The Northern Michigan Wildcats had about a nine minute burst in the second period on Friday night to take a 1-0 lead in the best-of-three CCHA First Round series against Miami. With the 4-0 win the Wildcats are just one more win away from a trip to Joe Louis Arena next week and the next round of the CCHA Tournament.
NMU improves to 24-11-2 while Miami is now 12-21-2.
“I thought that we played pretty well for two periods,” Rick Comley, head coach of NMU, said. “Scoring first is so important in this day and age.”
Terry Harrison scored the first goal of the game, which turned out to be the game-winner at 4:42 of the second period and then Alan Swanson scored his 11th goal of the season at 8:18 of the period.
Ryan Carrigan scored 32 seconds later at 8:50 in the second period to make the score 3-0. With Chad Theur getting an assist it was his 50th point on the season. He is the first Wildcat to register 50 points in a season since Greg Hadden did it during the 1994-95 season.
Chris Gobert scored the final goal of the game, his 15th on the season at 13:35 of the second period.
Craig Kowalski picked up his fourth shutout on the season. It was his first post-season and home shutout in his career. He stopped all 24 shots he faced. The Wildcats also had 24 shots on goal for the night.
“Craig was very steady tonight,” Comley added. “I thought that we played a pretty solid game.”
