Fighting Sioux Follow High Road Into NCAA Tournament
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March 25, 2005
By John Gilbert
There are no guarantees for the North Dakota hockey team in the NCAA tournament this weekend. Because the Fighting Sioux must play in the East Regional at Worcester, Mass., they will probably be considered underdogs against Boston University in Friday¹s opening game, and, should they get by that one, they undoubtedly would be underdogs if they face Boston College in Saturday¹s region final.
Not an easy path, to Columbus and the Frozen Four. However, the Fighting Sioux didn¹t flinch at being routed along the dirt road.
A year ago, Dean Blais was known as one of the premier coaches in hockey as the head coach at North Dakota, and two of the nation¹s top players and top scorers were Zach Parise and Brendon Bochenski. The season ended, Parise turned pro, and so did Bochenski, then so did coach Blais, who took a job as one of the associate coaches with the Columbus NHL team.
That was just the start of the tough trail for North Dakota. Dave Hakstol rose from an assistant position to become head coach, and with Brad Berry and Cary Eades as assistants, he started reassembling the Fighting Sioux. Then the parade of injuries started. The Sioux didn¹t need a team bus, they needed an ambulance. The team¹s fortunes went up and down, but by the end of the season, things started to fall into place.
After holding off UMD to claim the fifth and final home-ice spot in the WCHA playoffs, North Dakota crushed UMD 8-2 and 6-1. Their reward was the Fighting Sioux got the chance to play three games in three days, if they could win the play-in game against Wisconsin, a team that tied for third ahead of the Sioux.
Nobody, starting with rookie head coach Dave Hakstol, has taken anything for granted. They had to face a higher-seeded Wisconsin team in the WCHA play-in game, and they won 3-2.
³Our goal tonight,² Hakstol said after that game, ³was that we wanted to get back here Friday afternoon.²
That meant they had to win that first game. ³This was just a continuation of the series we¹ve had with Wisconsin this season. It was physical, and there was a good pace to it.²
With three goals in the game, the Sioux had nine players get one point each, and Jordan Parise played well in goal with 33 saves. Hakstol was asked if the Sioux were reaching a peak of their season¹s play.
³We¹re getting there,² Hakstol said. ³We¹ve played pretty well the past three or four weeks, and that¹s because we¹re close to being healthy. People say our fourth line played well, and I really don¹t consider them a fourth line, it¹s just that they haven¹t been together much. They added some stability, because we were able to use the whole bench.²
That fourth line, with Brian Canady centering Erik Fabian and James Massen, came with a huge goal against Wisconsin. Fabian jarred the puck loose with a big hit, then Canady rushed into the Wisconsin zone, making a perfect pass that Massen a right-handed shooter coming in on the left side was able to one-time for a 2-0 lead.
Hakstol was asked if he thought the victory would give his team an NCAA berth, and he said: ³The bottom line is, the only thing we can control is our play.²
The victory meant a quick turnaround, from Thursday night to the first Friday afternoon semifinal against WCHA champ Denver. Hakstol¹s relief at being healthy was short-lived, because in the second period, with the game tied 1-1, Brady Murray, who had missed 15 games with shoulder problems, reinjured the shoulder. On the next shift, sophomore defenseman Robbie Bina was checked from behind into the side boards and needed to be helped from the ice on a stretcher. He suffered a broken bone in his neck. A minor penalty was called on Denver¹s penalty-leader, Geoff Paukovich, although post-game review caused WCHA officials to suspend Paukovich for the championship game.
The midgame timing of the incident was interesting. There have been a lot of hockey teams that would have responded to such incidents, and the loss of a key player on a call that they found disagreeable, with some blatant hostility. Some Fighting Sioux teams might have been first to vent such animosity. But the Sioux simply raised their intensity level, and took the game to the Pioneers. But Gabe Gauthier¹s second goal of the game, in the first minute of overtime, gave Denver a 2-1 victory.
³I¹d be lying to you if I told you there wasn¹t a lot of emotion,² said Hakstol. ³But it¹s playoff time. We tried to focus on what was important, and we played well, even though we had to play the rest of the game with 10 forwards.²
It was at that point that the Sioux left the rough and rocky road for the high road. Nick Fuher, who scored North Dakota¹s goal and was named to the all-tournament team, said: ³There was a lot of emotion in the game, but we¹re a team that plays on emotion.²
The best praise came from Denver coach George Gwozdecky, who knew his top-seeded Pioneers had escaped a passionate test. ³First of all,² Gwozdecky said, ³I want to give a great deal of credit to North Dakota. They did a tremendous job, and they gave us all kinds of problems. They were very well coached, and they forced us to play in our defensive zone for long periods of time. It was as dfifficult and tiring a job as we¹ve had to do all year.
³It sure didn¹t look like they had played last night.²
The next day, the Sioux had to come back for their third major effort in three days and face Minnesota on the same Saint Paul Xcel Energy Center ice. With 14,730 on hand for the afternoon third-place game, North Dakota, in Hakstol¹s mind, was still playing to control what they could control, and not worry about the NCAA seedings.
Quinn Fylling gave North Dakota a 1-0 lead at 9:23 of the first period, but Minnesota tied it a minute later, as the Sioux looked spent, understandably, and were outshot 11-3 for the first period. When the Gophers went up 2-1 on a power-play goal in the second period, the Sioux were continuing to be outshot heavily. They drew a penalty, and things looked bleak.
But Rastislav Spirko called ³Sparky² by his teammates lived up that nickname at 10:53. He rushed up the ice, 1-on-1 with Minnesota defenseman Chris Harrington. Spirko, a freshman from Vrutky, Slovakia, made a couple of dekes and Harrington went down, then Spirko retrieved the puck, put a great move on goaltender Kellen Briggs, and easily tucked the puck in behind him at the left edge for a 2-2 tie.
Early in the third period, defenseman Matt Greene whistled a shot from inside the right point past Briggs on the short side, and late in the final period, Fuher carried in 2-on-1, faked a pass, deked, and beat Briggs to the short side, clinching a 4-2 Sioux victory. When they should have been exhausted from their third game in three days, the Sioux outshot Minnesota 12-5 in the pivotal third period.
³We¹re here, it was a big game, and it doesn¹t matter whether it was the third game in three days, or the fifth game in five days,² said Greene.
He noted that the team had taken time to visit Bina in Regions Hospital, and while there had been no condition report given about their fallen comrade, Greene said: ³We saw him today and it was pretty tough to see a guy on your team lying there. But he was in good spirits. If you know him, he¹s a pretty funny kid, and he told a couple of good jokes.²
Spirko, who joined Fuher on the all-tournament team, said: ³That was big motivation. We were playing for Robbie.²
Hakstol, who seemed to learn a lot about himself and his team as this season progressed, obviously got a cram-course in both during the three-day tournament.
³On the large scale, big-picture, national scene, there probably wasn¹t a lot of meaning to this game,² Hakstol said. ³But within our locker room, it meant a lot. When you put it all together, with guys out, we not only survived, we turned the game our way. The mood in the locker room was that if you put this jersey on, you play to win.
³We had to put three new players in the lineup. Scottie Foyt stepped in and got an assist on our first goal. Lee Marvin gave us a lift. And Kyle Radke played a good role out there. Jordan Parise did his job in goal, and I¹m proud of the way our team found a way to win.
³We¹ve shown the ability over and over to put the pieces back together, to fight back and battle back.²
And Fighting Sioux reward is that they get to play on, to challenge
Boston¹s best, in the form of Boston University and then, maybe, Boston
College, the No. 1 ranked team in the country. But nobody who watched
the Fighting Sioux perform in the WCHA Final Five would bet against them.
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