Wolverines-Spartans Battle to Second Tie

Saturday, January 19, 2002
Yost Ice Arena, Ann Arbor, Michigan

It's hard to believe that over three months have passed since these two teams opened the regular season playing before a world record crowd in Spartan Stadium, but that's how long its been. In that game after sixty-five minutes of play the game ended in a three all tie. What will happen tonight with first place in the CCHA at stake and both teams certainly different than the two teams that played that first game back in October.

Going into this game the Spartans are ranked sixth in the nation, while the Wolverines are ranked number eight. Michigan goes into the game without its leading scorer as Mike Cammalleri is out indefinitely with a case of mono. Michigan State isn't without problems of their own, as they enter tonights game missing two of their regular players, injured in this past Tuesdays contest against Ferris.

With the playing of that Tuesday night game against Ferris the total number of conference games is even between these two teams. With the number of games played equal, the Spartans hold a two point lead over the Wolverines in the CCHA. A Wolverine victory in this game tonight would put them into a tie with the Spartans, but the Wolverines would technically be the first place team as they would hold the tie breaker. A Michigan State victory would make the gap between first and second four points, a gap that the Wolverines might find to large to cross in this tight CCHA race. We'll hopefully have some of these questions answered this evening as these two teams are set to do battle for the second time this season.

The first period was a hard hitting period with the action moving up and down the ice at a pretty good pace. Barely four minutes into the game each team would lose a player to the sin bin, but while skating four on four neither team was able to notch a score. Both teams would get a power play opportunity in the first period, and neither team would be able to score while on the power play. The first period ended with the score all tied at zero. The Wolverines had a slight edge in shots on goal with a nine to eight count.

The Spartans looked to came very close to scoring the first goal of the game with just over one minute gone in the second period when they got what appeared to be a clean shot at the Michigan goal. Somehow Blackburn was able to come up with the stop to keep the Spartans off the board. Like the first period the first penalty of this period came with barely four minutes gone. This time it was the Wolverines who were called, putting the Spartans on the power play. The Michigan penalty kill continued to play very well as they killed off the Spartan power play.

Through the middle portion of the period both teams would lose players to the sin bin in pairs, leaving the teams skating four on four twice in this period. All that would change with 7:01 left in the period. After putting all kinds of pressure on the Michigan goal the Spartans chipped a rebound over Blackburn to score the games first goal. Michigan simply could not get control of the puck and clear it out of their net and eventually the Spartans were able to find twine.

About ninety seconds later Michigan would get called for a penalty to put Michigan State on the power play. At this time the Spartans had all the energy and it looked like they might put this game out of reach, but once again the Michigan penalty kill came up big. While skating through this power play each team would lose a player to another penalty, but the teams continued to skate five on four. In the end all the penalties were killed off and the score remained one to nothing in favor of the Spartans.

Michigan would get their chance to get back to even late in the second period. With just under three minutes left in the period the Spartans were called for a penalty putting Michigan on the power play. While the Wolverines were getting some pressure on the Spartan goal, they hadn't been able to get the puck into the net. With forty-three seconds left in this power play the Spartans were called for their second penalty giving Michigan a two man advantage on the power play. They would continue to get their scoring chances in the closing seconds of the period, but even with two extra attackers Michigan was unable to find an opening into the Spartan net. The second period would come to an end with Michigan State holding the one to nothing lead. The Wolverines out shot the Spartans in this period to extend their shots on goal lead to twenty-three to sixteen.

Michigan would start the final period of play with thirty-five seconds of power play time left, but they never really mounted any kind of scoring threat. Once again it would be the Wolverines who would provide the Spartans with a break when they were called for a penalty with just 1:26 gone in the period. Once again it was the penalty kill that saved Michigan as they killed off yet another Spartan power play.

The action would continue up and down the ice for much of the remainder of the period with time beginning to slip away from the Wolverines. With 6:37 left to play Michigan would finally get the break they had been working so hard to create. The Wolverines had been carrying play to the Spartans for several minutes, piling up shot after shot, but not getting any in the net. Finally, working very hard in the Spartan end Michigan got the puck to Helminen in the slot area where he got off a shot that beat Miller top shelf to once again tie the game. Assists on the goal went to Werner and Ortmeyer.

The Wolverines continued to apply pressure for the remainder of the period, but they couldn't get a second one past Miller. With 1:40 left in the period both teams would lose a player to a penalty and the game was finished with both teams skating with four men each. Regulation time would come to an end with the game all tied up at one goal each. Michigan once again extended their lead in shots on goal as regulation time ended with the Wolverines holding a thirty-nine to nineteen edge.

The five minute sudden victory overtime period started with both teams skating with four men for twenty seconds. Both teams would get chances at goals in the overtime period, but neither team was able to come up with the game winner. With 20.1 seconds left in the overtime period and a face off coming in the Spartan zone Michigan took their one minute time out to set their strategy. Whatever they had planned to do, didn't work as the overtime period ended with the score still all tied up at one goal each. Michigan ended the contest with a forty-three to twenty-one advantage in shots on goal.

Well these two teams have played two games against each other this year and so far each team has scored four goals in route to two tie games. In fact these two teams seem to be so evenly matched it's down right scary. It's clear that the difference maker in this game was Spartan goal tender, Ryan Miller. Without him in goal it's likely that Michigan would have scored at least three goals and probably would have scored more.

With the tie we know that the two teams continue to sit in first and second place in the CCHA with the Spartans holding the two point lead. These two teams play again in about a month, but that game will not be a CCHA game so it will have no bearing on the CCHA race. That game could have significant ramifications for both teams as far as the NCAA tournament is concerned, but it won't affect the CCHA race. That means that with each team having to play ten more CCHA games Michigan is in exactly the same position they were in prior to this game. They must win every single game they play and they must hope that the Spartans drop at least one, preferably two games out of those ten. The Spartans have some tough games yet to play so it's possible that they could drop a couple of games, but the Wolverines also have their work cut out for them. The final thing we know is that the conference race is probably going to wide open until the final weekend. There will probably be at least eight teams that don't know their finishing position in the conference until that final weekend. It's going to be a tough, tight stretch race with one little slip here or there costing teams one or more places in the final conference standings. It should be fun.