Senior goaltender Jeff Lerg watches as Ferris State celebrates winning the shootout Friday evening at Munn Ice Arena. Lerg made 44 saves in the 2-2 tie.
In years past, a tie with Ferris State would not be looked upon as a successful outcome for the MSU hockey team.
But in the midst of a tough season — one that includes winless streaks of 11 and, currently, six games — any point is a good point for the Spartans.
Despite losing a 2-0 lead for the second straight game and losing the shootout 2-1, MSU head coach Rick Comley will certainly settle for the point the 2-2 tie brings his team.
“Right now, win or lose, I have to go into that locker room and try to take the good out of what happened,” Comley said. “It’s the only thing I can do right now. Everybody we have is dressed. We don’t have four lines, fatigue becomes a factor at times in the game as they wear out. I thought there were an awful lot more good things than bad things for sure.”
The Spartans (7-18-4 overall, 4-14-3-2 CCHA) got rolling early, scoring on the power play less than three minutes into the game.
Freshman defenseman Matt Crandell took a shot from the point that was deflected in the slot by freshman forward Daultan Leveille. The puck slipped through Ferris State goaltender Pat Nagle and rolled toward the goal line. The puck, which was headed in regardless, was knocked in while on the line by sophomore forward Andrew Rowe.
From there, the rest of the period belonged to senior goaltender Jeff Lerg.
With the Spartans serving a bench minor for too men many on the ice, Lerg made a huge cross-crease diving save to keep MSU ahead. Later in the period, he made a sliding save on Ferris State’s Brendan Connolly, stopping him at point-blank range.
“He’s doing everything he possibly can,” Comley said of Lerg. “He made so many good saves and he has to right now.”
Again, the Spartans struck early in the second period, as sophomore forward Joey Shean scored his first career goal on a deflection near the side of the net off a shot from freshman defenseman Brock Shelgren.
The 2-0 lead would not last long, though, as exactly six minutes later, Ferris State forward Justin Menke found himself wide open in the slot following the completion of a Bulldogs power play and buried the puck past Lerg to cut the deficit in half.
With the Spartans on their heels at several points in the period, Lerg stepped up his game even further, making 20 of his 44 saves in the stanza.
He made his most impressive save of the night following an MSU turnover, as Ferris State’s Derek Graham walked in alone on a mini-breakaway. However, Lerg threw out a perfectly timed poke check to knock the puck away.
“He was slowly skating in,” Lerg said. “I saw him shift his shoulder to the right side, so I threw my stick out to my right and he went right into it. It was a good play.”
With under a minute to go in the period, Lerg again robbed Connolly with a nice glove save.
With a tenuous 2-1 lead heading into the third period, it appeared the Spartans would recapture the all-important two goal lead.
Leveille broke in on a 2-on-1 with sophomore forward Dustin Gazley. He waited and made a perfect pass to Gazley, whose shot was partially stopped by Nagle and sat in the crease for what seemed like an eternity before being cleared away by a defender.
Nagle made 30 saves on the night.
“Gazley had a great chance,” Comley said. “If that goes in it’s 3-1, but that kind of shot isn’t going in right now.”
If it wasn’t clear that the Spartans weren’t getting the breaks they were early in the game, it was after the Bulldogs (11-11-7, 8-8-5-2) tied the game at two with 7:29 remaining.
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Menke came down the left side and sent a shot toward the net where teammate Cody Chupp was sandwiched between freshman defenseman Tim Buttery and senior defenseman Brandon Gentile. The puck went through Buttery’s legs and was tipped beautifully by Chupp over Lerg’s glove and into the top corner.
“It was in three guy’s feet and then it just came flying out,” Lerg said. “It was a nice tip. They just threw it to the net and got a stick on it.”
Neither team would find the winner in the final minutes, nor would it come in overtime, so the teams would battle for the extra point in the shootout.
Senior forward Matt Schepke would put the Spartans up 1-0 on MSU’s second shot, but Chupp tied it for the Bulldogs on their final shot, sending it to sudden death. Both freshman forward Ben Warda and Rowe would be stopped by Nagle, setting up Graham for a chance at redemption against Lerg.
Graham skated in and got Lerg down and slid the puck through Lerg’s legs just before Lerg could get his stick down to cover up the hole, sending the Bulldogs back home with the extra point as the battle for home ice in the CCHA playoffs gets hotter.
“Ferris is a tough team to play against, their style makes it difficult,” Comley said. “You’d like to do more offensively, but right now we don’t. I didn’t see the peaks and valleys we’ve seen in some of the games. I thought the effort was more consistent.”
The two teams will meet again at 7:05 p.m. Saturday at Ewigleben Ice Arena in Big Rapids.
“I thought we played really well, especially in the first period,” Warda said. “We’re struggling right now but it’s coming together. We looked a lot better today and I thought we should’ve won that game, but we’re definitely playing a lot stronger.”
