Gophers men’s hockey team tops Notre Dame, pushes Big Ten tournament series to final game

Stuck in a tie game with Notre Dame early in the third period and with their Big Ten tournament lives on the line, the Gophers men’s hockey team needed a spark.

Up stepped Connor Kurth, who scored the go-ahead goal and set up the winner in a 4-2 victory over the Fighting Irish on Saturday night at 3M Arena at Mariucci. Minnesota’s victory evened the best-of-three series at a game apiece, and the Gophers and Fighting Irish will play Game 3 at 6 p.m. Sunday. The winner advances to a single-game Big Ten semifinal next Saturday.

“We used up our only mulligan in playoffs, so no more,” said Kurth, a junior forward from Lindstrom. “Now you’ve got to bring the jam every night from here on out.”

Oliver Moore, Matthew Wood and Brodie Ziemer also scored for the second-seeded Gophers (25-9-4), who lost Friday’s opener 3-2. Goalie Nathan Airey, starting in place of Liam Souliere, made 20 saves in front of an announced crowd of 6,331.

Hunter Strand scored in the first period and Henry Nelson in the third for seventh-seeded Notre Dame (11-24-1), which got 31 saves from Owen Say.

“A hard-fought playoff game — both teams," Gophers coach Bob Motzko said. “I liked how we played, really, start to finish.”

The finishing part — led by Kurth — especially stood out.

His first big play put the Gophers up 2-1 at 4:16 of the third period. After the puck caromed off Irish forward Justin Janicke’s skate and stayed in the Notre Dame zone, Jimmy Clark grabbed it, drove to the net and dished it to Kurth, who slammed it home for his 17th goal of the season.

“I could have skated that into the net, so that was all him,” Kurth said of Clark.

Kurth played a key role in the Gophers taking a 3-1 lead. Defenseman Ryan Chesley sent a stretch pass from the Gophers zone to the Irish zone, and Kurth got the puck but had defenseman Michael Mastrodomenico draped on him. Kurth drove toward the net but was pushed into the end boards. He still got off a backhand pass to Wood, and the transfer from Connecticut finished the play with his 17th goal of the season at 7:18.

“I couldn’t believe he put it on my tape; that was ridiculous,” Kurth said of Chesley’s pass. “He was like a quarterback there, hitting me with a Hail Mary.”

Notre Dame cut the lead to 3-2 at 9:42 of the third when Nelson fired a long rebound past Airey. Irish coach Jeff Jackson pulled Say for an extra attacker with 1:20 left. Airey made two saves, and Ziemer scored into the empty net with 29.4 seconds to play.

Motzko was pleased with the play of Airey, who took over in the second period Friday after two uncharacteristic mistakes by Souliere led to two Notre Dame goals. Airey stopped all 13 shots he faced Friday and was solid Saturday in improving to 12-2-2 this season.

“Both of our goalies have been good all year,” Motzko said. “… We’ve got a lot of faith in both of them."

The Gophers will try to close out the series Sunday, and they plan to take the same mind-set they displayed Saturday.

“Same thing: do or die,” Wood said. “It’s a big game, and we really want this one.”