MINNEAPOLIS — There was a day off in between Minnesota’s 5-0 drubbing of Notre Dame on Friday and the game that concluded the series on Sunday, but the Gophers picked up exactly where they left off.
Minnesota beat the Fighting Irish 4-2 in a late-afternoon game at Mariucci Arena by putting their first two shots behind Notre Dame netminder Cal Petersen.
Sam Warning skated from around the goal line to the high slot and let off a wrist shot to give Minnesota a 1-0 lead 29 seconds into the game.
“We started off like we were sleeping,” Notre Dame coach Jeff Jackson said. “The first shift of the game and they score a goal. It wasn’t acceptable. We addressed it after the first and we came back and competed a lot harder in the second and third.”
Six minutes later, the Gophers scored early on their first power play when Mike Reilly hit Taylor Cammarata near the crease with a pass from the blue line. Cammarata drew the goaltender his way and slid a pass across the goalmouth to Hudson Fasching, who had a wide-open frame to shoot at. The tic-tac-toe goal was Fasching’s fifth of the season.
Minnesota got a 3-0 lead on its second power play of the game when Reilly fired a shot from the blue line that was tipped into the net by defenseman Luke Ripley.
Cammarata had an assist on all three of Minnesota’s first-period goals.
“Goals early in the period really get me going, throughout the game,” Cammarata said. “I’ve gotten a couple points throughout the first few shifts of the last couple games, so that’s got me going.”
[photoshelter-gallery g_id=”G0000gRdRkb2_rNI” g_name=”20141109-NotreDame-Minnesota-JGR” f_show_caption=”t” f_show_slidenum=”t” img_title=”casc” pho_credit=”iptc” f_link=”t” f_bbar=”t” fsvis=”f” width=”500″ height=”375″ bgcolor=”#AAAAAA” bgtrans=”t” btype=”old” bcolor=”#CCCCCC” crop=”f” trans=”xfade” tbs=”4000″ f_ap=”t” linkdest=”c” f_fullscreen=”f” f_constrain=”f” twoup=”f” f_topbar=”f” f_bbarbig=”” f_htmllinks=”f” f_enable_embed_btn=”f” f_show_watermark=”f” f_send_to_friend_btn=”f” f_smooth=”f” f_mtrx=”f” f_up=”f” target=”_self” wmds=”llQ6QNgpeC.p1Ucz7U.f2JblCpesvHRg7Ajqky93IPnbTbQnVJGi6.oYupGcKkO.AuE8Jw–” ]Minnesota held a 9-3 shot advantage after one period, with the Gophers converting on 33 percent of those chances.
Chad Katunar replaced Petersen in net for Notre Dame in the second. Jackson said the move was intended to shake things up and wasn’t necessarily made because of Petersen’s performance.
Notre Dame controlled the play better in the second period, but wasn’t rewarded for its efforts. The Irish hit the post twice in consecutive shots on a power play about halfway through the period.
Right before that power play expired, the Gophers took another penalty, which essentially gave Notre Dame four straight minutes with the extra man. Robbie Russo scored Notre Dame’s first goal of the weekend on said power play with about seven minutes left in the second.
“You knew they probably had a foot up their rear end after the first period,” Minnesota coach Don Lucia said. “They changed their lines around and made their push. They had a good push there in the second period and all of a sudden, they started to win races to loose pucks and had offensive zone time.”
The goal cut Minnesota’s lead to two goals, but the Gophers wasted little time extending their lead back to three. Michael Brodzinski scored his first goal of the season about one minute after Russo’s goal.
“The fourth goal was obviously important to us, to keep the margin where it was,” Lucia said. “Notre Dame is a good team, nd when they play the way they did the last couple periods, they’re a difficult team to handle.”
Notre Dame answered Brodzinski’s goal three minutes later when Austin Wuthrich put a shot past Adam Wilcox after a one-time pass from Jordan Gross.
“We got too relaxed,” Brodzinski said. “We had a three-goal lead and the game’s never over. They came out hard after the third period and really took it to us for the first 10-15 minutes [of the second].”
The Gophers outshot Notre Dame 31-23 in the game. Katunar finished with 21 saves in two periods of work.
