Bills’ chances for making the playoffs for the first time in a generation slip away — and I realize suddenly that we’ve returned to blogging and columns this week and it’s my turn. <\/p>\n
So, hi. <\/p>\n
1. It was a good weekend for the Buckeyes and Gophers.<\/strong><\/p>\n
Both Ohio State and Minnesota needed the sweeps they earned to kick off the second half of the season. The Buckeyes ended their first half with a sweep of Minnesota, so both teams had something at stake: Ohio State wanted to keep the momentum going and Minnesota needed something positive moving forward. <\/p>\n
It was Tanner Laczynski with six seconds left in regulation Friday to give Ohio State the 3-2 win over Niagara and OSU went on to win 4-1 Saturday. Freshman goaltender Tom Nappier earned his second win of the season Saturday.<\/p>\n
Minnesota beat Army West Point 3-0 and 4-1, with sophomore goaltender Mat Robson earning his first career win Saturday. With that win, Don Lucia also became the first coach in Gopher hockey history to reach the 450-win mark. <\/p>\n
2. Who’s going to beat Notre Dame?<\/strong><\/p>\n
The Fighting Irish enter the second half with a record of 10-0-0 in B1G hockey and start the second half with a home-and-home, Friday-Sunday series against Michigan this coming weekend. With 30 points, Notre Dame is 14 points ahead of second-place Ohio State. In a league where each game is worth three points and with half a season of hockey left to play, the Irish are catchable, but if Cale Morris (.954 SV%, 1.53 GAA) continues as he has in net, it’s doubtful that anyone will. Goaltending has been the weakest link for B1G teams in the past two seasons. A team with a top netminder may be unstoppable in the coming months. <\/p>\n
3. The GLI at LCA.<\/strong><\/p>\n
This is the third time I’m actually complaining about this in print — or pixels, to be fair — but the Jan. 1-2 dates for the Great Lakes Invitational at Little Caesars Arena is just the worst. Not only is it New Year’s Day and the day after, a Monday and a Tuesday, but the competition for attention from the local football-loving populace will be fierce. No one is carrying the games on television, not even locally. I’m going the second night, so I’ll be tweeting out (@paulacweston) through both games. I expect some good hockey to be played in front of very few people, in a really pretty new arena. <\/p>\n
It’s New Year’s Eve, a few hours before midnight, and I’m watching my Buffalo Bills’ chances for making the playoffs for the first time in a generation slip away — and I realize suddenly that we’ve returned to blogging and columns this week and it’s my turn. So, hi. 1. It was a good weekend […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":140328,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1425],"tags":[],"coauthors":[802],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n