Michigan Tech’s sky-high ambitions didn’t quite pan out at the beginning of this hockey season.
A year removed from finishing just two points behind eventual champions Minnesota State for the MacNaughton Cup and securing an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament, the Huskies were picked to finish first in the CCHA this season thanks to a stellar cast of returning All-Americans and all-conference players.
But a disastrous October in which the Huskies went winless in their first seven games put them behind the eight ball almost immediately. There was a little bit of panic in the Copper Country, with Tech fans seeing their dreams of another at-large tournament bid all but slip away thanks in part to that poor out-of-conference October that included losses to Alaska, Wisconsin and Clarkson.
But if this past weekend is any indication, it appears the Huskies have figured some things out and are back on the right track.
Thanks to a resilient offense that got the goals when they needed and a restaurant All-American performance from goaltender Blake Pietila, the Huskies ended 2023 on a high note with a victory in the Great Lakes Invitational, played in Grand Rapids, Mich. The Huskies got some revenge on Alaska with a 3-2 overtime win in the semifinal before tying Michigan State in the finals and beating the Spartans in a shootout.
“We grew as a team in these two games in areas we needed to grow,” Michigan Tech coach Joe Shawhawn said during his postgame interview conference on Friday. “That’s really been my focus. Our PairWise isn’t great, obviously, because we didn’t have a good nonconference, so to me, it’s all about being the best we can.”
The successful weekend pulled the Huskies (9-8-4) back above .500 and positioned them well for the 2024 stretch run of their season. They currently are third place in the CCHA on 19 points but have two games-in-hand on league-leading Bemidji State and are the best team in the conference on a points-percentage basis.
One area of noticeable improvement for the Huskies since the beginning of the season was the defense. Coming into the season, Jed Pietila and Trevor Russell were the team’s only blueliners who had played in more than 30 games for their careers. And early in the season, some of that inexperience showed, as the Huskies were giving up an average of more than three goals a game in the first two months of the season.
“We’re so young back there, but we’re growing,” Shawhan said. “Our expectations of many of our players is higher than they’ve ever understood to go. They want to make a career of this. They aren’t playing against our players in practice. They’re playing against a guy like (Michigan State forward Joey Larson). In that regard, we’re still pushing those D, because they are young, but there’s talent there, and they’ve grown for sure. This weekend was huge part of that with guys stepping up and us being short some players.”
Another player who had a huge weekend was Blake Pietila. His numbers, too, were shaky at the beginning of the year; at one point his save percentage was .911 and had a 2.94 goals-against average–not quite up to his usual standard. But Shawhan was never worried about his start netminder, and this weekend he proved why. He made 77 saves in the tournament, including a career-high 54 against Michigan State in the title game (which didn’t include the three impressive saves he made in the shootout to keep Sparty off the scoreboard).
“He’s never not been consistent for us in the net. I use him as a reference for our group on consistency and raising that level of consistency. I believe that old Navy SEALS thing, you don’t rise to the occasion, you sink to the level of your training. You don’t miraculously turn into something that you’re not,” Shawhan said.
He was asked a little later in the press conference about if he ever questioned or had a talk with Pietila when the goalie was struggling a bit in October. That was a simple answer: No.
“He’s done so much consistently for us (over the course of his career), and he didn’t struggle this weekend,” Shawhan said. “Part of it was being your best when your best is needed. That’s what we look for as coaches. And (Blake) is there when you need him. So I never question Blake Pietila.”
The Huskies hope to use this momentum from the GLI to make sure they score the top seed in the CCHA tournament and give themselves the best possible chance to earn a top seed. As Shawhan mentioned, the Huskies’ Pairwise is currently at 37 and because their nonconference schedule is over, it is unlikely that they will be able to jump high enough to make the NCAA tournament as an at-large team.
That means they have to keep rolling in CCHA play. Winning the MacNaughton Cup for the first time since 2015-16 would be a nice bonus, but the only way to make the tournament will be to win the Mason Cup as CCHA tournament champions.
“We have expectations to make the national tournament and there’s only going to be one team out of our league making the national tournament, and that’s going to be the playoff winner,” Shawhawn said. “So going into (the GLI) we weren’t driving to win the tournament, we were driving to get better.”
