Icers' weekend split key for CCHA Tournament seeding

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Friday’s bus ride home from Big Rapids wasn’t fun for the No. 12 MSU hockey team.

The Spartans had just played one of their worst games of the season, losing 4-1 to No. 14 Ferris State. MSU looked completely out of sync, and after the game, head coach Rick Comley called out his team’s work ethic.

Maybe last weekend’s bye week was to blame, or maybe it was the new line combinations Comley tried at the start of the game.

Either way, the pressure was on MSU to earn the victory on Saturday night to keep the two teams tied in second place in the CCHA standings.

Surely it wasn’t the Spartans’ best performance on Saturday night. But it was enough to get the job done, defeating the Bulldogs 3-2 on a late game-winning goal from junior forward Dustin Gazley.

MSU now needs only one point in its final weekend of the season to secure a first-round bye in the CCHA Tournament.

The weekend split was huge for the Spartans, who were winless in four games entering Saturday and had scored two goals in their last three games.

“I think this young team has felt the pressure a little bit,” Comley said. “We haven’t played as sharp the last couple weeks. It’s a grind right now. (Friday) night was a tough game, and (Saturday) we had a few people really struggle. But we had other people really pick it up. We need to win games, and we found a way to win this one.”

From the first shift of Saturday’s game, it was clear the Spartans were out to avenge Friday’s sloppy loss. MSU came out of the gates with the jump it was lacking Friday night and junior forward Andrew Rowe netted the first MSU goal five minutes into the game.

Ferris State responded with a power-play goal to tie up the game. But, in his first game of the season, senior forward Jay Sprague unexpectedly gave MSU the lead midway through the second period.

The Bulldogs notched the score at two thanks to a shorthanded goal near the end of the middle frame.

An outstanding individual effort by sophomore forward Daultan Leveille eventually led to the MSU game-winning goal. Leveille was knocked to the ice, yet somehow managed to stickhandle and keep possession of the puck in MSU’s offensive zone. A quick give-and-go play to Rowe gave Leveille space to fire a cross-ice pass to Gazley, who was wide open and ripped the puck into the net.

Ferris State had several quality scoring chances near the end of the game, but MSU was able to hold on.

It wasn’t a pretty game for the Spartans. But it was a win.

“It wasn’t our best game by any means and probably not theirs,” Comley said. “But at times, it was really good. There were times, we played very well at their goal line. I think we played well enough to score five or six (goals) tonight.”

The back-and-forth action of Saturday’s game left both teams feeling pretty evenly matched.

“We are disappointed, obviously, with the end result,” Ferris State head coach Bob Daniels said. “We come out of the weekend saying the two teams are pretty even.”

MSU and Ferris State close out the regular season with home-and-home series against the bottom two teams in the CCHA. The Spartans will take on Bowling Green, while the Bulldogs will square off against Western Michigan.

If both teams earn sweeps in the last weekend and remain tied for second place in points, Ferris State will win the tiebreaker, as they outscored MSU 6-4 this weekend.

Although Bowling Green has struggled this season, they took five-of-six points from Notre Dame last weekend. So the Spartans (18-11-5 overall, 13-8-5 CCHA) are being careful not to overlook the Falcons.

“Every weekend is a new struggle,” sophomore goaltender Drew Palmisano said. “(Bowling Green) is going to be tough. They have something to prove to everyone, that they don’t belong where they are down in the standings. We aren’t going to let them try and spoil our season either, though.”

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