MADISON, Wis. — While he didn’t feel particularly good about his team’s overall performance in Friday’s shutout win, Minnesota coach Don Lucia felt that he got individual effort to scratch out a 4-0 victory.
That wasn’t the concern in the series finale, as the “team” aspect showed up in a big way Saturday night.
The Gophers got goals from seven different sources, a hat trick for defenseman Michael Brodzinski and 25 saves freshman Eric Schierhorn to cruise to a relatively easy 9-2 victory over floundering Wisconsin at the Kohl Center.
“We had a lot of opportunities from a lot of different guys,” said Brodzinski, who said the hat trick was his first since Pee Wees. “Our fourth line was great. They had a lot of shots and a couple goals. It was nice to have everybody contribute and everybody was working hard.”
In a game that was over before the 13,616 fans could settle into their seats with a program and a salted pretzel, Minnesota (13-10-0, 8-2-0-0 Big Ten) put its first, fourth and seventh shot in the back of the net. By the time Wisconsin attempted a shot, it was 3-0 after 5:52 and Minnesota never looked back, earning its first sweep in Madison since Jan. 2006.
“The first shift, we broke through with tempo,” said Lucia.
Much to the chagrin of the Badgers (4-12-6, 1-7-2-1), the Gophers only briefly let the foot off the gas in the second period. And when that missteps caused the lead to shrink to 5-2 at the second intermission, Brodzinski scored 1:58 into the period, the first of four Minnesota tallies in the period that emptied the seating bowl.
“When you’re around sports long enough, you’re going to have nights like this,” said Wisconsin coach Mike Eaves. “It’s disappointing. They happen.”
While not to this extent, the losses are starting to pile up for the Wisconsin program. Since winning the inaugural Big Ten tournament title in 2014, Wisconsin is 8-39-11 (.233).
UW hasn’t registered a win since Dec. 12 and is 0-5-1 since the beginning of second semester.
“The biggest thing with any team is consistency, playing a full 60 minutes,” said Wisconsin senior captain Kevin Schultz. “We haven’t done that yet in the second half.”
Already in a scoring funk, registering only eight goals in the last five games, Wisconsin didn’t get any favors when co-leading scorer Luke Kunin (9-9-18) was scratched with an upper-body injury. But the problem wasn’t the offense, as the defense lost their assignments and the goalies couldn’t stop the savable chances.
Getting the start for the second straight night, freshman goalie Matt Jurusik gave up a goal on the first shot he saw, was pulled after the first 4:05 in favor of senior Adam Miller and was reinserted into the lineup at 11:20.
The Gophers warmly greeted him with a goal on the first shot he saw after retaking the ice during a five-minute power play to make it 4-0 at 11:46 in the first period.
Other than a goal by Cameron Hughes at 4:27 in the second period and Grant Besse’s tally later in the period, there wasn’t much to cheer about for Wisconsin in its worst loss to its heated rivals in nearly 13 years.
“We don’t have to overanalyze this,” said Eaves. “Our young goaltender struggled and we weren’t good enough in front of him and didn’t do enough good things to get off to a good start.”
After starting the year 4-7, Minnesota has won five straight league games to stay alone in first place in the Big Ten.
“We’re coming for that No. 1 spot that we had last year,” said Brodzinski. “If we keep this run going, it could be ours by the end of the year.”
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