Western Collegiate Hockey Association
By John Gilbert
Ryan Duncan is the top goal scorer on a UND line that includes Jonathan Toews and T.J. Oshie.  |
|
Jan. 31, 2007
Ryan Duncan, Jonathan Toews and T.J. Oshie of North Dakota are not related, but if they were, they'd be Siamese triplets. Joined at the heads and hands.
After three months of creating mostly questions, the best forward line in the nation is supplying the University of North Dakota hockey team with some good answers. If you happened to be inside Mariucci Arena last weekend, you realized this week's WCHA Offensive Player of the Week should be the Duncan-Toews-Oshie line. Yes, it's possible to have co-winners of the award, so why not co-co-winners? It would make sense, because the top Fighting Sioux line is impossible to separate. The three quick, and extremely skilled sophomores seem to read each other's minds, and their hands simply react to share the puck with spectacular passes. Their play led North Dakota to resounding 5-3 and 7-3 victories at Minnesota, for a sweep over the No. 1 ranked Golden Gophers.
The Sioux are far more than just one line, of course, and they are quick to point to their teammates, and particularly goaltender Philippe Lamoureux for credit. But in the case of these guys, "just one line" is a misnomer. Maybe they should be called the "DOT" line - for Duncan-Oshie-Toews. It also works because if the Fighting Sioux are to make their familiar second-half surge to national puck prominence this season, all they need to do is sign on the Dotted Line.
In last Friday's 5-3 victory, North Dakota fell behind 2-0, then stunned the first of two standing-room-only crowds at Mariucci into silence by volleying five consecutive goals past Kellen Briggs. Of the five, the Dotted Line scored three of them, punctuated by five assists. On Saturday, when the Sioux shelled Jeff Frazee with three first-period
goals, and then tormented Briggs some more with two more in both the second and third periods, the Dotted Line got four of them, with five more assists. For the weekend, then, the trio snapped passes around to leave their signature on 7 goals and 9 assists for 16 points. Duncan scored 4-3--7, Oshie 2-2--4, and Toews 1-4--5, with virtually every point a reward for some spectacular and inseparable passing plays.
|
|
 |
Duncan now has scored 21 goals-15 assists--36 points for the season, and Oshie has 9-20--29, and Toews 7-18--25. Duncan's totals are outstanding, and his 21 goals lead the nation, as do his 16 WCHA-game goals lead the league.
"They're the best line I've seen," said Minnesota coach Don Lucia. "If they play like this the rest of the season, they'll all have 25 goals."
Any other questions?
Well, yes. Where the heck has this line been all season? Going into the season, that line was the reason some observers thought the Fighting Sioux would win the WCHA title, even thought the coaches picked them only for third, behind Minnesota and defending NCAA champion Wisconsin. Their prolific output at Minnesota - which produced the first Fighting Sioux sweep at Minnesota since Feb. 15-16, 1980, but where have Oshie and Toews been, after remarkable freshman seasons? Why weren't they scoring, when the Fighting Sioux followed up a strong 4-1-1 start in the WCHA by suffering through a painful 1-8 plunge that dropped them down below also-ran status, to a 5-9-1 league record that dropped them hopelessly out of contention, and out of any discussion for home-ice in the playoffs. About that time, Minnesota was on a nation's best 22-game unbeaten streak to take command of the WCHA race.
The Gophers didn't lose the nation's No. 1 rank by splitting at Wisconsin, and then splitting against Denver. But suddenly, they didn't bounce back from a Friday loss and were swept by North Dakota, which means the Golden Gophers have lost four of six to let Denver and St. Cloud State move back into contention. And, as if to supply yet another answer to whether the Fighting Sioux will be heard from this season, North Dakota has finally risen to 9-9-2 in the WCHA - even .500 - and is 6-0-1 for the longest current unbeaten streak in the nation.
As for the magical DOT line, all three are strikingly different, although they share a basic humility as easily as they share the puck. Duncan, who is from Calgary and played at Salmon Arm in the British Columbia Junior League, is 5-foot-6 and 158 pounds. After the Saturday game, a Twin Cities reporter, perhaps baiting him, asked Duncan if he thought the Gophers were over-rated. "I wouldn't say they're over-rated," said Duncan. "I would say we had been under-achieving. We played well on other weekends, we just didn't seem to get the breaks. These were a huge two wins for us. We came into a tough arena and won two big games."
As for playing with Toews and Oshie, Duncan, who is a free agent, said: "It's great. Those guys are first-round draft picks, and they're going to make a lot of money some day."
Oshie is a 6-foot, 188-pounder from Warroad, Minn., who was a first-round draft pick of the St. Louis Blues, and who scored 24-21--45 as a freshman last year, leading the nation with nine game-winning goals. He also agreed that the Gophers were far from over-rated. "They've earned it," he said. And the Sioux?
"We came together on December 17, when Michigan Tech swept us," said Oshie. "We realized right then we had to change what we were doing. No, I don't think we were taking it easy because we had come on so strong at the end of last season. As the start, we just had nobody grinding. We were not playing with a lot of grit. We might have four going, instead of five, on a shift. Or two going instead of three.
"Maybe me and Jon [Toews] felt like we had to do too much. But this weekend will definitely help us out and be a springboard for us the rest of the way."
Toews, who is 6-foot-2, 202-pounder from Winnipeg, was drafted by the Chicago Blackhawks, and scored 22-17--39 as a freshman last season, as the Sioux reached the Frozen Four before losing a semifinal 6-5 thriller to Boston College. He helped beat Team USA in the recent World Junior Tournament when he scored three consecutive goals on a three-round shootout that decided a 2-1 victory for Canada.
"We lost five key players from last year's team," said Toews. "With those guys, it was easy for T.J., Ryan and me to fly under the radar a little. This year, we got off to a slow start by not doing the little things. Now, we're doing them.
"I played better at the World Juniors than I had been. I got something like four goals and two assists," Toews added. "When I got back, it was more of a mental thing for me. Obviously, your body is tired, but it's such a mental boost, I was excited to get back. We played with a lot of confidence this weekend, and we've got to use this and keep playing the way we are. Our line is firing on the power play, and no one really worries who does what, because somebody will come through."
To hear Oshie and Toews talk, they worked hard but just had a lot of bad luck the first half. Nice try, guys, but the shroud of trying to avoid any alibi and now be explained, because they've recovered, but Oshie and Toews were pretty much taken off their game while trying to play through serious injuries. Oshie was trying to grip his stick after suffering a broken thumb at the start of the season, Toews missed nine games overall, most of them with a shoulder injury, and he came back to play but wasn't 100 percent.
"They've all played that hard all season, but they haven't had the rewards until last Saturday night," said coach Dave Hakstol, referring to a game when North Dakota fell behind Bemidji State 2-0 before roaring back for a 6-3 victory.
Once Hakstol knew that his interrogator was aware of the seriousness of the Oshie and Toews injuries, he acknowledged that they had been severely hampered through the first half of the season. "Those guys compete every game," said Hakstol. "But Toews and Oshie are just now getting back to 100 percent. It wasn't like Toews had a great World Junior tournament because he got healthy - he didn't get healthy until it was over. Their energy is back, both mentally and physically. But it was hard getting through those injuries."
Getting the big line clicking again gives the Sioux a positive bottom line. Or, make it DOTted Line. When things started going their way, nothing could stop them. Saturday, for example, they came out flying, with freshman Darcy Zajac scoring on a swift counter-rush 2-on-1 with a short-side bullet at 6:16. Barely a minute later, Chay Genoway got the puck after turning back another Gopher rush, and after he carried into the Minnesota zone, the puck was poke-checked off his stick. But Toews arrived just in time to keep it in at the blue line, and fed Duncan, a left-hand shooter deep on the right, and Duncan's short-side goal made it 2-0.
A very interesting byplay followed. Mike Howe of Minnesota broke hard for the net on a power-play, lowered his shoulder and barreled into Lamoureux. Instead of a penalty, the referee called Genoway for holding less than a minute later, and Erik Johnson scored for Minnesota on the two-man power play. Five minutes later, Ryan Stoa scored another power-play goal, and then Howe boosted the Gophers to a 3-2 lead on yet another power-play goal. For the game, Minnesota had a 12-5 edge in power-plays, and for the weekend series, it was 23-10. But compared to the first half of the season, that sort of adversity was nothing. Instead of being knocked flat, North Dakota bounced back. Literally.
Robbie Bina got the puck while killing yet another penalty with 1:13 remaining in the wild first period, and as he took a step across his own goal line, he flung a long clearing attempt on goal. The puck sailed down the ice, bounced twice, and, when goaltender Jeff Frazee dropped to his knees in the crease, it took a bad-hop and went over his shoulder and into the left edge - a 165-foot fluke goal, which tied the game 3-3. Lucia sent Kellen Briggs in to relieve Frazee for the second period, but the Fighting Sioux were flying again, and Duncan connected from deep on the right for a power-play goal at 11:29 of the second period, and Erik Fabian tucked in a wraparound 24 seconds later, and the Sioux were up 5-3.
That left it to the third period, but Oshie, a right-handed shooter deep on the left, one-timed a Duncan pass for a power play goal at 5:13, and Oshie converted a highlight-film pass from Toews, with Duncan also assisting, to make it 7-3 midway through the period.
Lamoureux was solid in goal, the Sioux defense was hustling, everybody chipped in - and the Sioux signed off on the Dotted Line.
