By Ryan Stieg
MENDOTA HEIGHTS, Minn. — Thanksgiving was two days ago and based on its performance this weekend, the St. Thomas men’s hockey team is still suffering from indigestion.
After falling to Lake Superior State 4-2 Friday, the Tommies were hoping to rebound and force a split on Saturday. However, the Lakers scored two goals in the final minute of the first period and didn’t look back on their way to a 5-3 victory and a series sweep. That’s two weeks in a row where UST couldn’t pick up a victory.
“I sound like a broken record here, but we’ve got to manage the puck better,” Tommies head coach Rico Blasi said. “Four turnovers, four goals. Our net front battles need to be better. So, our process needs to be better. It’s not good enough yet. It’s been decent in spurts, but to win at this level consistently, your process has to be good and our process hasn’t been good enough.”
For LSSU, it was a quality weekend overall. The Lakers are now above .500 at 7-6-1 and are leading the CCHA in points percentage.
“Sweeping on the road is a very difficult thing to do and I think they’ve got a lot of talented players,” Lakers head coach Damon Whitten said. “I think they’re extremely dangerous, so I’m very happy with the results. I liked a lot of the things that we did on the ice and coming off a trip to Alaska too on a Saturday-Sunday game, we weren’t sure exactly what we had in the tank, but we found out. So, it was a great weekend for us.”
The Tommies struck first thanks to Alexander Tell’s first collegiate goal at the 12:16 mark. After Casy Laylin’s shot was saved by Lakers goalie Rorke Applebee, the puck squirted free in the crease and Tell tapped it into the open net to make it 1-0 UST.
UST’s slim lead appeared as if it would hold till the end of the period, but then the Tommies fell apart in the final minute. With 53 seconds left, the Lakers’ John Herrington tied the game at 1-1 and with eight ticks remaining on the clock, Connor Milburn gave LSSU the lead at 2-1. Tommies goalie Aaron Trotter stretched out to stop LSSU’s Timo Bakos by the left post, but then the Lakers forward sent a backwards pass across the crease and Milburn snapped the puck into the open net.
“That’s process, right?” Blasi said. “Your process is good for 18 minutes, but you let off the gas for two minutes. You turn the puck over twice and the puck is in the back of your net. Part of that process is managing the puck and managing the game. We’ll keep working on it.”
Things got worse for the Tommies in the second. LSSU padded its lead to two goals at the 7:17 mark on a tally by William Ahlrik and then it pushed it to three goals a little more than two minutes later. After the Lakers blocked a Tommies shot, Carter Batchelder broke free up center ice, skated in front of the crease and shot the puck past Trotter to make it 4-1 going into the third.
UST got a goal back while on the power play with 11:36 left to play in the game on a nice shot by captain Lucas Wahlin. With the Tommies on a rush, Wahlin fired a shot at Applebee from a weird angle that somehow got past Applebee to trim the Tommies’ deficit to 4-2.
Later in the third, and during a 4 on 4, Trotter was pulled for the extra attacker and the Tommies scored again on a goal by Matthew Gleason. Trotter was pulled again in an effort to tie the game in the final minutes, but Milburn scored an empty netter to nail down the victory.
UST travels to Michigan Tech next week to close out the first half of the season.