By Ryan Stieg
ST. PAUL, Minn. — If there’s one opponent that seems to give the St. Thomas men’s hockey team fits, it’s Bemidji State. Heading into this weekend’s series, the Tommies had only beaten the Beavers twice at home.
However, on Friday night, UST’s special teams shined with three power play goals and a shorthanded tally to earn a 5-1 victory over BSU. Tommies goalie Carsen Musser made 14 saves to earn the win. The victory also kept UST in a tie with Augustana for first place in the CCHA standings.
The No. 19-ranked Tommies have struggled this season during the first period on Friday nights and that problem continued against the Beavers as UST had to deal with a 5-on-3 penalty kill just two minutes into the game. However, unlike previous games, UST didn’t give up a goal early on. Instead, it scored one as captain Lucas Wahlin broke free and scored a shorthanded goal to make it 1-0 Tommies at the 2:55 mark. That was Wahlin’s 50th career goal for UST.
“We’re still working on that Friday night start,” Wahlin said with a chuckle, “And it was an interesting start to the game, but we weathered the storm and we were able to come up on top right away.”
After killing off a major penalty on Nathan Pilling and then a bench minor for too many men on the ice, the Tommies finally got their first power play at 17:48 and they took advantage as Jake Braccini scored to make it 2-0. Braccini got a pass down low from Charlie Schoen and tucked it under BSU goalie Raythan Robbins’ blocker. UST led 2-0 going into the second period.
“During the first period when the penalty killers did a great job of killing off the 5 on 3 and then the major, I think the momentum was on our side, and then our power play went down and scored a big goal,” Tommies head coach Rico Blasi said. “They (the Beavers) were getting their looks. Obviously, they’re going to make some changes for tomorrow and some adjustments, and we’ll have to be ready for that. I thought our puck retrieval was really good on the power play, which allowed us to get a couple more looks on it. They did a good job.”
The Beavers got one goal back in the second period thanks to a tally by Tory Lund at 5:59. Using a screen in front of the net, Lund sent a shot from the high slot that beat Musser five-hole.
Bemidji tried to build a little momentum after killing off a major penalty at 12:41, but at 14:19, the Tommies struck again as Dylan Godbout collected a loose puck in the slot and beat a sprawling Robbins to make it 3-1.
During the opening minute of the third, UST went on the power play again, and it only took 10 seconds for Lucas Van Vliet to fire a puck past Robbins’ glove and extend the lead to 4-1.
“I think we’re slowly starting to build some confidence within each other and find some chemistry as well,” Wahlin said. “Both power play units scored tonight, so hopefully we can continue to keep clicking, and we know that special teams will win us games.”
At 7:02, the Tommies put the game away on a goal by Ryan O’Neill. Just six seconds into a power play, O’Neill snapped a rebound past Robbins to make it 5-1.
As good as UST was on offense, it was also strong on the defensive end as the Tommies held Bemidji to just 15 shots.
“They’re (the Beavers) a team that slings the puck to the front of the net, and I thought we did a really good job of picking up sticks net front,” Blasi said. “We blocked a lot of shots. We did a really good job of communicating in the D zone, which helps. I think our D corps played a little bit faster toward the end of the first period, which allowed us to get the puck out of our zone and not spend time in our own end, which was also a key.”