U's dominance rewarded late in victory over Huskies

ST. CLOUD -- Going into the final two minutes of Saturday night's game, Sam Warning had six shots on net and had missed an uncovered upper corner.

The Gophers freshman winger got one more chance late -- and buried it. Warning's fourth goal of the season, with 1 minute, 19 seconds left, gave the visitors a 3-2 victory over St. Cloud State.

The Gophers outshot the Huskies 46-12 at the National Hockey Center in front of an announced crowd of 6,102. Only goalie Ryan Faragher's 43 saves kept the score close. And defenseman Andrew Prochno, another Huskies freshman, nearly forced an overtime by clanging a shot off a post in the closing seconds.

"We were pounding them the whole third period," Gophers defenseman Justin Holl said. "It's good to have something to show for it."

Holl was the middle man in the passing sequence setting up Warning's goal. Jake Hansen found Holl in the slot, and Holl dished the puck to Warning, down low on the right side.

Warning's one-timer from short range gave the Gophers their first series sweep since early December. They beat the Huskies 2-1 on Friday at Mariucci Arena.

"I give all the credit to Justin Holl," Warning said. "He made a good pass to me back door. All I had to do was put it in the back net."

Faragher made 17 saves in the third period alone. This was his fourth game with 40 or more stops.

"With them rolling all their lines," Faragher said, "the pressure they had, it was difficult to get the puck out."

With the victory and second-place Minnesota Duluth's 5-0 loss to Michigan Tech, the No. 3-rankedGophers (19-9-1, 15-5-0) go into an off week with a five-point lead over the Bulldogs in the WCHA race.

St. Cloud State (10-14-4, 7-10-3) had not been swept in a conference series but played with two defensemen on its fourth line because of injuries.

Even so, the Huskies scored the only goal of the first period. One second Nate Condon had a near breakaway for the Gophers before being separated from the puck.

The next, SCSU had an odd-man rush that ended with Ben Hanowski sliding the puck underneath Gophers goalie Kent Patterson.

Gophers coach Don Lucia chewed out the referee who dared skate over to the visitors' bench. Lucia wanted a hooking call on Condon's rush.

In the second period, defenseman Ben Marshall and forward Erik Haula each scored power-play goals to give the Gophers a 2-1 lead. But Hanow- ski, with 62 seconds left in the period, again tied the score from an incredible angle -- well below the extended goal line on the right. The puck hit the side of the net, then Patterson's stick and trickled in.

That flukey goal will be forgotten now because the Gophers won anyway.

"The biggest difference is we were able to play a lot of four lines to their three," Lucia said. "By the end of the weekend because of their injuries and shortened personnel, we were the fresher team."

Huskies coach Bob Motzko agreed: "They wore us down."