Lighter Sacchetti feeling better on ice with one game-winner already

Nico Sacchetti, after a disappointing sophomore year, is hoping for a breakthrough year.

"My freshman year I came in and didn't get a whole lot of playing time, which I kind of expect as a freshman," Sacchetti said. "Last year was a season I really expected myself to take off offensively and it just didn't happen."

He played in 38 of the team's 39 games but only had four goals and 11 assists for 15 points that were spead out well. He scored in 13 different games over 12 separate weekends.

"So I worked really hard this summer," Sacchetti said, "and I am hoping that maybe the breakout year just took a year off or something. I mean I worked hard this [off]season and it feels good to get a goal the first weekend."

He scored the game-winning goal at 3:41 of the third period last Saturday as the Gophers beat UMass 5-4. His goal made the score 5-3.

EMPHASIS ON FITNESS

In his final two seasons at Virginia High School, Sacchetti had 164 points in 52 games, or better than three points per game. As a high school senior, he played for the Omaha Lancers of the USHL in 2007-08. That season he had 10 goals and 14 assists in 56 games.

Sacchetti said he worked on his conditioning the most this past summer.

"The summer before, we [his Gopher teammates and him] really just lifted weights a lot," Sacchetti said. "And I ended up putting on 10-15 pounds of muscle on on my upper body. I was just too heavy, too top-heavy almost. This summer I focused more on agility and running stuff. I ended up dropping 15 pounds."

He weighs 186, 187 pounds now, Sacchetti said, instead of being around 200.

Does that make a difference? "Oh yeah. Compare it to like skating around with an extra 10-pound weight in your breezers," Sacchetti said. "It is going to weigh on you. I feel all-around a lot better."

He looked pretty good last Saturday with the puck on his stick early in the thid period against UMass.

"We work on two on twos all the times, which is exactly what that was," Sacchetti said. "That other guy always drives the net hard. It does two things, it makes the goalie nervous; [someone] he is there for rebounds. And it pushes the other defenseman back, which gave me more room to shoot the puck."

UNO A CHALLENGE

"[Omaha] is a growing hockey town. When I was there, UNO was pretty good in their [conference]," Sacchetti said. "But they were not really NCAA contenders. Obviously, they didn't have Dean Blais and Mike Hastings coaching there when I was there.

"Since Blais has come there and with the addition of Hastings, their recruiting classes have gone way up and their overall coaching is a lot better. So they are going to be a well-coached team, they are going to be an older team -- like a lot of USHL guys are [going] there -- and they are going to be physical.

"It will be a different game from playing UMass."

"It was definitely an experience going from my junior [year] of high school [at Virginia], playing 30-some games in a high school season, my senior year [at Omaha] we ended up playing 70-some games. It was obviously a grind on your body. It was something I was glad I did. It was a growing experience for me, mentally and physically.

"Winning a national championship, I don't know what you can compare it to. Like for the rest of my life I will be able to say I am a national champion."

Sacchetti said he knows some of the UNO players. One of his best friends his one season with the Lancers was Matt White, now a freshman forward for the Mavericks.

"He is one of the top guys on UNO as a freshman. He is maybe like a [Jacob] Cepis type kid, but he is bigger than Cepis. He is kind of the same. He is feisty. He has real good skill and he is just tough, tough as nails. He is just a well-rounded player."

Sacchetti said he has also played against many of UNO's other players such as Alex Hudson and Matt Ambroz.

"They are going to be very competitve. They are the type of team that is going to want to come out and just beat us just because we are the Gophers."

Sacchetti said he expects the Mavericks to be a defensive-minded, physical team, but well-disciplined. "They are going to come at us all night," he said. "It is going to be a different style game. UMass is faster and more skilled, but [UNO] is going to be a strong team."

HIS ACADEMIC SIDE

Sacchetti is one of four Gophers in the prestigious Carlson School of Management along with senior Patrick White and freshmen Nate Condon and Justin Holl. Sacchetti has a cumulative GPA of 3.6 and last season was named the hockey team's outstanding student-athlete and picked for the WCHA all-academic team.

He said hockey is his first priority, but he has always done well in school. Asked about his career plans in finance, "I have no plans," he said, adding he will have a lot of options.

"You have to be confident if you are going to be productive," he said.