Badgers rallied Saturday for tie at St. Cloud State, play Gophers next

The Gophers were not the only WCHA team to rally late in the third period on Saturday.

Wisconsin, the Gophers' next opponent, did so, too. The Badgers scored two goals in the last five minutes of their 3-3 overtime tie at St. Cloud State.

The tie gave the Badgers (4-5-1, 2-3-1 WCHA) their first road point of the season. They lost 7-2 the night before to the Huskies (4-4-2, 2-1-1 WCHA) and were swept at Michigan Tech.

Here is the rest of the slight edited UW news release, with details from SCSU, too:

Momentum shifted to the Badgers on Saturday at the National Hockey Center with 6:50 left after Huskies freshman Brooks Bertsch was called for checking from behind, resulting in an ejection and five-minute man advantage for Wisconsin.

Down 3-1, the Badgers scored 2:31 into the power play on freshman Matt Paape's goal.

Eight seconds after that long power play expired, the Huskies got their seventh penalty with 1:42 left. Junior defenseman Justin Schultz tied the score 3-3 with 40 seconds to play after UW pulled its goalie for a six-on-four attack.

Jared Festler made it 2-1 St. Cloud State at 13:45 of the second period, which ended strangely. The Huskies' Drew LeBlanc slid hard into the boards behind the Wisconsin net with 29 seconds left in the second period. LeBlanc severely injured his lower leg and was unable to get up.

As the stretcher was brought onto the ice, the referees determined the final 29 seconds would be played after intermission. So when both teams returned to the ice, they played the final 29 seconds of the middle period before switching sides and beginning the final period.

Ben Hanowski's sixth goal of the season at 31 seconds of the third period put the Huskies ahead 3-1.

The Badgers outshot the Huskies 36-27. Joel Rumpel has 24 saves for UW, while St. Cloud's Ryan Faragher saved 33 in a matchup of freshmen netminders..

Wisconsin went 2-for-6 on the power play, SCSU 0-2.

St. Cloud State 7, Wisconsin 2

In the opener of their series, the Huskies scored seven goals for the second Friday at home. They beat New Hampshire 7-5 on Oct. 21.

Prochno and junior foward David Eddy gave SCSU an early 2-0 lead before Justin Schultz scored for the Badgers at 16:39 of the opening period.

Ahead 2-1, St. Cloud State expaned the lead to 4-2 in the second period on goals by Cory Thorson and Eddy's second. Paape had UW's goal.

In the third period, junior forward Ben Hanowski scored a power-play goal at 1:00, Nic Dowd had a shorthanded goal at 11:02 and then Hanowski got his second goal at 17:31.

The Huskies outshot Wisconsin 37-28, with UW's Landon Peterson, another freshman, collecting 30 saves. SCSU's Ryan Faragher made 26 saves.

GOPHERS TRIVIA

How well do you know the Gophers? Here are three tough/easy questions depending on who you are:

1. Who are their top three plus/minus players?

2. Who is their best faceoff man?

The answers are at the bottom of this post.

* Gophers have won four games in a row.

* The Gophers' 2-0 shutout of North Dakota on Friday was their first over UND since Kellen Briggs beat the Fighting Sioux 6-0 on Oct. 23, 2005 in Grand Forks. The last time the Gophers shut out North Dakota at home goes even further back, to Dec. 12, 1993 when Jeff Moen beat them 3-0.

* North Dakota held the Gophers without a goal in the first period on Friday and without a goal in the second period on Saturday. That was only the second and third times this season, they have not scored a goal in a period. So overall, they have at least one goal in 28 of 31 periods, including one overtime.

* Senior Nick Larson's tying goal on Saturday against the Sioux was his first goal in 15 games. His last goal was against Michigan Tech on Feb. 25, 2011. ... The longest current streak without a goal is 45 games, held by junior defenseman Seth Helgeson. His last goal was against Massachusetts on Oct. 8, 2010.

* Sophomore defenseman Nate Schmidt, who is having a breakthrough season so far with one goal and 10 assists, was not taken in the 2009 NHL draft although everyone seemed to rate him as a prospect. He was ranked No. 71 by Red Line Report, No. 123 by the Independent Scouting Service and No. 163 by Central Scouting.

* Nick Bjugstad already has as many goals as he had last season. The sophomore center got his eighth goal Saturday at 7:09 of the first period by going hard to the North Dakota net and scoring on a backhand rebound. Earlier in the game, he got himself involved with two big hits within seconds on the same shift. He also helped kill a penalty shortly before his goal.

* Other things I saw when I looked up from my laptop in the second period:

Tom Serratore knocks down 6-4, 226-pound D-man Ben Blood

Sam Warning and Jack Hansen almost clicking on a 2-on-0 rush.

And in third period, Gophers goalie Kent Patterson stops Brock Nelson on a 3-on-1 with 3:27 to play.

* A fellow named Jon on the Gophers' live chat predicted Kyle Rau would score a goal at 10:05 p.m. Saturday. At 10:08, Rau did. Of course, it was Rau's fourth game-winner so he is the logical pick to do somethhing special. He has a magic touch.

Answers to three Gophers questions:

1. Kyle Rau, plus-14 , Nick Bjugstad and Ben Marshall, plus-12 and Erik Haula, plus-10.

2. Zach Budish is 11-2 on faceoffs, .846. Looking someone who takes more? Taylor Matson is 63-48, .567; Travis Boyd is 29-23, .558 and Nick Bjugstad 96-83, .536.