Friday, December 3, 1999

Friday, December 3, 1999, BGSU Ice Arena, Bowling Green, Ohio

Wow, it’s already the first Friday in December, where has this year gone?? It’s the first weekend of December and Michigan finds itself back in conference play as they take on the Falcons of Bowling Green in a home and home series. I think these next two weeks are essential for Michigan. They have these two games against Bowling Green and two games next weekend against Nebraska. Then they are off until the Great Lakes Invitational (GLI). They cannot afford to loose another game in the conference in this, the first half of the season. It will also do them good to go into the mid season break on a five game winning streak. They do have to be very careful, the next couple of weeks. Bowling Green is a good team that will beat you if you don’t stay sharp. Nebraska, in their first year in the CCHA, has surprised a couple of teams and they do seem to be playing better as the season progresses.

Michigan currently sits in third place in the conference with Northern Michigan three points ahead of us and Michigan State still six points ahead. Another reason why Michigan cannot afford to loose any more in conference games is that neither of the teams in front of them are in their CCHA cluster. This means that they will only play those teams twice in the regular season. That’s enough (barely) for us to pass Northern Michigan (provided that we sweep them this season – and there is no guarantee of that), and we can pass Michigan State if we don’t loose. We still have two games in hand on State, but as you can see things are really tight between the top conference teams. Western, Lake State, and Ferris are all only two points behind Michigan and looking to move up in the standings.

On a strictly Michigan note Jeff Jillson and Andy Hilbert will both join the US National Junior team in an international tournament this month in Sweden. They will play for the National team from December 25 to January 4^.This of course means that both of these players will be miss the GLI tournament this year. In addition, Mike Comrie has been asked to try out for the Canadian team. If Mike makes the Canadian team that will leave Michigan without three of their top players going into this years GLI. Even though I’m sure all Wolverine fans would like to see these guys in Maize and Blue when the GLI comes around, I’m also sure that you all wish them the best of luck as they represent their respective countries in this annual tournament.

The mixed weekend in the College Hockey Showcase saw the Wolverines holding their spot at number six in the national polls. Michigan State fell one place because of their split in this same showcase. The first three places stayed the same with Maine, North Dakota, and Wisconsin sitting 1-2-3. New Hampshire is the team that bumped Michigan State down a spot as they leap four spots this weekend from number eight to number four. Colgate and Rensselaer take up the next two spots as Northern Michigan and Boston University move into the top ten for the first time at numbers nine and ten respectively. Ferris the only other CCHA team receiving votes in this week’s poll. I must say that I don’t remember the hockey poll being so volatile in a real long time. This poll has usually reflected the fact that the teams play a lot of games and everyone expects them to pick up a loss here and there during the year. There just doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to some of the huge moves, up and down, that we have seen in this year’s poll. Hopefully this is a one-year bit of strangeness and we aren’t on our way to having bouncing polls like Basketball and Football. Also on the National scene Michigan has submitted a bid to host the 2002 West Regional of the NCAA hockey tournament. It would be great to see Michigan get the regional again. There was some great hockey in the West Regional held at Yost back in 1998 (not the least of which was the huge win by Michigan over the number one North Dakota on their way to the National Championship). Anyway two important games this weekend between the Falcons of Bowling Green and the Wolverines of Michigan, so lets get to the action.

I pick up the first period with just over three minutes left in the first period. Michigan holds the one to nothing. The lone Michigan goal came at the 13:44 mark of the period when Ortmeyer got off a slap shot on the power play that blazed past the Falcon netminder. Assists on the goal went to Comrie and Kosick. A big save by O’Malley, but BG brings the pressure back to the Michigan net. Michigan was getting a break toward the BG net, when the Michigan player was hauled down from behind. Bowling Green got the penalty and Michigan will go on the power play. Kosick takes a shot from the side of the net, but he hits the post and just misses giving Michigan the extra goal. Michigan getting some pressure while on this power play. Getting some looks down in front of the BG net, but so far they have been unable to get the extra goal. The penalty has expired, Hilbert takes a shot just after the penalty was killed, Hilbert misses, the rebound was bouncing there for a minute, but Michigan is unable to get to it. Bowling Green dodges a bullet there and Michigan comes up just a little bit short. The first period ends with Michigan leading one to nothing. Michigan holds a huge edge in shots on goal with a 13 to 2 count.

Shouneyia goes into the penalty box for hooking, even though it appeared that the Falcon player was doing the hooking. Needless to say BG is on the power play early in the second period. The Falcons get off a couple of in close shots that have been turned away. Bowling Green sneaks their goalie off the ice to get the two-man advantage, and suddenly the puck is almost in the net. It rolls along the goal line, until Vancik pushes it out of the danger zone. However, Peach picks up a penalty giving Bowling Green a real two man advantage. Michigan has to kill off a minute and 16 seconds of two-man advantage. Bowling Green gets off a huge shot that hits the goal post and Michigan dodges a bullet. O’Malley comes up with a save as BG comes close to getting the tying goal. This could be a turning point of the game, can Michigan’s defense hold up under the extended Falcon power play or will Bowling Green get a little momentum going and make things tuff on our Wolverines. Michigan kills off the first penalty, and we are only short by one man. BG gets off a big shot and O’Malley comes up with a big save. There is a bit of a mix-up between the players and we will get more penalties called. One each from Michigan and Bowling green go into the penalty box. These are coincidental penalties and we still skate five on four (advantage Bowling Green). With only five seconds in the penalty BG takes it into the Michigan zone, but Michigan kills off all of the penalties and both teams are now at full strength. Michigan is now on the power play as Bowling Green gets called for a penalty. Michigan making a move on the BG goal, but Comrie sends the puck over the Falcon net. Bowling Green gets a breakaway, but O’Malley comes up with a big save. The Falcons have killed off the penalty and both teams are again at full strength. Michigan seems to be giving the puck up in bad situations in this period, but so far they have been able to avoid any Bowling Green goals. Koch gets off a good shot, but the Falcon netminder comes up with a big save. A give away by Michigan and Bowling Green gets off a great shot, but O’Malley comes up with the save. A BG player buries Fraser on a big hit, and Michigan will go back on the power play. With Michigan on the power play, Bowling Green comes up with a short-handed goal to tie the game. This was set up by yet another give away by Michigan. As I said earlier they seem to be a bit sloppy with the puck in this period and it finally cost them a goal. It’s all tied up with just over eleven minutes left in the period. Bowling Green is back at full strength and they are bringing some heat at the Michigan net. Bowling Green almost picks up a goal there, but they just miss on the play. Michigan just misses as Hilbert sets Langfeld up perfectly, but Langfeld just can’t seem to connect. Bowling Green gets off a shot that O’Malley blocks, but he doesn’t get the rebound and the UM defense allowed a BG player to remain in the slot untouched. It’s now BG 2, Michigan 1 and the Wolverines have got to get their heads into this game or they are going to be in big trouble. O’Malley comes up with a save as the BG player gets past the defense and gets off an unmolested shot. We are now under four minutes to go in this period and right now I think Michigan has to look at getting out of this period without any more damage. Go into the locker room, regroup, and bring it to the Falcons in the third period. Cammalleri makes a great move, gets behind the BG defense all by himself, crashes the net and bags the goal. The lone assist on this goal goes to Jillson. Michigan has tied it up with about two minutes left in the game. I must say that really helps Michigan, Bowling Green could do no wrong there for a while and their crowd was really into the game. This helps quiet them down, and if they can hang on until the end of the period everything is even going into the final period. We are now under a minute to go in the period and if you can’t tell that goal has fired me up as well. Let’s go BLUE and take the lead as the period ends!! Bowling Green gets off a shot that is turned away and Michigan takes the puck the other way on a two on one break. Bowling Green comes up with a big defensive play to break it up, but for a minute it looked like Michigan might just take the lead back. The period ends with the game all tied up a two apiece. That period was really all Bowling Green as they end up with a 12 to 4 edge in shots on goal. Michigan still leads in shots on goal for the game with a 21 to 15 count.

The third period is under way with Michigan blowing a golden opportunity. They had the puck deep in the Falcon zone with extra players around the net and they just didn’t get off the shot (it looked like they fanned on the shot). Bowling Green is now putting all kinds of pressure on the Michigan net and finally Michigan ices the puck to relieve the pressure. We were lucky not to have given up a goal in that little span of time as Bowling Green got two or three real good looks at the Michigan net. Bowling Green gets off another good shot which O’Malley stops, but again O’Malley doesn’t cover the rebound and Bowling Green just misses the goal as it sails over the net. Bowling Green still putting big pressure on the goal, another shot, another big rebound that Michigan doesn’t cover and this time Bowling Green buries the puck to take the 3 to 2 lead fairly early in the third period. Michigan is still asleep as they blow by the Michigan defense with the puck yet again, and Michigan just gets lucky to not give up another goal. Again Michigan dodges a bullet as they allow Bowling Green to get in close with the puck again – that was really close. Now its Michigan’s turn to put some pressure on the Bowling Green goal, but so far they have been unable to crack the Bowling Green goalie. We move under twelve minutes to go in the game and we are still down by one. Bowling Green almost comes up with another goal off a rebound, but this time they shoot wide and Michigan dodges another bullet. With Michigan looking to get something going in front of the BG net the Falcons drag Comrie down to the ice and Michigan will go on the power play looking to tie this thing up. So far Michigan has been able to get some pressure on the BG net during this power play, but with only six seconds left in the power play it doesn’t appear that they will get a goal during this power play. The penalty expires with about eight minutes left in the game and Michigan is still down by one goal. Michigan continues to get some pressure on the BG goal, but again they come up short. Bowling Green ices the puck and the face off comes back to the Bowling Green zone. We are still down by one as we go under five minutes to play in this game – come on BLUE, lets get this thing tied up. Both teams are going back and forth with Michigan looking to tie it up. On their best look at the tying goal the puck is deflected out of play. We are down to 3:25 to go in this period and Michigan is just not getting it after it the way they need to. There was a great chance for Michigan as the puck was in front of the ice, the net was empty, but the BG defense was all over us and we couldn’t get to the puck. Michigan will be looking to pull their goalie sometime in the next 30 to 45 seconds as time begins to run out on the Wolverines. There is now 2:20 to go in the game as Michigan is still the looking for the equalizer. We’re under two minutes now with the face off in the Bowling Green zone. There will be an icing call against Bowling Green with about 1-½ minutes to go in the game. With the face off in the BG zone O’Malley is pulled from the game and Michigan now has the extra attacker on the ice. That ends the game as Michigan looses the puck and Bowling Green picks up the empty net goal to take a two goal lead with just over one minute to go in the game. That’s about all she wrote. If Michigan can get pull this one out it wouldn’t be the first one I’ve seen them pull out, but they just don’t seem to be on their game tonight. Michigan will play the final 15 seconds with a two-man advantage after a big scrum between the two teams. It’s nice to think they might tie this thing up to get to overtime, but the way they are playing tonight I wouldn’t bank on it. That ends the game with Bowling Green winning by a score of 4 to 2. Michigan did win the shots on goal battle with a 30 to 24 count.

We really didn’t need this loss tonight. We can no longer tie or pass Northern in head to head competition – we need help from someone else. The best we can do against Michigan State is tying them if we don’t loose anymore this year (or at least don’t loose unless they loose). We have once again given our destiny to other teams, we need help on several fronts in order to win the conference in the regular season. This past several weeks reminds of last January when we were working real hard, but just couldn’t seem to get the breaks. I suppose if we must have stretches like this it is better to have them now rather than late in the year as we make our run for the NCAA tournament. These two teams face off again tomorrow night, but this time the game will be played in Ann Arbor at Yost Arena. In tomorrow’s contest Brian Murphy and Mike Jones from Bowling Green and J.J. Swistak from Michigan will not play as all three picked up game disqualifications from the melee at the close of the game. Until tomorrow, C-ya!!