Berge Scoring to Make Up for Lost Time with Mavericks
Nov. 16, 2007
Mick Berge seems determined to make up for lost time, but he also seems to be unable to take much satisfaction from personal achievements, and hopes to help lead Minnesota State-Mankato up into contention in the WCHA.
"The pucks are going in for me," Berge said, "but wins are all that matter."
He was talking just after Mavericks had suffered a sweep at the hands of the University of Minnesota, a team which came into the series 0-4 in league games, but got its first two at Mankato's expense. It's not news that Minnesota defeated Minnesota State, Mankato, but the Mavericks had come into the series with its young and rebuilding effort headed in the right direction.
The Mavs had recovered from an opening weekend lost at Michigan Tech in 2-0 and 7-1 setbacks to the Huskies. Mankato turned things around the following weekend with a trip to Anchorage, where the Mavericks for a 2-2 deadlock and a 2-0 victory. At 1-2-1 in the WCHA, the Mavericks went to Alabama-Huntsville and won 7-0 and 4-2. At the very least, they seemed ready for the Golden Gophers.
Minnesota State played well for two periods of the first game, in Mankato, before a record crowd of 5,196, but the Mavericks went flat in the second period. For them, the maddening thing was they repeated the performance the next night in Minneapolis, where they played two strong periods but sagged in the middle - a deja vu performance that doomed them to another setback.
In the first game, Minnesota soared to a 3-0 lead on goals by Ben Gordon, Tony Lucia and Patrick White. Gordon, a veteran scorer, got a wide-open chance from the right side and mishit his one-timer, but got enough of it to pop the puck up, and it fluttered over goaltender Mike Zacharias. It was a painful igniter for the three-goal Gopher start before the Mavericks came back for a goal by Jon Kalinski in the second period, which was offset by another Minnesota goal, from Evan Kaufmann.
Berge, who grew up in Oklahoma City, scored to open the third period, firing up the Mavericks and giving him his fourth goal, and extended his point-scoring streak to four games. Andrew Sackrison scored his first as a Mav to close the deficit to 4-3, but even while taking over the game with a spirited third period, the game ended 4-3.
Next night, different arena, same start. Midway through the first period, Ben Gordon was open at the right side and tried to one-time a pass across the crease from Jay Barriball. He only got a piece of it, and the shot slithered half-speed toward the net, but the change-up was just right to elude the dive of goaltender Dan Tormey.
The Mavericks responded earlier this time, and Kalinski took off on a shorthanded rush up the right side. Their luck seemed to be changing when Kalinski tried to backhand a pass across the slot, and when it was blocked by a defenseman's stick, the puck rebounded right back to Kalinski, who had the unusual opportunity to score by one-timing his own pass for a shorthanded goal and a 1-1 tie.
Later in the first period, Berge moved in at the net from the right circle on a power-play, and when a defenseman blocked the puck off his stick, Berge pounced on it in the slot, spun around and fired into the upper right corner to give Minnesota State-Mankato a 2-1 lead - its first lead of the weekend.
Berge scored his second of the game, third of the weekend, and sixth of the season when he intercepted Derek Peltier's pass in the Gopher zone and moved in, actually passing the goal line on the right before banking his shot in off freshman goaltender Alex Kangas. That was an opportunist's goal, but the problem was - the second period.
While the Mavericks outscored Minnesota 3-1 in the combined first and third periods, they backed off and watched the Gophers speed past them for a 16-4 shot advantage in the second period, and consecutive goals by Kyle Okposo (two), Tony Lucia and Cade Fairchild. The four-goal outburst not only proved too much to overcome, but it got Okposo rolling. The goals were only his second and third of the season - a very good reason, perhaps, why the Gophers started 0-4 in the WCHA before the series.
Berge, on the other hand, was being counted on by coach Troy Jutting to join Kalinski and lead the Mavericks offense this season, while the younger players found their legs. Jutting may be gritting his teeth, but he's both patient and optimistic.
"We're not in bad shape for a young team," Jutting said. "We've just got to learn to play for 60 minutes. This was a learning weekend for us. Minnesota has gone through some of the same things. We have young energy, and we got running around a little. Both games, both teams had a 20-minute stretch where they didn't play too well. In the second game, we were horrible in the second period and they moved the puck well while we chased. Then in the third period, we came on strong. The difference was, they capitalized on their chances in the second period, and we didn't capitalize enough on our chances in the third.
"In the first game, they had a great first period and we were pretty awful, but again we came back for a good third period. I thought our first period in the second game was much better than in the first game - we had three Grade A scorng chances in the first three minutes, and their goalie made a couple nice saves."
For his part, Berge, who had his scoring curtailed by injuries in his first two seasons at Mankato, has come through prominently. In his last five games, he has scored five goals and two assists for seven points, and he ranks among the league leaders with six goals for the season. The Mavericks missed his scoring touch last season, when they started 3-11-3 the first half of the season, before a strong 10-8-3 finish. That and the fact that the Mavs won't get a full home series until they have five series in the record books.
Maybe because he's trying to make up for lost time, Berge isn't as patient as his coach. "We opened up and got a one-goal lead against the Gophers in their barn," he said. "We talked about it, and how we've got to keep going because we're trying to get a win here. Then we came out flat. We looked silly in the second period.
"We played two good periods, and we came back strong in the third, but it's easy to play hard when you're down."
The Mavericks have to get in sync, and play consistently all three periods. At the same time, they have only played one game at home - the first Gopher game - out of their first eight, and they now head for Denver for two more games. They won't play a full WCHA series at home until Minnesota Duluth comes to Mankato on Nov. 30-Dec. 1.
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