Category: SiouxSports.com

Where were you last Halloween?

Many of us were in our seats at Ralph Engelstad Arena back on October 31st, witnessing North Dakota trailing Minnesota Duluth 3-1 late in the third period. Not only was the situation dire, but the first month of the season had been a mixed bag…

Yes, UND had put together a home-and-home sweep of St. Thomas (6-2, 5-2), but there were two splits to follow: a home series against Minnesota (5-2, 1-5) and a road series at Clarkson (2-5, 1-0).

First-year head coach Dane Jackson was about to see his team drop its conference opener at home and fall to 4-3 on the young season.

Enter Mac Swanson. The sophomore forward brought the home team within one with just under four minutes to go in the hockey game. And with just over 70 seconds remaining, senior captain Ben Strinden scored an extra attacker goal to send the game to overtime.

Yes, it is true that the Bulldogs picked up the extra league point with a fluky goal less than a minute into the extra session, but it is also true that UND’s comeback was a sign of things to come.

The following night, North Dakota put together a complete effort and dismantled Minnesota Duluth by a final score of 5-1.

Beginning with that game back on November 1st, the Fighting Hawks have gone 23-5-1, secured the program’s seventh Penrose Cup in thirteen NCHC seasons (as well as its 22nd overall regular-season conference title, the most in NCAA history), and guaranteed themselves one of the four #1 seeds in the NCAA tournament, which begins in less than two weeks.

Minnesota Duluth was in the mix for the Penrose Cup as recently as late January but lost four straight games (vs. Western Michigan and at Denver) and had an up-and-down February which saw them finish in fourth place in the NCHC. That spot in the league standings led to a home matchup against St. Cloud State last weekend.

Astonishingly, the Bulldogs swept the Huskies by tying each game late in regulation (23 seconds left on Friday night, 31 seconds left on Saturday night) and scoring the game-winner early in each night’s first overtime session (3:30, 5:11). More amazingly, UMD sophomore forward Zam Plante scored all four of those series-altering goals.

UND had an easier time last weekend against Omaha (5-3, 5-1), giving them a six-game season sweep over the Mavericks.

On Saturday night in Grand Forks, #2 North Dakota (27-8-1) will host #8 Minnesota Duluth (22-13-1) in the NCHC semifinals. If UND wins, they will host the winner of #4 Western Michigan (26-9-1) at #6 Denver (23-11-3) at Ralph Engelstad Arena next Saturday, March 21st for the NCHC Frozen Faceoff championship. If the Bulldogs earn the victory, they will travel to either Denver, Colorado or Kalamazoo, Michigan for next Saturday’s league playoff title.

Many of us are lamenting the loss of the league playoff weekend in the Twin Cities; please click on this link for a trip down memory lane.

This season’s NCHC Frozen Faceoff semifinals offer less intrigue than most years, as all four participants – North Dakota (NPI 2), Western Michigan (NPI 4), Denver (NPI 6), and Minnesota-Duluth (NPI 8) – are all safely in the national tournament regardless of league playoff results. The NCAA tourney will begin with a regional round taking place from March 26th through March 29th at four sites (Loveland, CO; Sioux Falls, SD; Worcester, MA; Albany, NY); the winners of those four regionals will advance to the Frozen Four (April 7th and 9th in Las Vegas, Nevada).

While North Dakota is not guaranteed to be placed in the Sioux Falls regional, it is likely that the committee will place them there to boost attendance. UND can also help its own cause with good results in the NCHC tournament, as a higher NPI rank could keep the Fighting Hawks closer to home.

What can fans expect from UND and Duluth on the ice this weekend?

As mentioned above, North Dakota took four of six points from the Bulldogs on Halloween weekend in Grand Forks. In early February, UND wrote a similar script in Duluth, coming back from a two-goal deficit late in the third period before falling in overtime on Friday night. In Saturday’s rematch, the visitors won 4-1 with all five goals coming in the final frame. UND’s Mac Swanson and Will Zellers gave the Fighting Hawks a lead they would never relinquish, and Dylan James added a pair of goals for a 4-1 North Dakota victory.

UND is nine years removed from its eighth national championship but has made the national tournament in just four of the past eight seasons. That track record – and some early playoff exits – led to a coaching change, and Dane Jackson is now leading the charge. His first year as bench boss is eerily reminiscent of Brad Berry’s exactly ten years ago, with great goaltending, an impressive defensive corps, and remarkable scoring depth. While Brad Berry had a bit more top-end offensive talent (Drake Caggiula, Brock Boeser, and Nick Schmaltz) during the 2015-2016 season, this year’s version of the Fighting Hawks is wearing teams down and owning the third period, outscoring opponents 58-19 and either pulling away on the scoreboard or mounting one impressive comeback after another.

In the NCHC preseason poll, UND was picked to finish in third place (behind Western Michigan and Denver), while the Bulldogs were tabbed to end up in sixth (ahead of Omaha, St. Cloud State, and Miami). With the addition of St. Thomas to the NCHC (and a new schedule format) beginning in 2026-2027, the Fighting Hawks and Bulldogs will meet for four regular-season games each year.

After an impressive run of eight straight NCAA tournament appearances from 2015 to 2022 (including two national titles), UMD missed the NCAAs in each of the last three seasons and sputtered to a combined record of just 41-60-9 (.414). After 25 seasons behind the Bulldog bench, some were asking whether head coach Scott Sandelin was on the hot seat.

Back in October, those questions were largely answered, as Duluth got off to an 8-1 start (including a road sweep of the Golden Gophers). Thankfully for fans of the Bulldogs, Scott Sandelin has his squad in line for another NCAA tournament appearance (currently NPI 8).

UMD also boasts one of the top two forward lines in the country, a trio of second-year players:

Sophomore Max Plante: 22-25-47 in 36 games played

Sophomore Zam Plante: 20-25-45 in 36 games played

Sophomore Jayson Shaugabay: 10-31-41 in 36 games played

These three forwards (jersey numbers 10, 17, and 27) have scored 52 of UMD’s 116 goals and collected nearly half of the team’s points (133 of 311).

There have been eight games this season in which neither Plante brother registered a point; the Bulldogs are 0-8 in those games.

Of the three forwards, Max is the largest at 5-11 and 180 pounds. A key for North Dakota will be to win faceoffs in their own end, play a hard, physical game, and pay attention to line matchups – not just the defensive pair but all five skaters on the ice.

The NCHC has been the premier hockey conference since its inception, and particularly over the past ten seasons. The nine teams in the league have gone 602-310-81 (.647) in non-conference action since the start of the 2014-15 season and sent fifteen teams to the Frozen Four (UND and Omaha in 2015, UND and Denver in 2016, Denver and Duluth in 2017, Duluth in 2018, Denver and Duluth in 2019, Duluth and St. Cloud State in 2021, Denver in 2022 and 2024, and Denver and Western Michigan in 2025 over that nine-year stretch (there was no national tournament in 2020). Conference members North Dakota (2016), Denver (2017, 2022, 2024), Minnesota Duluth (2018, 2019), and Western Michigan (2025) have won seven of the last nine national titles.

Turning our attention to this weekend…

A half-point per game or better is my benchmark for solid offensive production, and – aside from Shaugabay and the Plantes – Scott Sandelin’s squad has just five other lineup regulars who meet that threshold: sophomore forward Callum Arnott (11-14-25), freshman forward Hunter Anderson (5-11-16), senior forward Scout Truman (13-5-18), sophomore defenseman Ty Hanson (8-24-32), and freshman defenseman Grayden Siepmann (5-12-17).

North Dakota is hoping to have eleven players in the lineup this weekend who have met that same offensive threshold: senior forward Ellis Rickwood (8-26-34), senior forward Ben Strinden (15-18-33), freshman forward Will Zellers (18-12-30), sophomore forward Mac Swanson (11-16-27), freshman forward Cole Reschny (5-28-33), senior forward Dylan James (18-10-28), freshman forward Jack Kernan (9-10-19), freshman forward Ollie Josephson (6-14-20), junior defenseman Jake Livanavage (5-20-25), junior defenseman Abram Wiebe (5-22-27), and freshman defenseman Keaton Verhoeff (6-14-20).

Ben Strinden and Will Zellers both missed last Friday’s series opener against Omaha (illness); Zellers returned to the lineup on Saturday.

Remarkably, North Dakota already has ten players with twenty or more points this season, the most since 2014-15. If freshman Jack Kernan can add one more goal or assist to his line of 9-10-19, UND will have the most players with 20-plus points since 2003-04.

The Bulldogs played ten games at the Division I level in the early 1930s but didn’t really get started until after World War II. Its first nineteen seasons after the war were played as an independent before joining the WCHA in 1965. It would take eighteen seasons – and a head coach named Mike Sertich – before UMD would make the NCAA tournament, and Sertich would take them there in three consecutive seasons:

1982-1983: National Quarterfinalist

1983-1984: 2nd Place (National Runner-Up)

1984-1985: 3rd Place (Consolation Champion)

In 1984, Duluth was tantalizingly close to winning its first title. The Bulldogs defeated North Dakota 2-1 in overtime (behind a goal by Bill Watson) to advance to the championship game, where they would face Bowling Green in the longest NCAA final in Division I men’s hockey history. Gino Cavallini scored for the Falcons in the fourth overtime session, ending a game that took over 97 minutes of game action to complete.

And, perhaps, fittingly, UMD would find themselves locked in overtime contests in 1985 as well. The Bulldogs took RPI to three overtimes in the national semis before falling 6-5. Back in those days, there was still a third-place game, and so Duluth faced Boston College (which had also played three overtimes in its semifinal) for no reason at all. Of course, that game also went to overtime, with UMD defeating the Eagles 7-6.

After that three-year splash on the national scene, Mike Sertich would manage just one more tournament appearance (1993) over the final fifteen years of his head coaching career before giving way to Scott Sandelin, who has guided the Bulldogs to the NCAAs eleven times in his 24 completed seasons behind the Bulldog bench. It is worth noting, however, that Duluth has had two consecutive losing seasons (28-40-6) overall and has missed the last two NCAA tourneys.

Even though UMD has been a more frequent participant over the past two decades than at any other point in team history, Duluth and North Dakota have only met twice in the national tournament (1984 and 2021). UND had a chance to meet the Bulldogs in the 2011 title game but fell to the Wolverines in the semifinals 2-0 (with an empty-net goal) despite outshooting Michigan 40-20.

Before the Wolverines were forced to withdraw from the 2021 tournament, UMD and Michigan were set to square off in the national tournament for the first time since that overtime thriller in St. Paul.

North Dakota was down 2-0 to Minnesota Duluth with just 101 seconds remaining in the third period of the 2021 NCAA Midwest Regional final at Scheels Arena in Fargo, North Dakota. The Bulldogs had built their lead with two goals just 80 seconds apart early in the final frame on a pair of fluky plays. A partially blocked shot off the stick of Jackson Cates fluttered past Fighting Hawks’ netminder Adam Scheel, and a broken stick at the blue line sent Cole Koepke in alone on a breakaway. UND scored two extra-attacker goals in the final two minutes of regulation to send the game long into the night. Minnesota Duluth outlasted North Dakota 3-2 in five overtimes to advance to the NCAA Frozen Four. The three goaltenders involved in the contest combined to make 114 saves.

With three national titles in a nine-year stretch, the Bulldogs could certainly be considered the best team of the 2010s; North Dakota’s eight national titles have been spread out across the decades: 1959, 1963, 1980, 1982, 1987, 1997, 2000, and 2016.

The Wolverines have won nine NCAA titles but only two since 1964, those coming in 1996 and 1998. For that reason, I consider North Dakota (eight titles) and Denver (ten titles) the two best programs in NCAA Division I men’s ice hockey history.

Last season, North Dakota and Minnesota Duluth squared off four times…

On November 8th and 9th, 2024, UND traveled to Duluth and swept the homestanding Bulldogs 7-3 and 4-1. North Dakota chased highly-touted netminder Adam Gajan on two consecutive nights after scoring five goals on twenty shots in 34:18 of game action in the opener and besting that with two goals on eight shots in 5:38 on night two.

The Bulldogs made the return trip to Grand Forks on February 21st and 22nd, 2025. In Friday’s opener, North Dakota scored an empty-netter to escape with a 4-2 victory after UMD drew within one with two goals in the middle frame. Adam Gajan and UND’s T.J. Semptimphelter each made thirty saves.

In Saturday’s rematch, UND went 4-for-6 with the man advantage, including three second-period goals during the same five-minute power play after UMD’s Jack Smith was penalized and given a game misconduct for checking from behind. Gajan (nine saves, one goal allowed) and Klayton Knapp (thirteen saves, five goals allowed) each played in the rematch.

Gajan, a sophomore who competed in the 2023 and 2024 World Junior U-20 Championships for his native Slovakia, was a second-round pick of the Chicago Blackhawks in the 2023 NHL Draft. He played in 21 games last season, with a 7-12-1 record, a goals-against average of 3.33, a save percentage of .885, and one shutout.

Fellow first-year goalie Klayton Knapp – from Sylvania, Ohio – split time with Gajan a season ago, appearing in sixteen contests, with a record of 6-6-2, a 2.67 GAA, a .907 SV%, and one shutout.

After last season, Knapp transferred to Lindenwood, and Gajan has played nearly every minute in net for Scott Sandelin’s squad, with a record of 17-11-1, a goals-against average of 2.25, a save percentage of .906, and two shutouts.

One key area to watch this weekend is the face-off circle. To this point in the season, the Fighting Hawks have won 53.8% of faceoffs, good for 4th in the country. By comparison, the Bulldogs are 34th in the nation (49.4%).

In the faceoff circle, Dane Jackson has been relying on freshman phenom Cole Reschny ( of , ), portal transfer Ellis Rickwood (of , ), and freshman Ollie Josephson ( of , %).

For the Bulldogs, graduate student Kyle Gaffney (, %) has been the most effective, although sophomore center Zam Plante (, %) has seen more action in the dot.

Not only will North Dakota start with the puck more often than UMD in this game, they will also hold onto it.

Throughout this season, the Fighting Hawks have outpaced the Bulldogs in two key puck possession statistics:

UND: 3rd in Corsi (57.1%) and 3rd in Fenwick (57.0%)
Duluth: 10th in Corsi (54.8%) and 6th in Fenwick (55.7%)

Corsi measures the number of shot attempts for each team at even strength, while Fenwick measures the number of unblocked shot attempts for each side.

The Green and White do not want to get into a specialty teams battle with the Bulldogs. To this point in the season, North Dakota is a combined +18, with 35 power play goals (35 of 126, 27.8%, 4th in the country), nineteen power play goals allowed (91 of 110, 82.7%, 16th), six shorthanded goals, and four shorthanded goals allowed.

Scott Sandelin’s squad is a plus-26, with 39 power play goals (39 of 132, 29.5%, 2nd) and only thirteen allowed (104 of 117, 88.9%, 2nd). UMD has scored two shorthanded goals and allowed two to opponents.

Through 36 games, North Dakota has blocked an incredible 411 shots (11.4 per game), led by Bennett Zmolek with 51, Jake Livanavage with 44, and Keaton Verhoeff with 41. Zmolek has been in and out of the lineup over the past few weeks; Zmolek’s 51 blocks have come in just 29 games.

Duluth has blocked 365 shots in its 36 games (10.1/game), with senior Joey Pierce (60), sophomore Adam Kleber (45), and sophomore Ty Hanson (43) leading the charge.

Kleber was recently named the 2025-26 NCHC Defensive Defenseman of the Year.

North Dakota’s defensive corps has provided plenty of production from the back end, already notching 104 points (22 goals and 82 assists) in 249 combined games (0.42 points per game). Among defensemen, UND is led by two juniors – Abram Wiebe (5-22-27) and Jake Livanavage (5-20-25) – and freshman Keaton Verhoeff (6-14-20).

Verhoeff is widely expected to go in the top three of the 2026 NHL Entry Draft, while Livanavage (4-24-28) and Wiebe (4-20-24) were two of UND’s top four point-getters a season ago.

By comparison, Duluth’s blueliners have scored twenty goals and 55 assists for 75 points in 252 combined games (0.30 points/game). Other than sophomore Ty Hanson (8-24-32) and freshman Grayden Siepmann (5-12-17), no UMD defenseman has more than ten points.

Not only have North Dakota’s defensemen been producing offensively, first-year head coach Dane Jackson has also put together an impressive mix of defenders he can trust in any situation. As a unit, UND’s defensemen have allowed a total of just 842 shots on goal this season in 36 games (23.4/game, 2nd-best in the country), while Duluth has allowed 890 (24.7, 5th).

The Bulldogs are allowing 2.47 goals per game this season (18th in the nation), while North Dakota is allowing just 2.31 (8th). On the offensive side, UND is scoring 3.92 goals per game (3rd), while Duluth has scored 3.22 goals per game (20th).

Sometimes it is difficult to dissect numbers like those above, so here it is in plain terms: in 36 games, UND has outscored opponents 141-83. In the same number of games, the Bulldogs have outscored their opponents 116-89. I attribute those numbers to North Dakota’s roster depth, puck possession metrics, and goaltending.

Fighting Hawks’ graduate netminder Gibson Homer (9-5-0, 2.71 goals-against average, .889 save percentage) started each of the first four games of the season and then split the next four weekends with freshman Jan Spunar (16-3-1, 1.93 GAA, .917 SV%, four shutout) before giving way to Spunar entirely for the majority of the season. Homer did earn a start on Senior Night three weeks ago and again on the final night of the regular season (after UND clinched the Penrose), but I would expect Spunar to start from here on out.

UMD sophomore goalie Adam Gajan is 17-11-1 with a goals-against average of 2.25, a save percentage of .906, and two shutouts. Gajan played in both games at North Dakota during the first half of the season, making 48 of 56 saves; he was replaced in the third period of Saturday night’s 5-1 defeat after allowing goals to Ollie Josephson and Abram Wiebe in the first five minutes of the final frame.

Jan Spunar was the goaltender of record in UND’s 5-1 Saturday night home victory over Duluth, making nineteen of twenty saves. He appeared in both games at Duluth last month, stopping 29 of 32 in the 3-2 overtime loss and 25 of 26 in the 4-1 victory.

Minnesota Duluth Bulldogs

Head Coach: Scott Sandelin (26th season at UMD, 491-421-104, .534)

National Rankings: #8/#8
NPI Ranking: 7th
KRACH Rating: 314.1 (6th)

This Season: 22-13-1 overall, 8-8-4-4 NCHC (4th)
Last Season: 13-20-3 overall (missed NCAA tournament), 7-11-3-3 NCHC (7th of 9 teams)

2025-2026 Season Statistics:

Team Offense: 3.22 goals scored/game – 20th of 63 teams
Team Defense: 2.47 goals allowed/game – 18th of 63 teams

Power Play: 29.5% (39 of 132) – 2nd of 63 teams
Penalty Kill: 88.9% (104 of 117) – 2nd of 63 teams

Key players: Sophomore F Max Plante (22-25-47), Sophomore F Jayson Shaugabay (10-31-41), Sophomore F Zam Plante (20-25-45), Sophomore F Callum Arnott (11-14-25), Senior F Scout Truman (13-5-18), Sophomore D Ty Hanson (8-24-32), Sophomore D Adam Kleber (3-7-10), Freshman D Grayden Siepmann (5-12-17), Sophomore G Adam Gajan (17-11-1, 2.25 GAA, .906 SV%, 2 SO)

North Dakota Team Profile

Head Coach: Dane Jackson (1st season at North Dakota, 27-8-1, .764)

National Rankings: #2/#2
NPI Ranking: 2nd
KRACH Rating: 546.0 (1st)

This Season: 27-8-1 overall, 16-2-1-5 NCHC (1st)
Last Season: 21-15-2 overall (missed NCAA tournament), 11-8-4-1 NCHC (5th)

2025-26 Season Statistics:

Team Offense: 3.92 goals scored/game – 3rd of 63 teams
Team Defense: 2.31 goals allowed/game – 8th of 63 teams

Power Play: 27.8% (35 of 126) – 4th of 63 teams
Penalty Kill: 82.7% (91 of 110) – 16th of 63 teams

Key Players: Freshman F Cole Reschny (5-28-33), Senior F Ben Strinden (15-18-33), Freshman F Will Zellers (18-12-30), Senior F Dylan James (18-10-28), Sophomore F Mac Swanson (11-16-27), Senior F Ellis Rickwood (8-26-34), Junior D Jake Livanavage (5-20-25), Junior D Abram Wiebe (5-22-27), Freshman D Keaton Verhoeff (6-14-20), Freshman G Jan Spunar (18-3-1, 1.93 GAA, .915 SV%, 4 SO)

By The Numbers

Last Meeting: February 7, 2026 (Duluth, Minnesota). One night after Zam Plante (who else?) sent the home fans happy with just seven seconds remaining in overtime, things were knotted at 0-0 with just over fifteen minutes to go in the game. UND’s Mac Swanson and Will Zellers gave the Fighting Hawks a lead they would never relinquish, and Dylan James added a pair of goals for a 4-1 North Dakota victory. Freshman Jan Spunar made 25 saves for the Green and White.

Last Meeting in Grand Forks: November 1st, 2025. One night after UND mounted a furious two-goal comeback in the final four minutes of regulation, it was all Green and White in the rematch. North Dakota senior captain Ben Strinden – who score an extra attacker goal to even the score in Friday’s opener – notched four assists in the 5-1 victory. UND outshot Minnesota Duluth 38-20, including 16-7 in the final frame.

Most Important Meeting: March 27, 2021 (Fargo, ND). North Dakota was down 2-0 to Minnesota Duluth with just 101 seconds remaining in the third period of the 2021 NCAA Midwest Regional final at Scheels Arena in Fargo, North Dakota. The Bulldogs had built their lead with two goals just 80 seconds apart early in the final frame on a pair of fluky plays. A partially blocked shot off the stick of Jackson Cates fluttered past Fighting Hawks’ netminder Adam Scheel, and a broken stick at the blue line sent Cole Koepke in alone on a breakaway. UND scored two extra-attacker goals in the final two minutes of regulation to send the game long into the night. Minnesota Duluth outlasted North Dakota 3-2 in five overtimes to advance to the NCAA Frozen Four. The three goaltenders involved in the contest combined to make 114 saves.

The Meeting That Never Was: Both teams advanced to the 2011 NCAA Frozen Four at Xcel Energy Center (St. Paul, Minnesota). UND could not get past Michigan, falling 2-0 despite outshooting the Wolverines 40-20. In the other national semifinal, Minnesota-Duluth defeated Notre Dame 4-3 and rode that momentum to the title game. The Bulldogs took the Wolverines to overtime before senior forward Kyle Schmidt scored the game winner and earned UMD their first national championship. North Dakota won two of the three games against Duluth that season, outscoring Scott Sandelin’s team 11-5.

All-time Series: UND leads the all-time series, 163-93-11 (.631), including a sparklng record of 89-40-3 (.686) in games played in Grand Forks. The teams first met in 1954, with North Dakota winning the first ten games between the schools by a combined score of 72-16. UMD’s first win over the Fighting Sioux (a 3-2 road victory on December 18th, 1959) did not sit well with the defending national champions. UND defeated Duluth 13-2 the following night.

Last Ten: North Dakota is 8-2-0 (.800) in the last ten games between the teams, with this season’s two 3-on-3 overtime defeats the only blemishes on the record. The combined score of the last ten contests is 45-18 in favor of the Fighting Hawks. Seven of the last ten games in this series were played in Grand Forks.

Game News and Notes

Both head coaches this weekend are alumni of the University of North Dakota; Dane Jackson (1988-1992) and Scott Sandelin (1982-86) both played for UND under John “Gino” Gasparini. North Dakota junior forward Anthony Menghini played his first two seasons at Duluth, scoring twenty goals and adding nine assists in 72 games. UND’s 163 victories over the Bulldogs are the second-most against any opponent in program history. North Dakota has outscored opponents 56-18 in third periods this season, including a scoring margin of 47-11 against conference foes. On nine occasions this season, UND has scored at least three goals in the final twenty minutes of regulation.

All Green. All In.

The University of North Dakota has announced that each home game throughout the playoffs will be a “Green Out”. All fans are encouraged to wear green to support the team!

The Prediction

I expect a fast, physical weekend of hockey out of this matchup, with plenty of talent on display. An early lead would be beneficial for UND, as they seem to play with much more purpose and poise when they aren’t chasing the game. Of course, specialty teams are always a factor, and the Fighting Hawks do not want to get into a power play contest with this Bulldogs squad. This tilt will definitely have a playoff feel, and the fans are in for a treat. I’ve got North Dakota winning another close one and advancing to the NCHC Frozen Faceoff Championship next Saturday night in Grand Forks. UND 3-2.

Broadcast Information

Tonight’s game will be broadcast live on Midco Sports and will also be available online at NCHC.tv. All UND men’s hockey games can be heard on stations across the Fighting Hawks Radio Network as well as through the iHeart Radio app. Puck drop is set for 6:07 p.m. Central Time.

Social Media

Keep up with the action live during all UND hockey games by following @UNDmhockey and @UNDInsider on Twitter. Fans can also read the action via Brad Schlossman’s live chat on the Grand Forks Herald website.

As always, thank you for reading. I welcome your thoughts, comments, and suggestions.

#3 North Dakota (25-8-1) hosts unranked Omaha (12-22-0) at Ralph Engelstad Arena this weekend in the first round of the NCHC playoffs. The two teams will play a best-of-three series beginning on Friday night and concluding on Sunday (if necessary), with the winner advancing to the league semifinals next Saturday night.

In the current NCHC playoff format, top-seeded North Dakota is hosting 8th-seed Omaha (9th-place Arizona State did not advance). If UND wins the series against the Mavs, it will host the lowest-remaining seed from the following quarterfinal matchups:

7th-seed Miami at 2nd-seed Denver

6th-seed Colorado College at 3rd-seed Western Michigan

5th-seed St. Cloud State at 4th-seed Minnesota-Duluth

If Omaha wins the series, it will travel to the highest-remaining seed and see its season continue, while a series loss this weekend would mark the end of the 2025-26 campaign for the Mavericks (currently 41st in the NPI used to seed the 16-team tournament field).

North Dakota (NPI 3), Denver (NPI 7) and Western Michigan (NPI 4) are all safely in the national tournament regardless of league playoff results, while Minnesota-Duluth (NPI 10) is nearly a lock.

Along with Omaha, St. Cloud State (NPI 25), Colorado College (NPI 27), and Miami (NPI 26) would also need to win the league playoff championship to appear in the NCAA tournament, which will begin with a regional round taking place from March 26th through March 29th at four sites (Loveland, CO; Sioux Falls, SD; Worcester, MA; Albany, NY); the winners of those four regionals will advance to the Frozen Four (April 7th and 9th in Las Vegas, Nevada).

While North Dakota is not guaranteed to be placed in the Sioux Falls regional, it is likely that the committee will place them there to boost attendance. UND can also help its own cause with good results in the NCHC tournament, as a higher NPI rank could keep the Fighting Hawks closer to home.

What can fans expect from UND and Omaha on the ice this weekend? While it might be easy to look at North Dakota’s four-game season sweep of the Mavericks (7-2, 4-1 at Omaha; 4-1, 3-1 in Grand Forks) as evidence that Dane Jackson’s crew will breeze through to the league semifinals, history has taught us that sweeping the first-round series is often more difficult than fans expect.

North Dakota does bring an impressive resume and results into this matchup, including the program’s seventh Penrose Cup and 22nd overall regular-season conference title, the most in NCAA history.

Last weekend, UND traveled to Lawson Arena in Kalamazoo, Michigan with the NCHC regular season championship on the line. North Dakota won Friday’s game in regulation to secure the Penrose Cup and followed that up by taking the defending national champions to overtime in the rematch; the Fighting Hawks finished the regular season with 55 points in 24 league games, three points clear of second-place Denver. Remarkably, UND only lost two NCHC games in regulation all season (16-2-1-5).

In 2025, Western Michigan won the Penrose Cup at home against North Dakota.

In 2024, UND won the Penrose Cup at home against Western Michigan.

UND is nine years removed from its eighth national championship but has made the national tournament in just four of the past eight seasons. That track record – and some early playoff exits – led to a coaching change, and Dane Jackson is now leading the charge. His first year as bench boss is eerily reminiscent of Brad Berry’s exactly ten years ago, with great goaltending, an impressive defensive corps, and remarkable scoring depth. While Brad Berry had a bit more top-end offensive talent (Drake Caggiula, Brock Boeser, and Nick Schmaltz) during the 2015-2016 season, this year’s version of the Fighting Hawks is wearing teams down and owning the third period, outscoring opponents 56-18 and either pulling away on the scoreboard or mounting one impressive comeback after another.

In the NCHC preseason poll, UND was picked to finish in third place (behind Western Michigan and Denver), while the Mavericks were tabbed to end up in seventh (ahead of only St. Cloud State and Miami). With the addition of St. Thomas to the NCHC (and a new schedule format) beginning in 2026-2027, the Fighting Hawks and Mavericks will no longer be guaranteed four regular-season games each year.

Omaha head coach Mike Gabinet is now in his ninth season behind the bench, and he has only led the Mavericks to two NCAA tournament appearances – once in the COVID-shortened 2020-2021 season and once two years ago. Both of those playoff bids came to an abrupt end at the hands of the Minnesota Golden Gophers, who dispatched Omaha 7-2 in the 2021 West Regional semifinal (Loveland, Colorado) and edged the Mavericks 3-2 in the 2024 Midwest Regional semifinal (Sioux Falls, South Dakota).

Last season, Omaha finished in the top half of the NCHC but was done in by a less-than-stellar non-conference record of 4-6-0, including home losses to Augustana (twice), Lindenwood, and UMass-Lowell and a road sweep at the hands of Minnesota State.

Twelve full seasons have come and gone since the college hockey landscape changed forever. With Minnesota and Wisconsin departing the Western Collegiate Hockey Association for the Big Ten after the 2012-13 season, several other conference schools and two members of the former Central Collegiate Hockey Association created the National Collegiate Hockey Conference and left Alaska Anchorage, Bemidji State, Michigan Tech, and Minnesota State behind in a watered-down WCHA.

And now, the WCHA is no more, and Bemidji State, Michigan Tech, and Minnesota State find themselves as three of nine programs in the latest version of the CCHA along with Bowling Green, Ferris State, Lake Superior State, Northern Michigan, St. Thomas (fifth season at the Division I level), and Augustana (third season at the Division I level).

Next season, St. Thomas will leave the CCHA to become the tenth member of the National Collegiate Hockey Conference (NCHC).

So far this season, the NCHC has won nearly seventy percent of its non-conference games (62-29-2, .677) and has four teams (#3 North Dakota, #4 Western Michigan, #8 Denver, and #9 Minnesota Duluth) positioned in the top ten in the latest rankings.

The NCHC has been the premier hockey conference since its inception, and particularly over the past ten seasons. The nine teams in the league have gone 602-310-81 (.647) in non-conference action since the start of the 2014-15 season and sent fifteen teams to the Frozen Four (UND and Omaha in 2015, UND and Denver in 2016, Denver and Duluth in 2017, Duluth in 2018, Denver and Duluth in 2019, Duluth and St. Cloud State in 2021, Denver in 2022 and 2024, and Denver and Western Michigan in 2025 over that nine-year stretch (there was no national tournament in 2020). Conference members North Dakota (2016), Denver (2017, 2022, 2024), Minnesota Duluth (2018, 2019), and Western Michigan (2025) have won seven of the last nine national titles.

Last season, the Fighting Hawks and Mavericks ended the regular season by splitting a pair of games at Ralph Engelstad Arena. The following weekend – with the season on the line for both teams – UND swept a pair of games at Omaha by identical 3-2 scores. North Dakota’s season would end six days later at the hands of eventual national champion Western Michigan at the last-ever NCHC Frozen Faceoff in St. Paul, Minnesota, a 4-2 defeat that would cost former head coach Brad Berry his job.

On the final weekend of the 2022-2023 regular season, North Dakota swept Omaha (5-4 OT, 2-1). The Fighting Hawks dropped Game One of the playoff series in Omaha by a final score of 2-1 before winning two straight (3-1, 5-2) and advancing to the NCHC Frozen Faceoff in St. Paul, Minnesota.

On January 12th and 13th, 2024, UND took four of six league points in a home series against Omaha, falling 5-4 in overtime on Friday night before rebounding for a 3-1 regulation win in Saturday’s rematch. The disappointing thing about the series opener is that North Dakota led 3-1 after the first period. The Mavericks won the middle frame decisively, however, outscoring the homestanding Hawks 3-1. Both teams scored twice with the man advantage. Omaha scored just 34 seconds into the 3-on-3 overtime session to grab the extra league point.

Saturday’s finale was a bit more of a defensive struggle, with Omaha tying the game at one goal apiece just 49 seconds into the third period. UND’s Dylan James scored the game-winner three minutes later, and former Maverick Cameron Berg iced the game with an empty-net goal in the final thirty seconds. North Dakota outshot Omaha 30-23 on Saturday night and 69-47 on the weekend.

Turning our attention to this weekend…

A half-point per game or better is my benchmark for solid offensive production, and Mike Gabinet’s squad has just seven lineup regulars who meet that threshold: sophomore forward Maxime Pellerin (8-12-20), freshman forward Luke Woodworth (4-15-19), freshman forward Jeremy Loranger (7-11-18 in 26 games), sophomore forward Trevor Wong (5-14-19), sophomore forward Brett Hyland (8-8-16), freshman forward Samuel Huo (6-9-15 in 28 games), and senior defenseman Griffin Ludtke (0-17-17).

North Dakota is hoping to have ten players in the lineup this weekend who have met that same offensive threshold: senior forward Ellis Rickwood (8-24-32), senior forward Ben Strinden (15-18-33), freshman forward Will Zellers (17-10-27), sophomore forward Mac Swanson (8-16-24), freshman forward Cole Reschny (5-26-31), senior forward Dylan James (17-10-27), freshman forward Josh Zakreski (3-2-5 in nine games), junior defenseman Jake Livanavage (5-20-25), junior defenseman Abram Wiebe (5-21-26), and freshman defenseman Keaton Verhoeff (6-14-20).

Ben Strinden and Will Zellers are both dealing with illness and will miss Friday’s opener.

Josh Zakreski returned to the lineup two weekends ago after a lengthy absence and promptly scored a goal on his first shift; he also added a goal late in the second period of last Friday’s Penrose Cup-clinching victory over the WMU Broncos that gave North Dakota a lead they would not relinquish.

One key area to watch this weekend is the face-off circle. To this point in the season, the Fighting Hawks have won 53.8% of faceoffs, good for 5th in the country. By comparison, the Mavericks are 55th in the nation (47.0%).

In the faceoff circle, Dane Jackson has been relying on freshman phenom Cole Reschny (253 of 461, 54.9%), portal transfer Ellis Rickwood (316 of 524, 60.3%), and freshman Ollie Josephson (238 of 432, 55.1%).

For the Mavericks, no one has been all that effective, with freshman Luke Woodworth (183 of 383, 47.8%), sophomore Sean Tschigerl (168 of 392, 42.9%), and senior Tyler Rollwagen (155 of 336, 46.1%) sharing the load.

Not only will North Dakota start with the puck more often than not in this series, they will also hold on to it. Throughout the season, the Fighting Hawks have far outpaced the Mavericks in two key puck possession statistics:

North Dakota: 2nd in Corsi (57.3%) and 3rd in Fenwick (57.1%)

Omaha: 42nd in Corsi (48.5%) and 44th in Fenwick (47.8%)

Corsi measures the share of shot attempts for each team at even strength, while Fenwick measures the share of unblocked shot attempts for each team at even strength.

To this point in the season, the Green and White have had far the better of the specialty teams play. North Dakota is a combined +16, with 32 power play goals scored (32 of 119, 26.9%, 9th in the country) and eighteen power play goals allowed (88 of 106, 83.0%, 13th). UND has scored six and allowed four shorthanded goals this season.

Mike Gabinet’s squad is at a minus-6, with 27 power play goals scored (27 of 124, 21.8%, 21st in the country) and thirty power play goals allowed (98 of 128, 76.6%, 50th). Omaha has scored just one shorthanded goal this season while allowing four to opponents.

On Friday, November 7th in Omaha, the Fighting Hawks went 4-for-8 with the man advantage and held the Mavericks to just one power play goal on four chances.

One night later, the Mavs held the advantage by going 1-for-3 on the power play and holding North Dakota scoreless on two opportunities.

In the mid-December series in Grand Forks, North Dakota scored twice in seven man-advantage situations and allowed one power play goal to the Mavericks in eight chances.

In the four-game season series, North Dakota went 6-for-17 with the man advantage (35.3%) and killed 12 of 15 Omaha power plays (80.0%).

Through 34 games, the Green and White have blocked an incredible 385 shots (11.3 per game), led by Bennett Zmolek with 48, Jake Livanavage with 42, and Keaton Verhoeff with 38. Zmolek has been in and out of the lineup over the past few weeks; Zmolek’s 48 blocks have come in just 27 games.

Omaha has blocked 183 shots in its 34 games (5.4/game), with Marc Lajoie (35), Jacob Guevin (30), and Marcus Broberg (28) leading the charge.

North Dakota’s defensive corps has provided plenty of production from the back end, already notching 100 points (22 goals and 78 assists) in 235 combined games (0.43 points per game). Among defensemen, UND is led by two juniors – Abram Wiebe (5-21-26) and Jake Livanavage (5-20-25) – and freshman Keaton Verhoeff (6-14-20).

Verhoeff is widely expected to go in the top three of the 2026 NHL Entry Draft, while Livanavage (4-24-28) and Wiebe (4-20-24) were two of UND’s top four point-getters a season ago.

By comparison, Omaha’s blueliners have scored sixteen goals and 52 assists for 68 points in 220 combined games (0.31 points/game), led by senior Griffin Ludtke (0-17-17), sophomore Marc Lajoie (6-7-13), and junior Aidan de la Gorgendiere (3-9-12),

Not only have North Dakota’s defensemen been producing offensively, first-year head coach Dane Jackson has also put together an impressive mix of defenders he can trust in any situation. As a unit, UND’s defensemen have allowed a total of just 807 shots on goal this season in 34 games (23.7/game, 3rd-best in the country), while Omaha has allowed 1091 (32.1, 47th).

The Mavericks are allowing 3.47 goals per game this season (52nd in the nation), while North Dakota is allowing just 2.32 (9th). On the offensive side, UND is scoring 3.85 goals per game (3rd), while Omaha has managed just 2.68 goals per game (44th).

Sometimes it is difficult to dissect numbers like those above, so here it is in plain terms: in 34 games, UND has outscored opponents 131-79. In the same number of games, Omaha has been outscored 91-118.

Fighting Hawks’ graduate netminder Gibson Homer (9-5-0, 2.71 goals-against average, .889 save percentage) started each of the first four games of the season and then split the next four weekends with freshman Jan Spunar (16-3-1, 1.93 GAA, .917 SV%, four shutout) before giving way to Spunar entirely for the majority of the season. Homer did earn a start on Senior Night two Saturdays ago and again last Saturday night (after UND clinched the Penrose), but I would expect Spunar to start from here on out.

Omaha senior goaltender Simon Latkoczy (8-14-0, 3.20 GAA, .899 SV%) has played roughly two-thirds of the minutes for the Mavericks this season. While his numbers this season do not measure up to his previous three collegiate campaigns, he has recorded thirty or more saves nine different times this year and retains the ability to steal a game for his team.

Omaha Team Profile

Head Coach: Mike Gabinet (9th season at UNO, 147-153-19, .491)

National Rankings: #NR/NR
NPI Ranking: 41st
KRACH: 102.1 (33rd)

This Season: 12-22-0 overall, 8-16-0-0 NCHC (8th)
Last Season: 18-17-1 overall (missed NCAA tournament), 13-8-2-1 NCHC (4th)

Team Offense: 2.68 scored/game – 44th of 63 teams
Team Defense: 3.47 goals allowed/game – 52nd of 63 teams

Power Play: 21.8% (27 of 124)– 21st of 63 teams
Penalty Kill: 76.6% (98 of 128)– 50th of 63 teams

Key Players: Sophomore F Maxime Pellerin (8-12-20), Freshman F Luke Woodworth (4-15-19), Freshman F Marcus Nguyen (11-5-16), Sophomore F Trevor Wong (5-14-19), Freshman F Jeremy Loranger (7-1-18), Senior D Griffin Ludtke (0-17-17), Junior D Aidan de la Gorgendiere (3-9-12), Sophomore D Marc Lajoie (6-7-13), Senior D Jacob Guevin (3-6-9), Senior G Simon Latkoczy (8-14-0, 3.20 GAA, .899 SV%)

North Dakota Team Profile

Head Coach: Dane Jackson (1st season at North Dakota, 25-8-1, .750)

National Rankings: #3/#2
NPI Ranking: 3rd
KRACH Rating: 507.8 (2nd)

This Season: 25-8-1 overall, 16-2-1-5 NCHC (1st)
Last Season: 21-15-2 overall (missed NCAA tournament), 11-8-4-1 NCHC (5th)

2025-26 Season Statistics:

Team Offense: 3.85 goals scored/game – 3rd of 63 teams
Team Defense: 2.32 goals allowed/game – 9th of 63 teams

Power Play: 26.9% (32 of 119) – 9th of 63 teams
Penalty Kill: 83.0% (88 of 106) – 13th of 63 teams

Key Players: Freshman F Cole Reschny (5-26-31), Senior F Ben Strinden (15-18-33), Freshman F Will Zellers (17-10-27), Senior F Dylan James (17-10-27), Sophomore F Mac Swanson (8-16-24), Senior F Ellis Rickwood (8-24-32), Junior D Jake Livanavage (5-20-25), Junior D Abram Wiebe (5-21-26), Freshman D Keaton Verhoeff (6-14-20), Freshman G Jan Spunar (16-3-1, 1.93 GAA, .917 SV%, 4 SO)

By The Numbers

Last Meeting: December 13, 2025 (Grand Forks, ND). One night after dispatching the visitors by a final score of 4-1, North Dakota completed the four-game season sweep over the Mavericks with a 3-1 victory. UND’s Anthony Menghini responded less than a minute after Omaha’s first goal, and Ellis Rickwood gave the home team the lead for good by dancing between defenders and lighting the lamp with only two seconds remaining in the second period.

Last Playoff Meeting: March 15th, 2025 (Omaha, Nebraska). For the second night in a row, the visiting Hawks narrowly edged their hosts by a final score of 3-2. On this night, it was a furious third-period comeback after Omaha had built a 2-0 lead. North Dakota defenseman Jayden Jubenvill netted the game-winner with just 96 seconds remaining in the hockey game to propel the Green and White to the NCHC Frozen Faceoff. UND scored its three goals on just five shots in the final frame.

Most Memorable Meeting: The game that UND fans will long remember is the outdoor game played at TD Ameritrade Park (Omaha, Nebraska) on February 9th, 2013. One day after winning a tight 2-1 contest indoors, North Dakota throttled UNO 5-2 on a sunny, melty afternoon. Mavericks netminder John Faulkner was pulled after allowing three goals on five shots in just ten minutes of game action. In my opinion, this hockey weekend solidified the notion that for UND hockey, it’s always a home game.

Last Ten: North Dakota has won seven of the past ten tilts between the teams, including three of the four games played last season and all four regular-season matchups this year. UND has outscored the Mavericks 34-27 over the past ten games; Omaha has scored two goals or fewer in each of the past six meetings.

All-Time: UND leads the all-time series 43-23-2 (.636), including a record of 22-11-1 (.662) in Grand Forks. The teams first met on November 19, 2010.

Game News and Notes

Eleven seasons ago, both North Dakota and Omaha advanced to the NCAA Frozen Four but neither team made the championship game. UND fell to Boston University 5-3, while the Mavericks were upended 4-1 by eventual national champion Providence. In team history, the Mavericks have made the national tournament five times (2006, 2011, 2015, 2021, 2024), with a Frozen Four appearance under head coach Dean Blais in 2015. In 33 of the past 41 contests in this series, the winning team is the one which scores the first goal. This season, North Dakota is 17-3-1 (.795) when scoring first; Omaha, 8-8-0 (.500). North Dakota has outscored opponents 56-18 in third periods this season, including a scoring margin of 44-11 against conference foes. On nine occasions this season, UND has scored at least three goals in the final twenty minutes of regulation. UND’s Dylan James has nine goals and thirteen points in his twenty career games against the Mavericks.

All Green. All In.

The University of North Dakota has announced that each home game throughout the playoffs will be a “Green Out”. All fans are encouraged to wear green to support the team!

The Prediction

The underlying metrics all seem to favor North Dakota, although as I mentioned above, it is a tall task to end another team’s season. The home team will not have a problem in Friday’s opener, but the rematch on Saturday night will be a battle. Ultimately, this will be a sweep for the Green and White, but it won’t be easy. UND 4-1, 4-2.

Broadcast Information

All games this weekend will be broadcast live on Midco Sports and will also be available online at NCHC.tv. All UND men’s hockey games can be heard on stations across the Fighting Hawks Radio Network as well as through the iHeart Radio app. Puck drop is set for 7:07 p.m. Central Time on Friday night and 6:07 p.m. Central Time on Saturday night. If Sunday’s Game Three is also necessary, that game will begin at 6:07 p.m.

Social Media

Keep up with the action live during all UND hockey games by following @UNDmhockey and @UNDInsider on Twitter. Fans can also read the action via Brad Schlossman’s live chat on the Grand Forks Herald website.

As always, thank you for reading. I welcome your thoughts, comments, and suggestions.

#3 North Dakota (24-7-1 overall, 15-2-1-4 NCHC) squares off against #4 Western Michigan (23-8-1 overall, 13-5-3-1 NCHC) at Lawson Arena in Kalamazoo, Michigan this weekend with the NCHC regular season championship on the line. With six league points up for grabs in the two-game series, the Fighting Hawks need just one point to secure at least a share of the Penrose Cup. In other words, WMU would need to win both games in regulation to repeat as outright league champions; last year, Western Michigan won the program’s first-ever Penrose Cup. For the first time since 2015, two NCHC teams playing head-to-head on the final weekend of the regular season could both hoist the trophy.

In 2024, UND won the Penrose Cup at home against Western Michigan.

In 2025, Western Michigan won the Penrose Cup at home against North Dakota.

This weekend, there is more on the line than the trophy. The NCHC regular-season champion will also have home ice throughout the league playoffs.

UND and Western Michigan have not met this season, so we’ll need to take a look further back to make sense of what fans should expect in this pivotal matchup.

Nearly a year ago, the Broncos ended UND’s season with a 4-2 victory in the semifinals of the last-ever NCHC Frozen Faceff (Xcel Energy Center; St. Paul, Minnesota). The Fighting Hawks drew within one goal on freshman Sacha Boisvert’s eighteenth goal of the season, an extra-attacker tally with just fifty seconds remaining. 26 seconds later, a Broncos’ empty-netter sent the boys in green home early and led to a coaching change in Grand Forks.

After dispatching North Dakota, WMU won a double-overtime thriller over Denver to win the NCHC playoff championship and rode that momentum all the way to the program’s first national title. Incredibly, Western Michigan also won a pair of 2OT games in the NCAA tournament. First it was a 2-1 win over Minnesota State in the regional semifinal. Two games later – after a 2-1 victory against UMass – Western Michigan faced DU in the Frozen Four semifinals; that game went 26 seconds into double overtime before Owen Michaels sent his team to the championship game (a 6-2 Broncos victory over Boston University).

Western Michigan played a total of twelve overtime games in 2024-25 and came out of those contests with an overall record of 8-3-1. One of those overtime losses was WMU’s last loss of last season: a 4-3 home defeat at the hands of North Dakota which saw Sasha Boisvert tie the game with under forty seconds to play and Jake Livanavage score a power play goal in the extra session. Livanavage made sure to celebrate near the Lawson Lunatics (WMU’s student section), since they direct most of their collective attention at whichever opponent wears #4.

It is worth noting that the Broncos won the other three games in the season series a year ago and were the best team North Dakota faced in the entire campaign. WMU won Friday’s opener in Kalamazoo and earned a sweep in Grand Forks two months earlier. The home squad had a chance in Friday’s opener, but it was all Broncos in the rematch. UND drew a penalty late in regulation in game one, but an interference call just 24 seconds later negated the advantage. Early in the extra frame, Western Michigan scored a power play tally to earn the 3-2 victory. On Saturday night, the game was probably closer than the 5-1 final score, but WMU continually frustrated North Dakota in all three zones.

Two seasons ago, in the only series between the teams, North Dakota swept Western Michigan at home (5-3, 3-0) to capture the program’s sixth Penrose Cup. In the in the twelve completed seasons of the National Collegiate Hockey Conference, only UND, Denver, St. Cloud State , and Western Michiganhave hoisted the Penrose.

Three years ago, UND managed to take five of six league points on the road at Kalamazoo (2-2 tie/shootout win; 3-0 win), but the Broncos swept the Fighting Hawks at Ralph Engelstad Arena (4-0, 7-6) to take the season series.

Fifth-year head coach Pat Ferschweiler (WMU ’93) recently earned a contract extension that will keep him behind the Broncos’ bench through April 2030. Ferschweiler, who had previously been the WMU associate head coach under Andy Murray, also spent four seasons as an assistant coach for the NHL’s Detroit Red Wings.

In his rookie campaign four seasons ago, Ferschweiler went 26-12-1 and brought his team within one game of the Frozen Four, falling to Minnesota in the regional final. In September of 2022, the Western Michigan bench boss was extended through the 2025-26 season. Three years ago, he led the Broncos to a 2nd-place finish in the NCHC, an overall record of 23-15-1, and another NCAA tournament appearance. Two seasons ago, Ferschweiler once again led his team to the NCAA tourney with an overall mark of 21-16-1.

Last year was certainly Ferschweiler’s best behind the bench.

After losing seven of his top nine point producers – forwards Luke Grainger (14-34-48 in 2023-24), Dylan Wendt (23-21-44), Sam Colangelo (24-19-43), Chad Hillebrand (7-19-26), and Ethan Phillips (9-14-23) and defensemen Zak Galambos (9-12-21) and Carter Berger (4-16-20) – Ferschweiler saw his team scoring at a HIGHER rate last season (3.98 goals scored per game in 2024-25; 3.58 in 2023-24).

And the scary part for opponents was that last year’s championship team was much better defensively than any we’ve seen in the Ferschweiler era:

2024-25: 2.05 goals allowed/game
2023-24: 2.55 goals allowed/game
2022-23: 2.62 goals allowed/game
2021-22: 2.59 goals allowed/game

Things aren’t quite as impressive this year, but Western is still scoring 3.75 goals per game (6th in the nation) and allowing just 2.34 (11th).

This year’s version of the Fighting Hawks clears both of those:

Goals scored/game: 3.84 (4th in the nation)
Goals allowed/game: 2.25 (7th)

After having the luxury of starting either graduate netminder Cameron Rowe (15-2-0, 2.00 goals-against average, .924 save percentage, one shutout) or freshman Hampton Slukynsky (19-5-1, 1.90 GAA, .922 SV%, 1 SO) between the pipes last season, Slukynsky has played every minute in net for WMU, with a record of 23-8-1, a goals-against average of 2.25, a save percentage of .916 save perctentage, and four shutouts).

After alternating with Rowe for much of the 2024-25 season, Slukynsky, started – and won – the last twelve consecutive games for the Broncos. Slukynsky was slated to attend Northern Michigan University before head coach Ryan Potulny departed the program to become the head coach of the Hartford Wolf Pack (AHL). Slukynsky got out of his NLI and chose to attend WMU along with his brother Grant Slukysnky, who entered the portal after playing one season (6-3-9 in 34 games) under Potulny.

In the Division I era (since 1975), the Broncos have had seventeen twenty-win seasons, with nine of those coming between 1984 and 1996 under head coach Bill Wilkinson. At 23-8-1, Pat Ferschweiler has already led his team to twenty victories for the fifth consecutive year.

As mentioned above, UND is in the driver’s seat for another league title and could clinch the Penrose Cup with a victory tonight.

UND can finish no lower than third place in the league standings and will be at home for the first round of the NCHC playoffs, which will be played from March 6th through March 8th.

Twelve full seasons have come and gone since the college hockey landscape changed forever. With Minnesota and Wisconsin departing the Western Collegiate Hockey Association for the Big Ten after the 2012-13 season, several other conference schools and two members of the former Central Collegiate Hockey Association created the National Collegiate Hockey Conference and left Alaska Anchorage, Bemidji State, Michigan Tech, and Minnesota State behind in a watered-down WCHA.

And now, the WCHA is no more, and Bemidji State, Michigan Tech, and Minnesota State find themselves as three of nine programs in the latest version of the CCHA along with Bowling Green, Ferris State, Lake Superior State, Northern Michigan, St. Thomas (fifth season at the Division I level), and Augustana (third season at the Division I level).

Next season, St. Thomas will leave the CCHA to become the tenth member of the National Collegiate Hockey Conference (NCHC).

So far this season, the NCHC has won nearly seventy percent of its non-conference games (62-29-2, .677) and has four teams (#3 North Dakota, #4 Western Michigan, #8 Denver, and #9 Minnesota Duluth) positioned in the top ten in the latest rankings.

The NCHC has been the premier hockey conference since its inception, and particularly over the past ten seasons. The nine teams in the league have gone 602-310-81 (.647) in non-conference action since the start of the 2014-15 season and sent fifteen teams to the Frozen Four (UND and Omaha in 2015, UND and Denver in 2016, Denver and Duluth in 2017, Duluth in 2018, Denver and Duluth in 2019, Duluth and St. Cloud State in 2021, Denver in 2022 and 2024, and Denver and Western Michigan in 2025 over that nine-year stretch (there was no national tournament in 2020). Conference members North Dakota (2016), Denver (2017, 2022, 2024), Minnesota Duluth (2018, 2019), and Western Michigan (2025) have won seven of the last nine national titles.

Turning our attention to this weekend’s matchup, a half-point per game or better is my benchmark for solid offensive production, and the Broncos boast TEN lineup regulars who meet that threshold: junior forward Grant Slukysnky (8-27-35), senior forward Liam Valente (17-13-30), junior forward William Whitelaw (17-12-29), junior forward Zaccharya Wisdom (15-11-26), junior forward Owen Michaels (10-12-22), sophomore forward Ty Henricks (9-13-22), freshman forward Bobby Cowan (5-16-21), sophomore forward Zach Nehring 5-12-17), senior defenseman Samuel Sjolund (6-16-21), sophomore defenseman Zach Sharp (5-14-19).

Liam Valente spent his first two seasons at Providence, scoring seven goals and adding thirteen assists in 59 games played. Last year, he put up a line of 14-19-33 in 42 games.

William Whitelaw is on his third team in three seasons (Wisconsin in 2023-24, Michigan in 2024-25). Zaccharya Wisdom played the past two seasons at Colorado College.

It is worth noting that WMU’s top two defensemen – sophomore Joona Vaisanen and junior Cole Crusberg-Roseen remain out of the lineup this weekend. Neither has played since the calendar turned to 2026; both are out for the season with lower-body injuries. When they were on the ice, Vaisanen was averaging nearly 22 minutes per game; Crusberg-Roseen, nearly 21 minutes.

North Dakota will also have ten players in the lineup this weekend who have met that same offensive threshold: senior forward Ellis Rickwood (8-23-31), senior forward Ben Strinden (14-16-30), freshman forward Will Zellers (16-10-26), sophomore forward Mac Swanson (7-15-22), freshman forward Cole Reschny (4-24-2), senior forward Dylan James (17-10-27), freshman forward Josh Zakreski (2-2-4 in eight games), junior defenseman Jake Livanavage (5-19-24), junior defenseman Abram Wiebe (5-20-25), and freshman defenseman Keaton Verhoeff (6-12-18).

Josh Zakreski returned to the lineup last weekend after a lengthy absence and promptly scored a goal on his first shift.

As mentioned above, sophomore Hampton Slukynsky (23-8-1, 2.25 GAA, .916 SV%, 4 SO) has played every minute in net for the Broncos.

For North Dakota, it’s been the younger netminder with the better of the results. Freshman Jan Spunar was splitting time with graduate transfer Gibson Homer to start this season, but Spunar began to earn more starts as the season went along.

Here’s how the two stack up:

Spunar: 15-3-1, 1.87 goals-against average, .919 save percentage, four shutouts

Homer: 9-4-0, 2.62 goals-against average, .890 save percentage

Gibson Homer did earn a start last Saturday night for Senior Night, but I would expect that it will be Jan Spunar’s net for the remainder of the season.

After this weekend, both teams will be hosting the first round of the NCHC playoffs (best-of-three quarterfinals from March 6th-8th); their opponents remain to be determined.

Western Michigan Team Profile

Head Coach: Pat Ferschweiler (5th season at WMU, 127-58-5, .682)

National Rankings: #4/#4
NPI Ranking: 4th
KRACH Ranking: 437.3 (4th)

This Season: 23-8-1 overall, 13-5-3-1 NCHC (t-2nd of 9 teams)
Last Season: 34-7-1 overall (NCAA Champions), 15-1-4-4 NCHC (1st)

2025-2026 Season Statistics:

Team Offense: 3.75 goals scored/game – 6th of 63 teams
Team Defense: 2.34 goals allowed/game – 11th of 63 teams

Power Play: 20.5% (25 of 122) – 32nd of 63 teams
Penalty Kill: 86.3% (107 of 124) – 7th of 63 teams

Key Players: Junior F Grant Slukysnky (8-27-35), Senior F Liam Valente (17-13-30), Junior F William Whitelaw (17-12-29), Junior F Zaccharya Wisdom (15-11-26), Junior F Owen Michaels (10-12-22), Sophomore F Ty Henricks (9-13-22), Freshman F Bobby Cowan (5-16-21), Sophomore F Zach Nehring 5-12-17), Senior D Samuel Sjolund (6-16-21), Sophomore D Zach Sharp (5-14-19), Sophomore G Hampton Slukynsky (23-8-1, 2.25 GAA, .916 SV%, 4 SO)

North Dakota Team Profile

Head Coach: Dane Jackson (1st season at North Dakota, 24-7-1, .766)

National Rankings: #3/#3
NPI Ranking: 3rd
KRACH Rating: 488.5 (3rd)

This Season: 24-7-1 overall, 15-2-1-4 NCHC (1st)
Last Season: 21-15-2 overall (missed NCAA tournament), 11-8-4-1 NCHC (5th)

2025-26 Season Statistics:

Team Offense: 3.84 goals scored/game – 4th of 63 teams
Team Defense: 2.25 goals allowed/game – 7th of 63 teams

Power Play: 27.6% (32 of 116) – 7th of 63 teams
Penalty Kill: 82.0% (82 of 100) – 20th of 63 teams

Key Players: Freshman F Cole Reschny (4-24-28), Senior F Ben Strinden (14-16-30), Freshman F Will Zellers (16-10-26), Senior F Dylan James (17-10-27), Sophomore F Mac Swanson (7-15-22), Senior F Ellis Rickwood (8-23-31), Junior D Jake Livanavage (5-19-24), Junior D Abram Wiebe (5-20-25), Freshman D Keaton Verhoeff (6-12-18), Freshman G Jan Spunar (15-3-1, 1.87 GAA, .919 SV%, 4 SO)

By The Numbers

Last Meeting in Kalamazoo: March 1, 2025. Western Michigan took a 3-2 lead in the third period thanks to two Ty Hendricks goals just two minutes apart. UND battled back and forced overtime on an extra-attacker tally by Sacha Boisvert with just 36 seconds remaining in the game, and the Fighting Hawks’ Jake Livanavage completed the comeback with a power play marker late in the five-minute overtime session. The Broncos outshot North Dakota 36-18 but were continually stymied by UND netminder T.J. Semptimphelter, who finished with 33 saves.

Most Important Meeting: March 24, 2012 (St. Paul, MN). North Dakota upended Western Michigan 3-1 in the NCAA West Regional semifinal. Brock Nelson had two points, including an empty net goal with 25 seconds remaining that sent UND to the regional finals against Minnesota. Aaron Dell made 24 saves for the Green and White. The Broncos, who have played at the Division I level since 1975-76, have ten NCAA tournament appearances.

A Trip Down Memory Lane: Saturday, March 22, 2014 (Minneapolis, MN). North Dakota faced a must-win situation in the 3rd place game at the inaugural NCHC Frozen Faceoff, and did not disappoint the partisan crowd. The Green and White rolled to a 5-0 victory behind two first-period goals from Conner Gaarder. UND netminder Zane Gothberg made 25 saves for the shutout, and Dave Hakstol’s crew played the waiting game for several more hours before discovering that they had indeed made the NCAA tournament for the twelfth consecutive season.

All-Time Series: In the short history between the schools, UND has won 31 of the 48 games (31-16-1, .656), including a 13-6-1 (.675) record at Lawson Arena. Before the 2016-17 season in which Western Michigan won three of the four meetings, WMU’s lone victory over North Dakota was a 2-1 road win on March 8th, 2014. The teams first met in 1997.

Last Ten: Western Michigan has won six of the past ten between meetings the teams, even though only three of those ten games were played in Kalamazoo. The combined score of the last ten contests? Broncos 35, Fighting Hawks 30.

Game News and Notes

Western Michigan moved up to the Division I ranks beginning with the 1975-76 season and has advanced to the NCAA tournament ten times. Over that same stretch, North Dakota has appeared in the NCAA tourney thirty times, with sixteen Frozen Fours and six national championships (1980, 1982, 1987, 1997, 2000, 2016). The Broncos have made the NCAA tourney five times (2017, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025) in their first twelve seasons in the NCHC after advancing to the national tournament twice (2011, 2012) in the last three seasons in the now-defunct CCHA. North Dakota has outscored opponents 53-16 in third periods this season, including a scoring margin of 41-9 against conference foes. On nine occasions this season, UND has scored at least three goals in the final twenty minutes of regulation. With no trip to Lawson Arena (capacity 3667) scheduled next season and a new Western Michigan rink anticipated for the fall of 2027, this weekend’s games are likely to be UND’s final two appearances in front of the Lawson Lunatics. Since December 5th, WMU has lost just twice (14-2-1), but those two losses were vs. Omaha and at Miami. Since November 15th, UND has lost just three times (17-3-1), with all three losses by the same score (3-2) and two of the three reaching overtime.

The Prediction

Both teams have plenty to play for this weekend, and fans are in for a treat. After these two league games, I fully expect the Fighting Hawks and Broncos to meet at some point in the conference playoffs and in the national tournament. Unlike last year, these squads are very evenly matched, with each side boasting a few small edges. In a series like this, with equal motivation on both benches, a split is the most likely result. Of course, things change if Western wins the opener in regulation and can clinch the Penrose by duplicating that result on Saturday. If North Dakota wins on Friday night, the teams may just go through the motions in the rematch. UND 4-2, WMU 4-2.

Broadcast Information

Both games this weekend will be available via webcast at NCHC.tv. Puck drop is scheduled for 6:00 p.m. Central Time on Friday, with a 5:00 p.m. start time on Saturday night. All UND men’s hockey games can be heard on stations across the UND Fighting Hawks Radio Network as well as through the iHeart Radio app.

Social Media

Keep up with the action live during all UND hockey games by following @UNDmhockey and @UNDInsider on X-Twitter. Fans can also read the action via Brad Schlossman’s live chat on the Grand Forks Herald website.

As always, thank you for reading. I welcome your questions, comments, and suggestions. Follow me on X-Twitter (@DBergerHockey) for more information and insight. Here’s to hockey!

#3 North Dakota (23-7-0) hosts a familiar foe this weekend – the unranked Huskies (16-16-0) of St. Cloud State. SCSU has played well at various points this season but has given up far too many goals in conference play (3.45 goals allowed/game; 7th of nine teams in the NCHC) and has shown an inability to come back after trailing (4-14-0 when the opponent scores first).

UND is in the driver’s seat for another league title and could clinch the Penrose Cup with perfect results tonight and tomorrow night.

It has come down to a three-team race for the Penrose Cup ; the Fighting Hawks could secure the program’s seventh NCHC title with a regulation sweep over the Huskies.

NCHC standings:

North Dakota: 14-2-1-3 (47 league points) in 20 games played
Denver: 13-5-3-1 (46 league points) in 22 games played
Western Michigan: 12-5-2-1 (41 league points) in 20 games played

Here are the schedules for the top three NCHC teams over the final two weeks of the regular season:

UND: vs. St. Cloud State, at Western Michigan
Denver: OFF, vs. Arizona State
WMU: at Colorado College, vs. UND

UND can finish no lower than third place in the league standings and will be at home for the first round of the NCHC playoffs, which will be played from March 6th through March 8th.

Before we take a look at what fans can expect from the Huskies and Hawks this weekend, let’s take a trip down memory lane..

Three seasons ago, St. Cloud State got the better of the Fighting Hawks, winning four of five games and ending UND’s season in the semifinals of the 2023 NCHC Frozen Faceoff in St. Paul.

During the 2022-23 regular season, SCSU embarrassed North Dakota in St. Cloud, winning both games on the wide sheet by comfortable margins (7-2, 6-3). On Friday night, a disastrous second period saw the Huskies score every which way: at even strength, shorthanded, with the extra attacker on a delayed penalty, and on the ensuing power play. Saturday’s game at the Herb Brooks Center was a different kind of disturbing for fans of the Green and White, as the visitors led 3-0 early in the second period. The Huskies would get on the board just 23 seconds after UND’s third tally, and then it was the Zach Okabe show, as the senior forward scored a natural hat trick in under nine minutes of game action (from the 18:12 mark of the middle frame through the 7:05 mark of the third period). SCSU would add two late goals – including an empty-netter – to make the score look lopsided.

In the rematch in Grand Forks, both games went to overtime, with UND scoring during 3-on-3 play on Friday night before losing in a shootout in Saturday’s finale.

In the 2023-24 campaign, the two teams tangled only twice, and North Dakota took four of six points on the road, winning Friday’s opener 5-3 before tying the homestanding Huskies 3-3 and losing in a shootout.

Last season was even better for the Green and White, with North Dakota taking ten of twelve points from the Huskies, beginning with a 2-0 regulation win and a 4-3 overtime win on home ice in mid-December.

In St. Cloud, UND managed a shootout win and a 6-2 regulation win. In the series finale, SCSU probably deserved a better fate but were undone by goaltending, as the Fighting Hawks scored five goals on netminder James Gray, who made just eighteen saves. The Huskies scored an extra attacker goal with over six minutes remaining in the hockey game but gave up an empty netter just 29 seconds later.

In early December 2025, North Dakota pulled off the rare road sweep at the Herb Brooks Center. In Friday’s opener, the teams traded blows, with Will Zellers’ third-period tally standing as the game-winner in a 4-3 Fighting Hawks victory. In Saturday’s rematch, St. Cloud tied the game 2-2 with less than nine minutes remaining and earned a power play shortly thereafter. Less than thirty seconds into the man advantage, UND’s Jake Livanavage potted a brilliant shorthanded goal to put the visitors on top. Exactly seven minutes later – with four seconds remaining – Livanavage scored into the empty net for good measure. SCSU outshot the visitors 37-25; North Dakota freshman netminder Jan Spunar made 35 saves in the victory.

Twelve full seasons have come and gone since the college hockey landscape changed forever. With Minnesota and Wisconsin departing the Western Collegiate Hockey Association for the Big Ten after the 2012-13 season, several other conference schools and two members of the former Central Collegiate Hockey Association created the National Collegiate Hockey Conference and left Alaska Anchorage, Bemidji State, Michigan Tech, and Minnesota State behind in a watered-down WCHA.

And now, the WCHA is no more, and Bemidji State, Michigan Tech, and Minnesota State find themselves as three of nine programs in the latest version of the CCHA along with Bowling Green, Ferris State, Lake Superior State, Northern Michigan, St. Thomas (fifth season at the Division I level), and Augustana (third season at the Division I level).

Next season, St. Thomas will leave the CCHA to become the tenth member of the National Collegiate Hockey Conference (NCHC).

So far this season, the NCHC has won nearly seventy percent of its non-conference games (62-29-2, .677) and has four teams (#3 North Dakota, #4 Western Michigan, #8 Denver, and #9 Minnesota Duluth) positioned in the top ten in the latest rankings.

The NCHC has been the premier hockey conference since its inception, and particularly over the past ten seasons. The nine teams in the league have gone 602-310-81 (.647) in non-conference action since the start of the 2014-15 season and sent fifteen teams to the Frozen Four (UND and Omaha in 2015, UND and Denver in 2016, Denver and Duluth in 2017, Duluth in 2018, Denver and Duluth in 2019, Duluth and St. Cloud State in 2021, Denver in 2022 and 2024, and Denver and Western Michigan in 2025 over that nine-year stretch (there was no national tournament in 2020). Conference members North Dakota (2016), Denver (2017, 2022, 2024), Minnesota Duluth (2018, 2019), and Western Michigan (2025) have won seven of the last nine national titles.

Turning our attention to this weekend’s matchup…

A half-point per game or better is my benchmark for solid offensive production, and Brett Larson’s squad has six lineup regulars who have achieved that level of success, including two – junior forward Tyler Gross (18-21-39) and sophomore forward Austin Burnevik (17-18-35) – averaging over a point per game. Other solid offensive contributors include junior forward Barrett Hall (10-18-28), senior defenseman Max Smolinski (6-12-18), sophomore defenseman Finn Loftus (4-12-16), and freshman defenseman Tanner Hendricks (2-3-5 in ten games).

North Dakota is certain to have nine players in the lineup this weekend who have met that same offensive threshold: senior forward Ellis Rickwood (7-19-26), senior forward Ben Strinden (14-14-28), freshman forward Will Zellers (14-9-23), sophomore forward Mac Swanson (6-15-21), freshman forward Cole Reschny (4-22-26), senior forward Dylan James (17-9-26), junior defenseman Jake Livanavage (5-19-24), junior defenseman Abram Wiebe (4-17-21), and freshman defenseman Keaton Verhoeff (6-12-18).

UND freshman forward Josh Zakreski (1-2-3 in six games played) is close to returning to the lineup.

St. Cloud State’s Tyson Gross and North Dakota’s Jake Livanavage are both strong contenders for the 2026 Hobey Baker Memorial Award.

Offensively, UND outpaces SCSU by a substantial margin. To this point of the season, North Dakota has scored 113 goals in 30 games (3.77 goals per game, 4th in the country), while St. Cloud State has managed 100 in 32 games (3.13, 24th).

The Fighting Hawks are fifth in the nation in shooting percentage at 11.5%. SCSU clocks in at 10.0%, good for 29th in the country. Both teams do an adequate job of getting the puck to the net, with UND averaging 32.8 shots on goal per game (12th) and the Huskies just behind at 31.2 shots on goal per contest (23rd).

There is an even greater difference on the defensive side.

Through thirty games, the Green and White have blocked 333 shots (11.1 per game), led by Bennett Zmolek with 42 and Jake Livanavage with 38. Zmolek has been in and out of the lineup over the past two weekends; his 42 blocks have come in just 24 games.

St. Cloud State has blocked 323 shots in its 32 games (10.1/game), with seniors Mason Reiners (39) and Max Smolinski (38) leading the way.

North Dakota’s defensive corps has provided plenty of production from the back end, already notching twenty goals and adding 66 assists in 208 combined games (0.41 points per game).

The nine St. Cloud State State blueliners to play this season have scored twenty goals and added 55 assists in 220 combined games (0.34 points/game). Aside from seniors Max Smolinski (6-12-18) and Cooper Wylie (3-10-13) and sophomore Finn Loftus (4-12-16), no SCSU defenseman has collected more than eight points.

For the Fighting Hawks, it’s been two juniors – Jake Livanavage (5-19-24) and Abram Wiebe (4-17-21) – and a freshman (Keaton Verhoeff (6-12-18).

Verhoeff is widely expected to go in the top three of the 2026 NHL Entry Draft, while Livanavage (4-24-28) and Wiebe (4-20-24) were two of UND’s top four point-getters a season ago.

Sophomore defenseman EJ Emery – a first round pick of the New York Rangers in the 2024 NHL Entry Draft – notched the first two goals of his collegiate career in a 5-2 win against Minnesota back in October and scored UND’s first goal last Saturday night against Miami.

Not only have North Dakota’s defensemen been producing offensively, first-year head coach Dane Jackson has also put together an impressive mix of defenders he can trust in any situation. As a unit, UND’s defensemen have allowed a total of just 693 shots on goal this season (23.1/game, 3rd-best in the country), while St. Cloud State has allowed 954 (29.8, 32nd).

St. Cloud State is allowing 3.00 goals per game this season (34th in the nation), while North Dakota is allowing just 2.13 (4th).

Normally I would say that the Fighting Hawks would be ill-advised to get into a specialty teams battle with the Huskies; this year, however, UND has slightly better overall numbers than St. Cloud State.

SCSU is a +14, with thirty power play goals scored (30 of 118, 25.4%, 9th in the country), 21 power play goals allowed (67 of 88, 76.1%, 49th), six shorthanded goals scored, and one shorthanded goal allowed.

UND is a +15, with 31 power play goals scored (31 of 111, 27.9%, 6th), eighteen power play goals allowed (79 of 97, 81.4%, 26th), six shorthanded goals scored, and four shorthanded goals allowed.

In the December series in St. Cloud, it was a mixed bag of results for North Dakota. On Friday night, UND went 1-for-3 with the man advantage and held the Huskies scoreless on their two power play opportunities but did surrender a shorthanded goal. In the rematch, North Dakota went 1-for-1 on the power play, held St. Cloud State to one power play goal on six attempts (including a major penalty), and scored a key shorthanded goal late in the third period.

On the goaltending side of things, St. Cloud State has seen two goaltenders split time roughly evenly, with sophomore Patriks Berzins playing much better than freshman Yan Shostak to this point in the season:

Berzins: 10-6-0, 2.83 goals-against average, .910 save percentage

Shostak: 6-10-0, 2.90 goals-against average, .899 save percentage

Shostak does have the only two shutouts for the Huskies this season, a 21-save performance against Vermont back on October 18th and a 42-save performance against Minnesota-Duluth on January 16th. In a rare back-to-back for the first-year netminder, Shostak gave up four goals on 28 shots the following night.

Berzins played for the Maine Black Bears last season, appearing in two games and earning one victory before transferring to St. Cloud.

For North Dakota, it’s been the younger netminder with the better of the results. Freshman Jan Spunar was splitting time with graduate transfer Gibson Homer to start this season, but Spunar began to earn more starts as the season went along.

Here’s how the two stack up:

Spunar: 15-3-0, 1.76 goals-against average, .922 save percentage, four shutouts

Homer: 8-4-0, 2.49 goals-against average, .894 save percentage

On the team side of things, I’m looking at two other important areas in this matchup…

UND far outpaces St. Cloud State in two key puck possession statistics:

North Dakota: 2nd in Corsi (58.3%) and 3rd in Fenwick (58.1%)
St. Cloud State: 33rd in Corsi (50.7%) and 35th in Fenwick (50.0%)

Corsi measures the share of shot attempts for each team at even strength, while Fenwick measure the share of unblocked shot attempts for each team at even strength.

The other key area to watch this weekend is the face-off circle. The Fighting Hawks are the nation’s sixth-best team on draws (54.2%), while the Huskies clock in at 53.3% (9th).

For UND, senior transfer Ellis Rickwood has been the go-to guy in all key situations, winning 275 of 450 (61.1%). Aside from Rickwood, it’s been two freshmen – Cole Reschny (225 of 405, 55.6%) and Ollie Josephson (209 of 378, 55.3%) – handling the majority of draws.

For SCSU, junior Tyson Gross (439 of 741, 59.2%) has been an absolute workhorse, while freshman Nolan Roed (231 of 427, 54.1%) has done an admirable job and junior Verner Miettinen (180 of 353) has been a steady third option.

After this weekend, North Dakota (3rd in the NPI used to seed the NCAA tournament) will travel to Kalamazoo to face the Western Michigan Broncos (4th) for the final two games of the regular season. SCSU will be idle.

St. Cloud State Team Profile

Head Coach: Brett Larson (7th season at SCSU, 153-113-22, .569)

National Rankings: NR/NR
NPI Ranking: 22nd
KRACH Rating: 164.8 (16th)

This Season: 16-16-0 overall, 8-11-1-2 NCHC (5th of 9 teams)
Last Season: 14-21-1 overall (missed NCAA tournament), 5-13-2-4 overall NCHC (8th)

2025-26 Season Statistics:

Team Offense: 3.13 goals scored/game – 24th of 63 teams
Team Defense: 3.00 goals allowed/game – 34th of 63 teams

Power Play: 25.4% (30 of 118) – 29th of 63 teams
Penalty Kill: 76.1% (67 of 88) – 49th of 63 teams

Key players: Junior F Tyler Gross (18-21-39), Sophomore F Austin Burnevik (17-18-35), Junior F Barrett Hall (10-18-28), Freshman F Nolan Roed (3-12-15), Freshman F Noah Urness (7-8-15), Sophomore F Gavin Thoreson (8-7-15), Senior D Max Smolinski (6-12-18), Senior D Cooper Wylie (3-10-13), Sophomore D Finn Loftus (4-12-16), Sophomore G Patrik Berzins (10-6-0, 2.83 GAA, .910 SV%)

North Dakota Team Profile

Head Coach: Dane Jackson (1st season at North Dakota, 23-7-0, .767)

National Rankings: #3/#3
NPI Ranking: 3rd
KRACH Rating: 474.0 (3rd)

This Season: 23-7-0 overall, 14-2-1-3 NCHC (1st)
Last Season: 21-15-2 overall (missed NCAA tournament), 11-8-4-1 NCHC (5th)

2025-26 Season Statistics:

Team Offense: 3.77 goals scored/game – 4th of 63 teams
Team Defense: 2.13 goals allowed/game – 4th of 63 teams

Power Play: 27.9% (31 of 111) – 6th of 63 teams
Penalty Kill: 81.4% (79 of 97) – 26th of 63 teams

Key Players: Freshman F Cole Reschny (4-22-26), Senior F Ben Strinden (14-14-28), Freshman F Will Zellers (14-9-23), Senior F Dylan James (17-9-26), Sophomore F Mac Swanson (6-15-21), Senior F Ellis Rickwood (7-19-26), Junior D Jake Livanavage (5-19-24), Junior D Abram Wiebe (4-17-21), Freshman D Keaton Verhoeff (6-12-18), Freshman G Jan Spunar (15-3-0, 1.76 GAA, .922 SV%, 4 SO)

By The Numbers

Last Meeting: December 6, 2025 (St. Cloud, Minnesota). St. Cloud tied the game 2-2 with less than nine minutes remaining and earned a power play shortly thereafter. Less than thirty seconds into the man advantage, UND’s Jake Livanavage potted a brilliant shorthanded goal to put the visitors on top. Exactly seven minutes later – with four seconds remaining – Livanavage scored into the empty net for good measure. SCSU outshot the visitors 37-25; North Dakota freshman netminder Jan Spunar made 35 saves. One night earlier, the teams traded blows, with Will Zellers’ third-period tally standing as the game-winner in a 4-3 Fighting Hawks victory.

Last Meeting in Grand Forks: December 14, 2024. North Dakota’s Jake Schmaltz was the overtime hero for the Green and White, potting the game-winner just over two minutes into the 3-on-3 portion of the contest. UND never led in regulation and needed a third-period tally by Sacha Boisvert knot the game at three and send the game to an extra session. One night earlier, UND won 2-0 behind a 24-save shutout from T.J. Semptimphelter.

A Recent Memory: March 16, 2021 (Grand Forks, ND). One night before St. Patrick’s Day, North Dakota enjoyed playing for the NCHC playoff title in front of a whole bunch of green. St. Cloud State led 2-1 after two periods, but the Fighting Hawks stormed back with four third-period goals – including three in the span of 122 seconds early in the final frame and an empty-netter to seal the 5-3 victory and the program’s first Frozen Faceoff championship. UND senior Jordan Kawaguchi and freshman Riese Gaber each had two goals and an assist.

Most Important Meeting: NCAA West Regional Final in Fargo, ND (March 28, 2015). North Dakota scored three unassisted goals over the final two periods of the hockey game to defeat St. Cloud State 4-1 in the West Regional Final and advance to the NCAA Frozen Four. Jimmy Murray got the Huskies on the board less than 90 seconds in to the hockey game, but that did nothing to quiet the partisan crowd of 5,307 at SCHEELS Arena. Four different players scored for UND, while Zane McIntyre made 19 stops to earn his 29th and final victory of the season.

All-Time Series: North Dakota leads the all-time series, 85-49-19 (.618), including a stellar record of 43-18-9 (.679) in games played in Grand Forks. The teams have been squaring off regularly since the 1989-90 season but have only met once in the NCAA tournament (2015).

Last Ten: UND holds a 6-1-3 (.750) edge in the last ten games between the schools, with a scoring advantage of 35-24 in those contests. North Dakota has only lost once in the last eleven games in this series, a 3-2 overtime defeat in the 2023 NCHC Frozen Faceoff (St. Paul, Minnesota). St. Cloud State’s last victory over UND in Grand Forks was on January 25th, 2019.

Game News and Notes

St. Cloud State is a perfect 10-0 this season when leading after twenty minutes and 11-2 when leading after the middle frame. North Dakota has outscored opponents 49-16 in third periods this season, including a scoring margin of 37-9 against conference foes. On nine occasions this season, UND has scored at least three goals in the final twenty minutes of regulation. SCSU’s early-February sweep at Arizona State (4-1, 4-3) was its first over a league foe this season. North Dakota has already swept Omaha (twice), SCSU, ASU, and Miami. Following the conclusion of the 2025-26 campaign, the National Hockey Center will undergo extensive renovations, with the width of the ice surface reduced from 100 feet (Olympic ice) to just 94 feet (hybrid ice). Nearly all NCAA Division I teams – including North Dakota – now compete on NHL ice surfaces (85 feet wide). Since SCSU began competing in the WCHA in 1990, the Huskies have made the national tournament sixteen times, with Frozen Four appearances in 2013 and 2021 (zero titles). Over that same stretch, North Dakota has appeared in the NCAA tourney 24 times, with eleven Frozen Fours and three national championships (1997, 2000, 2016). North Dakota (2015, 2016, 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2024) and St. Cloud State (2014, 2018, and 2019) have combined to win the regular season title in nine of the twelve seasons of the NCHC. The Huskies also won the last WCHA conference title in 2013.

The Prediction

Both teams have plenty to play for this weekend. North Dakota could clinch the Penrose Cup, while St. Cloud State could move up in the NPI rankings with good results. In recent history between these two teams, the first ten minutes of each game have been critically important, but this year’s version of the Fighting Hawks has shown tremendous will, incredible depth, and an ability to mount a comeback, no matter the opponent or situation. The Huskies are older and heavier than the home team; it will be interesting to see how physical these games become as the series progresses. I expect at least one of these games to go to overtime, with Dane Jackson’s crew possessing too many advantages to let either game slip away. UND 3-2 (OT), 4-2.

Broadcast Information

Both games this weekend will be broadcast live on Midco Sports/TSN2 and also available via webcast at NCHC.tv. Puck drop is scheduled for 7:07 p.m. Central Time on Friday, with a 6:07 p.m. start time on Saturday night. All UND men’s hockey games can be heard on stations across the UND Fighting Hawks Radio Network as well as through the iHeart Radio app.

Social Media

Keep up with the action live during all UND hockey games by following @UNDmhockey and @UNDInsider on X-Twitter. Fans can also read the action via Brad Schlossman’s live chat on the Grand Forks Herald website.

As always, thank you for reading. I welcome your questions, comments, and suggestions. Follow me on X-Twitter (@DBergerHockey) for more information and insight. Here’s to hockey!

#3 North Dakota (21-7-0 overall, 13-2-0-3 NCHC) hosts the #20 Miami RedHawks (17-9-2 overall, 5-8-4-1 NCHC) for a pair of NCHC games at Ralph Engelstad Arena this weekend. UND is in the driver’s seat for another league title and could clinch the Penrose Cup with perfect results tonight and tomorrow night.

It has come down to a three-team race for the Penrose Cup; the Fighting Hawks could secure the program’s seventh NCHC title with a sweep over Miami and two regulation losses each by Denver and Western Michigan.

North Dakota: 13-2-0-3 (42 league points) in 18 games played
Denver: 11-5-3-1 (40 league points) in 20 games played
Western Michigan: 10-5-2-1 (35 league points) in 18 games played

Here are the schedules for the top three NCHC teams over the final weeks of the regular season:

UND: vs. Miami, vs. St. Cloud State, at Western Michigan
Denver: at Omaha, OFF, vs. Arizona State
WMU: vs. Arizona State, at Colorado College, vs. UND

After last Saturday night’s victory over Minnesota Duluth, UND can finish no lower than third place in the NCHC standings.

Astoundingly, it has been more than ten years since the Miami RedHawks men’s hockey team put together a winning season. From the start of the 2015-16 season through last year, MU posted an abysmal combined record of 85-225-38 for a winning percentage of just .299. Miami had suffered twenty or more losses in each of its last eight full seasons (the RedHawks went 5-18-2 in the COVID-shortened 2020-2021 campaign).

Somehow, second-year head coach Anthony Noreen has turned things around in Oxford. The RedHawks find themselves ranked #20 nationally, and, at 17th in the NPI, with a realistic chance of making the NCAA tournament. After zero conference victories a year ago, MU already has five in regulation and four others in overtime this season.

What is the biggest difference with this year’s Miami squad? In a word, everything.

The RedHawks coaching staff completely rebuilt the roster, with only two defensemen (graduate student Nick Donato and sophomore Michael Quinn) and five forwards (sophomores John Emmons, David Grosek, and Casper Nassen and seniors Blake Messenburg and Brayden Morrison) returning. The other 21 players (twelve freshmen and nine transfers – from Alaska Anchorage, Boston University, Canisius, Harvard, Michigan State, Quinnipiac, and St. Thomas) are new to the program this year.

To be fair, there is a clear divide in Miami’s results this season:

Non-conference: 9-1-0 vs. Ferris State (NPI 57; three games), RPI (NPI 56; two), Lindenwood (NPI 36; two), RIT (NPI 34; one), Union (NPI 30; one), and Michigan Tech (NPI 18; one)

vs. Denver (NPI 11) and Western Michigan (NPI 4): 0-5-1-0

vs. ASU (NPI 35), CC (NPI 31), Omaha (NPI 39), and SCSU (NPI 19): 5-3-3-1

To this point in the season, Miami has not squared off against North Dakota (NPI 3) or Minnesota Duluth (NPI 10).

UND is nine years removed from its eighth national championship but has made the national tournament in just four of the past eight seasons. That track record – and some early playoff exits – led to a coaching change, and Dane Jackson is now leading the charge. Jackson and his staff have North Dakota positioned well for the Penrose Cup chase, the league playoffs, and a deep run in the NCAA tournament.

In the NCHC preseason poll, UND was picked to finish in third place (behind Western Michigan and Denver), while Miami was tabbed to finish last, where they finished each of the past five seasons.

When the National Collegiate Hockey Conference was formed, Miami appeared positioned to be a dominant program. Prior to the 2013-14 season (their inaugural campaign in the NCHC), the RedHawks had made eight consecutive NCAA tournament appearances, with consecutive Frozen Four bids in 2009 (2nd) and 2010 (3rd). Since joining the NCHC, Miami has just one NCAA tournament appearance (2015), and that ended quickly with a first-round loss to eventual national champion Providence.

Long-tenured head coach Enrico Blasi was fired after posting a fourth consecutive losing season in 2018-2019. Over that stretch of time, the RedHawks were 47-81-19 (.384). There was reason for optimism in Oxford when Chris Bergeron was hired; Bergeron took over the program after leading Bowling Green to six consecutive winning seasons, five consecutive years with twenty or more victories, and an NCAA tournament appearance in 2018-2019.

Bergeron was fired two seasons ago; he compiled a record of 35-116-16 (.257) in his five years at Miami and never won more than eight games in a season.

Even though UND has played a tougher schedule to this point in the season, the Fighting Hawks still far outpace the RedHawks in two key puck possession statistics:

Miami: 44th in Corsi (47.9%) and 41st in Fenwick (48.0%)
North Dakota: 3rd in Corsi (57.3%) and 4th in Fenwick (56.9%)

Corsi measures the share of shot attempts for each team at even strength, while Fenwick measure the share of unblocked shot attempts for each team at even strength.

To this point in the season, Miami has allowed 30.3 shots on goal per game (36th); North Dakota (23.6) is fourth in the nation in that category. The RedHawks put 28.3 shots on goal per game (43rd), while UND clocks in at 32.1 (17th). Not only that, but the Fighting Hawks are scoring 3.86 goals per game (3rd) and allowing just 2.18 (6th) ; MU has scored 3.18 per game (22nd) and allowed 2.79 (27th)

Another way to look at those numbers is that in the same number of games (28), UND has outscored opponents 108-61, while Miami’s scoring margin sits at 89-78.

As always, a key area to watch this weekend is the face-off circle. The Fighting Hawks are the nation’s 8th-best team on draws (53.7%), while the RedHawks clock in at just 46.0% (57th). It remains to be seen whether UND freshman center Cole Reschny (204 of 371 , 55.0%) will return to the lineup after suffering an injury last Saturday night at Duluth.

Last year, UND and MU only played two games, with North Dakota earning a December road sweep of the RedHawks (5-4 and 4-2). Friday’s opener was a wild affair which featured a three-goal third period comeback by the visitors. UND outshot Miami 14-3 in the final frame and 38-17 overall. In Saturday’s rematch, the teams were knotted 2-2 after two before Jackson Kunz and Jayden Perron scored just over five minutes apart to break the tie.

Two seasons ago, these two teams met six times, including a March NCHC playoff series in Grand Forks. North Dakota won all six games, with only one close contest among them (a 5-4 overtime victory at Miami in February). The other five scores: 6-4, 5-1, 4-1, 5-1, and 7-1.

Remarkably, when North Dakota traveled to face to RedHawks back in January of 2023 (three seasons ago), the two teams were both at the bottom of the league standings. Two years ago, UND and Miami were at opposite ends of the spectrum: the Fighting Hawks were Penrose Cup champions, while the RedHawks won just ONE conference game all year (a 4-3 home victory over Western Michigan on January 13th, their last win of the season). Let me say that again: over the past seven weekends of hockey (one series each against every league foe), MU did not win a game (0-13-1, with a shootout loss at Denver the only bright spot). Over those fourteen games, Miami was outscored 58-26, an average margin of defeat of 4.14 – 1.86.

At the risk of repeating myself, Miami has already earned 24 league points this season (5-8-4-1) in eighteen NCHC contests; over the past three seasons, the RedHawks earned just 25 points in 72 games (4-55-0-13).

Over the first twelve completed regular seasons of the NCHC, Miami has averaged a seventh-place finish among the nine (formerly eight) conference teams (8th, 2nd, 5th, 7th, 8th, 8th, 7th, 8th, 8th, 8th, 8th, and 9th), with a combined league record of 63-192-33 (.276).

By comparison, North Dakota has finished 2nd, 1st, 1st, 4th, 4th, 5th, 1st, 1st, 1st, 5th, 1st, and 5th, for an average finish just under second place, with a combined league record of 169-90-29 (.637). No other league has collected as many conference wins as UND.

So far this season, the NCHC has won nearly seventy percent of its non-conference games (62-29-2, .677) and has four teams (#3 North Dakota, #4 Western Michigan, #8 Denver, and #10 Minnesota Duluth) positioned in the top ten in the latest rankings.

The NCHC has been the premier hockey conference since its inception, and particularly over the past twelve seasons. The nine teams in the league have gone 602-310-81 (.647) in non-conference action since the start of the 2014-15 season and sent fifteen teams to the Frozen Four (UND and Omaha in 2015, UND and Denver in 2016, Denver and Duluth in 2017, Duluth in 2018, Denver and Duluth in 2019, Duluth and St. Cloud State in 2021, Denver in 2022 and 2024, and Denver and Western Michigan in 2025 over that nine-year stretch (there was no national tournament in 2020). Conference members North Dakota (2016), Denver (2017, 2022, 2024), Minnesota Duluth (2018, 2019), and Western Michigan (2025) have won seven of the last nine national titles.

After this weekend, North Dakota (3rd in the NPI used to seed the NCAA tournament) will host St. Cloud State (19th) before traveling to Kalamazoo to face the Western Michigan Broncos (4th) on the last weekend of the regular season. Miami will host Minnesota Duluth (10th) before traveling to Omaha (39th).

Miami Team Profile

Head Coach: Anthony Noreen (2nd season at Miami, 20-37-5, .363)

National Rankings: #20/#20
NPI Ranking: 20th
KRACH Rating: 143.5 (17th)

This Season: 17-9-2 overall; 5-8-4-1 NCHC (5th)
Last Season: 3-28-3 overall (missed NCAA tournament), 0-20-0-4 NCHC (9th)

2025-26 Season Statistics:

Team Offense: 3.18 goals scored/game – 22nd of 63 teams
Team Defense: 2.79 goals allowed/game – 27th of 63 teams

Power Play: 13.5% (15 of 111) – 56th of 63 teams
Penalty Kill: 81.1% (86 of 106) – 28th of 63 teams

Key players: Freshman F Kocha Delic (9-11-20), Freshman F David Deputy (14-5-19), Freshman F Ilia Morozov (7-9-16), Graduate F Maximillion Helgeson (10-9-19), Junior F Matteo Giampa (9-11-20), Junior F Doug Grimes (7-8-15), Sophomore F Ryan Smith (8-8-16), Sophomore D Vladislav Lukashevich (questionable for this weekend’s series; 2-16-18), Sophomore D Michael Quinn (4-13-17), Sophomore G Matteo Drobac (16-9-2, 2.58 GAA, .913 SV%, 3 SO)

North Dakota Team Profile

Head Coach: Dane Jackson (1st season at North Dakota, 21-7-0, .750)

National Rankings: #3/#3
NPI Ranking: 3rd
KRACH Rating: 477.2 (3rd)

This Season: 21-7-0 overall, 13-2-0-3 NCHC (1st)
Last Season: 21-15-2 overall (missed NCAA tournament), 11-8-4-1 NCHC (5th)

2025-26 Season Statistics:

Team Offense: 3.86 goals scored/game – 3rd of 63 teams
Team Defense: 2.18 goals allowed/game – 6th of 63 teams

Power Play: 28.3% (30 of 106) – 6th of 63 teams
Penalty Kill: 81.1% (77 of 95) – 28th of 63 teams

Key Players: Freshman F Cole Reschny (questionable for this weekend’s series; 4-21-25), Senior F Ben Strinden (14-14-28), Freshman F Will Zellers (14-9-23), Senior F Dylan James (17-7-24), Sophomore F Mac Swanson (5-15-20), Senior F Ellis Rickwood (7-18-25), Junior D Jake Livanavage (4-19-23), Junior D Abram Wiebe (3-16-19), Freshman D Keaton Verhoeff (6-11-17), Freshman G Jan Spunar (14-3-0, 1.76 GAA, .924 SV%, 3 SO)

By The Numbers

Last Meeting: December 7, 2024 (Oxford, Ohio). North Dakota scored two goals in the third period to turn a 2-2 tie into a 4-2 road victory and a sweep of the homestanding RedHawks. Friday’s opener was a wild affair which featured a three-goal third period comeback by the visitors. UND outshot Miami 14-3 in the final frame and 38-17 overall.

Last Meeting in Grand Forks: March 16, 2024. Normally it is difficult to end a team’s season in the first round of the NCHC playoffs, but UND made quick work of Miami, besting the RedHawks 5-1 and 7-1. MU put plenty of pucks on net (56 in the two-game series), but North Dakota netminder Hobie Hedquist was up to the challenge, allowing only a single goal each night. UND’s Jackson Blake and Riese Gaber both scored on back-to-back nights.

Most Important Meeting: March 6, 2015 (Oxford, OH). North Dakota claimed the Penrose Cup with a 2-1 road victory over Miami. UND fell flat the following night, losing 6-3 in the final game of the regular season.

Last Ten: UND has won each of the past ten contests between the teams, outscoring Miami 53-19 over that stretch of games.

All-time Series: North Dakota leads the all-time series 33-8-4 (.778), including a sparkling 15-3-2 (.800) record in games played in Grand Forks. The teams first played in 1999 (Badger Showdown, Milwaukee, WI).

Game News and Notes

MU has not made the national tournament since 2015, their second season in the NCHC. Miami head coach Anthony Noreen played his collegiate hockey at UW-Stevens Point. North Dakota has outscored opponents 47-16 in third periods this season, including a scoring margin of 35-9 against conference foes. On nine occasions this season, UND has scored at least three goals in the final frame. Miami is 7-5-0 on the road this season; North Dakota is 10-4-0 at home. UND has done well on Friday the 13th in recent memory, with a record of 7-2 in its past ten games scheduled on Jason Voorhees Day (the tenth scheduled game was to be the league playoff opener against Colorado College on Friday, March 13th, 2020; that game – and the remainder of the season – was cancelled due to COVID-19). One of those two spooky scary losses was a 6-3 home defeat at the hands of Miami on Friday, January 13th, 2017. Green Hawks are preferable to RedHawks.

Highlights

Friday night is “Kids Takeover Night” at the Ralph; it is my honor and privilege to help some of Phoenix Elementary School’s finest students lead our fans in the singing of the Star Spangled Banner.

On Saturday night, UND legend Zach Parise (49-67-116 in 76 collegiate games from 2002-04) will skate “One More Shift”. The first 2500 fans will receive a special commemorative player card; those in attendance should also note a special Zach Parise collection on display in the main lobby.

The Prediction

The Fighting Hawks are deeper, more talented, and more experiened than the visitors. Specialty teams can sometimes be the great equalizer, but Miami’s power play has not been clicking (fifteen power play goals all season). MU is 7-1-0 in one-goal games this season, and they have exhibited a different level of compete and a frustrating, tight-checking brand of hockey. I expect the opener to be close, with the home team running away with the rematch. UND 3-2, 5-2.

Broadcast Information

Both games this weekend will be broadcast on Midco Sports and also available online at NCHC.tv. All UND men’s hockey games can be heard on stations across the Fighting Hawks Radio Network as well as through the iHeart Radio app. Puck drop is set for 7:07 p.m. Central Time on Friday and 6:07 p.m. Central on Saturday.

As always, thank you for reading. I welcome your questions, comments, and suggestions. Follow me on X-Twitter (@DBergerHockey) for more information and insight. Here’s to hockey!

Where were you last Halloween?

Many of us were in our seats at Ralph Engelstad Arena back on October 31st, witnessing North Dakota trailing Minnesota Duluth 3-1 late in the third period. Not only was the situation dire, but the first month of the season had been a mixed bag…

Yes, UND had put together a home-and-home sweep of St. Thomas (6-2, 5-2), but there were two splits to follow: a home series against Minnesota (5-2, 1-5) and a road series at Clarkson (2-5, 1-0).

First-year head coach Dane Jackson was about to see his team drop its conference opener at home and fall to 4-3 on the young season.

Enter Mac Swanson. The sophomore forward brought the home team within one with just under four minutes to go in the hockey game. And with just over 70 seconds remaining, senior captain Ben Strinden scored an extra attacker goal to send the game to overtime.

Yes, it is true that the Bulldogs picked up the extra league point with a fluky goal less than a minute into the extra session, but it is also true that UND’s comeback was a sign of things to come.

The following night, North Dakota put together a complete effort and dismantled Minnesota Duluth by a final score of 5-1.

Beginning with that game back on November 1st, the Fighting Hawks have gone 16-3-0 and find themselves in first place in the NCHC, three points clear of second-place Denver (with two games in hand) and seven points ahead of Western Michigan.

Minnesota Duluth was in the mix for the Penrose Cup as recently as a month ago but has lost four straight games (vs. Western Michigan and at Denver) and is now in a battle for the final home ice spot for the first round of the league playoffs.

This weekend, #3 North Dakota (20-6-0 overall, 12-2-0-2 NCHC) travels to take on #10 Minnesota Duluth (17-11-0 overall, 6-6-2-4 NCHC) at Amsoil Arena.

UND is nine years removed from its eighth national championship but has made the national tournament in just four of the past eight seasons. That track record – and some early playoff exits – led to a coaching change, and Dane Jackson is now leading the charge.

In the NCHC preseason poll, UND was picked to finish in third place (behind Western Michigan and Denver), while the Bulldogs were tabbed to end up in sixth (ahead of Omaha, St. Cloud State, and Miami). With the addition of St. Thomas to the NCHC (and a new schedule format) beginning in 2026-2027, the Fighting Hawks and Bulldogs will meet for four regular-season games each year.

After an impressive run of eight straight NCAA tournament appearances from 2015 to 2022 (including two national titles), UMD missed the NCAAs in each of the last three seasons and sputtered to a combined record of just 41-60-9 (.414). After 25 seasons behind the Bulldog bench, some were asking whether head coach Scott Sandelin was on the hot seat.

Back in October, those questions were largely answered, as Duluth got off to an 8-1 start (including a road sweep of the Golden Gophers). With nine losses in their last fifteen games, however, many are checking the temperature again.

Thankfully for fans of the Bulldogs, Scott Sandelin does still have his squad in line for an NCAA tournament appearance (currently NPI 8).

UMD also boasts one of the top two forward lines in the country, a trio of second-year players:

Sophomore Max Plante: 20-20-40 in 28 games played

Sophomore Zam Plante: 11-24-35 in 28 games played

Sophomore Jayson Shaugabay: 9-26-35 in 28 games played

These three forwards (jersey numbers 10, 17, and 27) have scored 40 of UMD’s 94 goals and collected well over half of the team’s points (110 of 161).

Of the three forwards, Max is the largest at 5-11 and 180 pounds. A key for North Dakota will be to win faceoffs in their own end, play a hard, physical game, and pay attention to line matchups – not just the defensive pair but all five skaters on the ice.

The NCHC has been the premier hockey conference since its inception, and particularly over the past ten seasons. The nine teams in the league have gone 570-291-86 (.647) in non-conference action since the start of the 2014-15 season and sent fifteen teams to the Frozen Four (UND and Omaha in 2015, UND and Denver in 2016, Denver and Duluth in 2017, Duluth in 2018, Denver and Duluth in 2019, Duluth and St. Cloud State in 2021, Denver in 2022 and 2024, and Denver and Western Michigan in 2025 over that nine-year stretch (there was no national tournament in 2020). Conference members North Dakota (2016), Denver (2017, 2022, 2024), Minnesota Duluth (2018, 2019), and Western Michigan (2025) have won seven of the last nine national titles.

So far this season, the NCHC has won nearly seventy percent of its non-conference games (62-29-2, .677) and has four teams (#3 North Dakota, #4 Western Michigan, #8 Denver, and #10 Minnesota Duluth) positioned in the top ten in the latest rankings.

Western Michigan did the entire league a favor by defeating both #11 Boston College and #13 Wisconsin at the Holiday Faceoff in late December Those results added to the league’s already-impressive results against the other five conferences in college hockey.

The NCHC has been the premier hockey conference since its inception, and particularly over the past twelve seasons. The nine teams in the league have gone 602-310-81 (.647) in non-conference action since the start of the 2014-15 season and sent fifteen teams to the Frozen Four (UND and Omaha in 2015, UND and Denver in 2016, Denver and Duluth in 2017, Duluth in 2018, Denver and Duluth in 2019, Duluth and St. Cloud State in 2021, Denver in 2022 and 2024, and Denver and Western Michigan in 2025 over that nine-year stretch (there was no national tournament in 2020). Conference members North Dakota (2016), Denver (2017, 2022, 2024), Minnesota Duluth (2018, 2019), and Western Michigan (2025) have won seven of the last nine national titles.

After this weekend, North Dakota (3rd in the NPI used to seed the NCAA tournament) will host Miami (19th) and St. Cloud State (25th) before traveling to Kalamazoo to face the Western Michigan Broncos (4th) on the last weekend of the regular season. Duluth (8th) will be off next weekend before a road series at Miami and a home series against Colorado College (30th).

The Bulldogs played ten games at the Division I level in the early 1930s but didn’t really get started until after World War II. Its first nineteen seasons after the war were played as an independent before joining the WCHA in 1965. It would take eighteen seasons – and a head coach named Mike Sertich – before UMD would make the NCAA tournament, and Sertich would take them there in three consecutive seasons:

1982-1983: National Quarterfinalist

1983-1984: 2nd Place (National Runner-Up)

1984-1985: 3rd Place (Consolation Champion)

In 1984, Duluth was tantalizingly close to winning its first title. The Bulldogs defeated North Dakota 2-1 in overtime (behind a goal by Bill Watson) to advance to the championship game, where they would face Bowling Green in the longest NCAA final in Division I men’s hockey history. Gino Cavallini scored for the Falcons in the fourth overtime session, ending a game that took over 97 minutes of game action to complete.

And, perhaps, fittingly, UMD would find themselves locked in overtime contests in 1985 as well. The Bulldogs took RPI to three overtimes in the national semis before falling 6-5. Back in those days, there was still a third-place game, and so Duluth faced Boston College (which had also played three overtimes in its semifinal) for no reason at all. Of course, that game also went to overtime, with UMD defeating the Eagles 7-6.

After that three-year splash on the national scene, Mike Sertich would manage just one more tournament appearance (1993) over the final fifteen years of his head coaching career before giving way to Scott Sandelin, who has guided the Bulldogs to the NCAAs eleven times in his 24 completed seasons behind the Bulldog bench. It is worth noting, however, that Duluth has had two consecutive losing seasons (28-40-6) overall and has missed the last two NCAA tourneys.

Even though UMD has been a more frequent participant over the past two decades than at any other point in team history, Duluth and North Dakota have only met twice in the national tournament (1984 and 2021). UND had a chance to meet the Bulldogs in the 2011 title game but fell to the Wolverines in the semifinals 2-0 (with an empty-net goal) despite outshooting Michigan 40-20.

Before the Wolverines were forced to withdraw from the 2021 tournament, UMD and Michigan were set to square off in the national tournament for the first time since that overtime thriller in St. Paul.

North Dakota was down 2-0 to Minnesota Duluth with just 101 seconds remaining in the third period of the 2021 NCAA Midwest Regional final at Scheels Arena in Fargo, North Dakota. The Bulldogs had built their lead with two goals just 80 seconds apart early in the final frame on a pair of fluky plays. A partially blocked shot off the stick of Jackson Cates fluttered past Fighting Hawks’ netminder Adam Scheel, and a broken stick at the blue line sent Cole Koepke in alone on a breakaway. UND scored two extra-attacker goals in the final two minutes of regulation to send the game long into the night. Minnesota Duluth outlasted North Dakota 3-2 in five overtimes to advance to the NCAA Frozen Four. The three goaltenders involved in the contest combined to make 114 saves.

With three national titles in a nine-year stretch, the Bulldogs could certainly be considered the best team of the 2010s; North Dakota’s eight national titles have been spread out across the decades: 1959, 1963, 1980, 1982, 1987, 1997, 2000, and 2016.

The Wolverines have won nine NCAA titles but only two since 1964, those coming in 1996 and 1998. For that reason, I consider North Dakota (eight titles) and Denver (ten titles) the two best programs in NCAA Division I men’s ice hockey history.

Last season, North Dakota and Minnesota Duluth squared off four times…

On November 8th and 9th, 2024, UND traveled to Duluth and swept the homestanding Bulldogs 7-3 and 4-1. North Dakota chased highly-touted netminder Adam Gajan on two consecutive nights after scoring five goals on twenty shots in 34:18 of game action in the opener and besting that with two goals on eight shots in 5:38 on night two.

The Bulldogs made the return trip to Grand Forks on February 21st and 22nd, 2025. In Friday’s opener, North Dakota scored an empty-netter to escape with a 4-2 victory after UMD drew within one with two goals in the middle frame. Adam Gajan and UND’s T.J. Semptimphelter each made thirty saves.

In Saturday’s rematch, UND went 4-for-6 with the man advantage, including three second-period goals during the same five-minute power play after UMD’s Jack Smith was penalized and given a game misconduct for checking from behind. Gajan (nine saves, one goal allowed) and Klayton Knapp (thirteen saves, five goals allowed) each played in the rematch.

Gajan, a sophomore who competed in the 2023 and 2024 World Junior U-20 Championships for his native Slovakia, was a second-round pick of the Chicago Blackhawks in the 2023 NHL Draft. He played in 21 games last season, with a 7-12-1 record, a goals-against average of 3.33, a save percentage of .885, and one shutout.

Fellow first-year goalie Klayton Knapp – from Sylvania, Ohio – split time with Gajan a season ago, appearing in sixteen contests, with a record of 6-6-2, a 2.67 GAA, a .907 SV%, and one shutout.

After last season, Knapp transferred to Lindenwood, and Gajan has played nearly every minute in net for Scott Sandelin’s squad, with a goals-against average of 2.29, a save percentage of .905, and two shutouts.

Unfortunately for the Bulldogs, Adam Gajan is competing in the Winter Olympics with his native Slovakia, and it’ll be sophomore Ethan Dahlmeir (2-0-0, 3.10 GAA, .894 SV% in 135 minutes of action) or untested freshman Cole Sheffield (no stats) this weekend.

One key area to watch this weekend is the face-off circle. To this point in the season, the Fighting Hawks have won 53.0% of faceoffs, good for 12th in the country. The Bulldogs are currently sitting at 49.7% (33rd).

For UND, senior transfer Ellis Rickwood (who spent his first three collegiate seasons with Clarkson) has been a huge addition up the middle, winning 225 of 370 (60.8%). Three freshmen – Cole Reschny (193 of 348, 55.5%), Ollie Josephson (164 of 314, 52.2%), and Jack Kernan (77 of 140, 55.0%) have performed admirably as well.

For the Bulldogs, graduate student Kyle Gaffney (229 of 400, 57.3%) has been the most effective, although sophomore center Zam Plante (306 of 639, 47.9%) has seen more action in the dot.

The Bulldogs (32.3% efficiency) and Fighting Hawks (28.6%) boast two of the nation’s top four power play units. Minnesota Duluth balances that with an equally-effective penalty kill (87.6%, 3rd), while North Dakota has struggled a bit (80.2%, 32nd).

Despite those numbers, UND leads in goals scored per game (3.92 – 3.36) and goals allowed per game (2.19 – 2.50). I attribute those numbers to North Dakota’s roster depth, puck possession metrics, and goaltending.

Nearly a third of Duluth’s goals this season (32 of 94) have been scored with the man advantage. For North Dakota, the numbers are more in balance (28 of 102).

With five points this weekend (or three points and some help), UND can clinch home ice for the first round of the NCHC playoffs. As a reminder, each NCHC regulation victory is worth three points, while an overtime win (3-on-3 or shootout) is worth two and any overtime loss worth one.

Minnesota Duluth Bulldogs

Head Coach: Scott Sandelin (26th season at UMD, 486-419-103, .533)

National Rankings: #10/#10
NPI Ranking: 8th
KRACH Rating: 304.4 (6th)

This Season: 17-11-0 overall, 6-6-2-4 NCHC (4th)

Last Season: 13-20-3 overall (missed NCAA tournament), 7-11-3-3 NCHC (7th of 9 teams)

2025-2026 Season Statistics:

Team Offense: 3.36 goals scored/game – 17th of 63 teams
Team Defense: 2.50 goals allowed/game – 18th of 63 teams

Power Play: 32.3% (32 of 99) – 1st of 63 teams
Penalty Kill: 87.6% (78 of 89) – 3rd of 63 teams

Key players: Sophomore F Max Plante (20-20-40), Sophomore F Jayson Shaugabay (9-26-35), Sophomore F Zam Plante (11-24-35), Sophomore F Callum Arnott (10-14-24), Senior F Scout Truman (10-3-13), Sophomore D Ty Hanson (8-19-27), Sophomore D Adam Kleber (2-7-9), Freshman D Grayden Siepmann (5-6-11), Sophomore G Ethan Dahlmeir (2-0-0, 3.10 GAA, .894 SV%)

North Dakota Team Profile

Head Coach: Dane Jackson (1st season at North Dakota, 20-6-0, .769)

National Rankings: #3/#3
NPI Ranking: 3rd
KRACH Rating: 492.3 (3rd)

This Season: 20-6-0 overall, 12-2-0-2 NCHC (1st)
Last Season: 21-15-2 overall (missed NCAA tournament), 11-8-4-1 NCHC (5th)

2025-26 Season Statistics:

Team Offense: 3.92 goals scored/game – 3rd of 63 teams
Team Defense: 2.19 goals allowed/game – 6th of 63 teams

Power Play: 28.6% (28 of 98) – 4th of 63 teams
Penalty Kill: 80.2% (69 of 86) – 32nd of 63 teams

Key Players: Freshman F Cole Reschny (4-21-25), Senior F Ben Strinden (14-12-26), Freshman F Will Zellers (13-8-21), Senior F Dylan James (15-7-22), Sophomore F Mac Swanson (4-13-17), Senior F Ellis Rickwood (6-18-24), Junior D Jake Livanavage (4-18-22), Junior D Abram Wiebe (3-12-15), Freshman D Keaton Verhoeff (6-11-17), Freshman G Jan Spunar (13-2-0, 1.73 GAA, .923 SV%, 3 SO)

By The Numbers

Last Meeting: November 1st, 2025 (Grand Forks, ND). One night after UND mounted a furious two-goal comeback in the final four minutes of regulation, it was all Green and White in the rematch. North Dakota senior captain Ben Strinden – who score an extra attacker goal to even the score in Friday’s opener – notched four assists in the 5-1 victory. UND outshot Minnesota Duluth 38-20, including 16-7 in the final frame.

Last Meeting in Duluth: November 9, 2024. The final score read UND 4, UMD 1, but it was much closer than that. North Dakota had a brilliant start to the game, scoring two goals on eight shots in the opening six minutes and chasing Adam Gajan from the contest. After that, the two teams played relatively even and traded power play tallies before an empty-netter from Jackson Kunz put the game away. In Friday’s opener, it took 35 minutes for the Fighting Hawks to chase Gajan from the net; he allowed five goals on twenty shots in a 7-3 North Dakota victory. Former UMD forward Anthony Menghini – now on the other side of the rivalry – scored three power play goals in the third period for the Bulldogs; all three were assisted by Jayson Shaughabay.

Most Important Meeting: March 27, 2021 (Fargo, ND). North Dakota was down 2-0 to Minnesota Duluth with just 101 seconds remaining in the third period of the 2021 NCAA Midwest Regional final at Scheels Arena in Fargo, North Dakota. The Bulldogs had built their lead with two goals just 80 seconds apart early in the final frame on a pair of fluky plays. A partially blocked shot off the stick of Jackson Cates fluttered past Fighting Hawks’ netminder Adam Scheel, and a broken stick at the blue line sent Cole Koepke in alone on a breakaway. UND scored two extra-attacker goals in the final two minutes of regulation to send the game long into the night. Minnesota Duluth outlasted North Dakota 3-2 in five overtimes to advance to the NCAA Frozen Four. The three goaltenders involved in the contest combined to make 114 saves.

The Meeting That Never Was: Both teams advanced to the 2011 NCAA Frozen Four at Xcel Energy Center (St. Paul, Minnesota). UND could not get past Michigan, falling 2-0 despite outshooting the Wolverines 40-20. In the other national semifinal, Minnesota-Duluth defeated Notre Dame 4-3 and rode that momentum to the title game. The Bulldogs took the Wolverines to overtime before senior forward Kyle Schmidt scored the game winner and earned UMD their first national championship. North Dakota won two of the three games against Duluth that season, outscoring Scott Sandelin’s team 11-5.

All-time Series: UND leads the all-time series, 162-90-11 (.637), including a 69-46-6 (.595) advantage in games played in Duluth. The teams first met in 1954, with North Dakota winning the first ten games between the schools by a combined score of 72-16. UMD’s first win over the Fighting Sioux (a 3-2 road victory on December 18th, 1959) did not sit well with the defending national champions. UND defeated Duluth 13-2 the following night.

Last Ten: North Dakota is 9-1-0 (.900) in the last ten games between the teams, with last October’s overtime defeat the only blemish on the record. The combined score of the last ten contests is 45-16 in favor of the Fighting Hawks. North Dakota has won seven straight games in Duluth; Minnesota Duluth’s last home victory over UND was more than six years ago (January 24th, 2020). Six of the last ten games in this series were played in Grand Forks.

Game News and Notes

Both head coaches this weekend are alumni of the University of North Dakota; Dane Jackson (1988-1992) and Scott Sandelin (1982-86) both played for UND under John “Gino” Gasparini. North Dakota junior forward Anthony Menghini played his first two seasons at Duluth, scoring twenty goals and adding nine assists in 72 games. UND’s 162 victories over the Bulldogs are the second-most against any opponent in program history.

The Prediction

I expect a fast, physical weekend of hockey out of this matchup, with plenty of talent on display. An early lead would be beneficial for UND, as they seem to play with much more purpose and poise when they aren’t chasing the game. Of course, specialty teams are always a factor, and the Fighting Hawks do not want to get into a power play contest with this Bulldogs squad. On the road and without last line change, Dane Jackson will need to leverage his three advantages in this series: forward depth, a more talented defensive corps, and proven goaltending. I can’t imagine North Dakota escaping with all six points, but UND has lost only twice on the road this season (10-2-0) and seem to be catching Duluth at the right time, so anything is possible.

I expect something similar to the series in Grand Forks, with a tight Friday contest and a runaway victory in the rematch. UMD 4-3 (OT), UND 5-1.

Broadcast Information

Both games this weekend will be broadcast on Midco Sports and also available online at NCHC.tv. All UND men’s hockey games can be heard on stations across the Fighting Hawks Radio Network as well as through the iHeart Radio app. Puck drop is set for 7:07 p.m. Central Time on Friday and 6:07 p.m. Central on Saturday.

Social Media

Keep up with the action live during all UND hockey games by following @UNDmhockey and @UNDInsider on Twitter. Fans can also read the action via Brad Schlossman’s live chat on the Grand Forks Herald website.

As always, thank you for reading. I welcome your thoughts, comments, and suggestions.