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UMD BATTLES BACK, GAINS 2-2 TIE AT NO. 2 MINNESOTA

Saturday, February 23, 2013

Caleb Herbert and Minnesota's Erik Haula take a faceoff Saturday night at Mariucci Arena

Credit: Jim Rosvold

The fact that the University of Minnesota Duluth and the University of Minnesota played to an overtime tie Saturday should hardly come as a news flash.

After all, heading into their Western Collegiate Hockey Association series finale at Mariucci Arena in Minneapolis, the two clubs had met 15 times since March 2008 and 11 of those meetings had been decided by one goal or less, including five which required an extra session. Jake Hendrickson made it six overtimes Saturday evening when he took a centering feed from fellow senior foward Keegan Flaherty and buried a shot with 7:06 remaining in regulation to help the Bulldogs gain a 2-2  deadlock with their long-time intrastate rivals. Rookie goaltender Matt McNeely certainly did his part by turning aside 38 of 40 shots against the nation's top-scoring offense.

"I told Matt earlier today that he was going to be tested, that they were going to come with more of an offensive push and they did," said UMD head coach Scott Sandelin, whose Bulldogs fell 5-3 to the Gopher on Friday (giving up an empty net goal with six seconds remaining in the third period.) "Every team needs good goaltending and we got that tonight.

"I like how our team played  We got through the first 10 minutes, weathered the storm, but then took a too many men penalty, which you can't do, and they scored."

Scored indeed. The No. 2-ranked Gophers, which had gone 0-of-5 with the man advantage Friday, capitalized on their first power play opportunity of the night when Mike Reilley beat McNeely with a wrister from the low slot with just under two minutes to go in the first period. Freshman left winger Austin Farley drew UMD (10-17-5 overall; 8-13-5 WCHA) even midway through the second period by stuffing in a rebound for this 13th goal of the year (tying him for the team lead with senior right winger Mike Seidel) and third of the weekend. Tom Serratore's wraparound goal 6:25 into the third put Minnesota back on top 2-1 before Hendrickson countered six minutes later for his fifth goal of the year, equaling a career high.

The game marked the Bulldogs' final regular season road appearance of 2012-13 and the last time UMD and Minnesota will meet with WCHA points on the line.

"I thought we had a good weekend," said  Sandelin. "It's hard to play a perfect 125 minutes, but I like the way be played and battled."

The Bulldogs will take a brief break from WCHA warfare next Friday and Saturday night by hosting the University of Alabama-Huntsville before concluding the regular season at home against the University of Nebraska-Omaha the following weekend.

Scoring Summary

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