No. 1 Wisconsin beats No. 3 Gophers 6-1 for women’s hockey series split

Imagine a playoff race in the NHL’s Central Division with the Colorado Avalanche missing Nathan MacKinnon and Cale Makar for the final month of the regular season, the Dallas Stars without Mikko Rantanen and Jake Oettinger, and the Wild without Matt Boldy and Brock Faber. Suddenly, a team’s depth would be tested heavily, its secondary scoring would need to emerge, and its backup goaltending might have to step up.

That’s just what’s playing out in the top conference in women’s college hockey as WCHA powers Wisconsin, Ohio State and the Gophers began a month without some of their best players who are with their respective national teams for the Winter Olympics in Milan and Cortina, Italy.

In the WCHA, there’s a three-team race for the Julianne Bye Cup, which goes to the regular-season champion. Top-ranked Wisconsin holds a two-point lead over No. 2 Ohio State, with the No. 3 Gophers seven points behind the Badgers in third. Each team has a series against the other two during the Olympics.

For the Gophers and defending national champion Wisconsin, the new-look lineups produced familiar results. In their first series this season, Minnesota won the opener before falling in the finale. This time, the Gophers handed Wisconsin only it second loss of the season, 3-2 on Molly Jordan’s goal 1:17 into overtime in the series opener on Friday, Jan. 30, at Ridder Arena. But on Saturday, the Empire struck back, with the Badgers hammering the Gophers 6-1 on the strength of Cassie Hall’s hat trick to salvage a split in front of an announced sellout crowd of 3,159.

“There’s no excuses,” Gophers coach Brad Frost said. “We got it handed to us tonight, and we need to be better. It’s not going to get any easier.”

Gophers players who will miss the remaining three series of the regular season because of Olympic duties are forward Abbey Murphy, the nation’s leader in goals and points, who’s playing for Team USA; forward Josefin Bouveng (Sweden), Minnesota’s second-leading scorer; forward Tereza Plosova (Czech Republic); and defender Nelli Laitinen (Finland).

Wisconsin is without four members of Team USA: star defender Caroline Harvey, defender Laila Edwards, forward Kirsten Simms and starting goalie Ava McNaughton; plus Czech forward Adela Sapovalivova.

Frost sees the situation as an opportunity. Not only will his quartet of Olympians represent his program on the international stage, his players in Minnesota will have a chance to show what they can do. Of course, the view from the Gophers’ side was better after the series opener.

“They’re our top scorers, right? So I guess it’s tough [not having the Olympians], but it’s an opportunity for everyone to step up and score,’’ Gophers forward Emma Kreisz said. “It’s giving us motivation. Every time we are on the ice, we want to make them proud.’’

For Wisconsin (23-5, 17-5 WCHA), the series finale showed assistant coach Dan Koch how the program did well in handling a short-handed situation.

“Our most important people become our strength coach and our athletic trainers, and they have a lot of respect from our players,” said Koch, coaching in place of head coach Mark Johnson, who missed the game to attend the funeral of a close friend. “… They’re missing players. We’re missing players, and so you have to make sure you’re balancing that energy level."

Energy wasn’t a problem for the Badgers and Hall, who quickly staked her team to a lead in the series finale, scoring six seconds into a power play for a 1-0 lead 1:33 into the game. The Badgers made it 2-0 at 9:19 of the first when Edina’s Vivian Jungels hammered home a rebound of a shot by Hall for her first of two goals.

BOXSCORE: Wisconsin 6, Gophers 1

WCHA standings

Chole Primerano scored at 4:37 of the third for the lone goal for the Gophers (24-2-2, 18-2-2).

Leading up to the series, Frost considered the matchup a good gauge for his team and its long-term goals. His opinion didn’t differ after the series.