By Virg Foss
GRAND FORKS, N.D. -- The University of North Dakota men's hockey team is breathing the rarefied air from the top of the mountain today.
The Fighting Sioux (16-7-1 WCHA, 19-8-2 overall) moved into a tie for first place in the Western Collegiate Hockey Association race with Colorado College tonight with a 4-1 victory over visiting Denver to complete a weekend sweep of the Pioneers.
The sweep, UND's first at home against Denver since February 1999, enabled the Sioux to tie idle Colorado College for first place in the WCHA race with 33 points. The Tigers, though, have six league games remaining to four for the Sioux.
The red-hot Sioux also extended their nation-best unbeaten streak to 11 games (10-0-1) by limiting Denver to 17 shots on net. The victory also moved UND into a tie for second place in the PairWise rankings with New Hampshire, behind Michigan. The PairWise rankings mimic the process the NCAA uses to select its 16-team tournament field in March.
North Dakota also clinched home ice for the WCHA playoffs, which begin March 14. The top five teams in the WCHA regular season earn home ice for the opening round best-of-three series.
Junior center T.J. Oshie (Warroad, Minn.), junior wing Andrew Kozek (Sicamous, British Columbia) and freshman center Evan Trupp (Anchorage, Alaska) all had a goal and an assist for the Sioux while sophomore defenseman Chay Genoway (Morden, Manitoba) added two assists.
The Sioux scored all the goals they would need in a span of 117 seconds late in the opening period.
Finley sucked up a long rebound kicked to the left point by Denver goalie Peter Mannino and knuckleballed his long shot past Mannino's stick side at 13:04 of the opening period for Finley's fourth goal of the season.
Less than two minutes later, Trupp got a stick on a shot from the right point by Genoway on UND's first power play to deflect the puck past Mannino for his eighth goal of the season at 15:01 and a 2-0 Sioux lead.
Kozek's fourth goal of the weekend and 13th of the season came at 11:46 of the second period after Oshie won a faceoff in the Denver zone and pushed the puck clear to Kozek to make it 3-0.
Denver's Brian Gifford scored at 13:14 of the second period to ruin a shutout bid by Sioux goalie Jean-Philippe Lamoureux (Grand Forks, N.D.), who finished with 16 saves.
But Oshie matched Kozek for the team lead in season goals (13) with 90 seconds left in the game when he lofted a backhand from his own blue line into an empty net to make it 4-1. It came about a minute after Denver had pulled Mannino for a sixth attacker on a 6-on-4 power play. Oshie's shorthanded goal was North Dakota's first empty-net goal of the season.
UND and Lamoureux have now given up just one goal in eight of their last 10 games to punctuate the hot streak the Sioux are riding.
"I thought we really played strong in the first (period),'' associate head coach Cary Eades said. "We were able to maintain the momentum from our comeback win Friday night. We had solid, solid play through the first period. We were able to roll the depth of our team. It showed as far as energy was concerned and build the lead to 3-0. We were able to withstand their goal in the second and play a very smart 60 minutes of hockey.''
The Sioux step outside WCHA play next weekend, hosting Bemidji State in a nonconference Saturday-Sunday series. "This was a great weekend for us, a building weekend,'' Eades said. "We look forward to getting back at it against Bemidji State.''
Oshie's goal traveled nearly about 110 feet, half of it through the air, before settling in the middle of the net.
"It was actually a pretty lucky shot. I thought,'' Oshie said. "I had an idea where the net was going to be, I didn't even take a look. I probably could have been called for the hook (hooking penalty) there, but luckily I didn't get a call there. I turned around and threw it as hard as I could with my backhand. Fortunately it went in.''
Meanwhile, Denver head coach George Gwozdecky will be looking for answers on his airplane ride home today after UND put an exclamation point on the Pioneers' struggles of late.
Denver is now 2-6-1 in calendar year 2008 after posting a 17-4 record before the new year.
"Our top two lines really struggled to generate chances,'' Gwozdecky said. "Part of it was that I thought North Dakota did a great job of forechecking us, and really taking us out of a lot of transition. Our defensemen as a group really struggled against North Dakota's pressure.''
It was the second time in three weeks the Pioneers have been swept on the road in the WCHA after losing twice at Minnesota State-Mankato three weekends ago.
The Pioneers had great trouble generating much offense, in part because of leading scorer Brock Trotter leaving school a week ago to sign with the Montreal Canadiens and an abdominal injury to Tyler Ruegsegger, another key offensive cog.
Between the two, they had 23 of Denver's 85 goals --nearly 33 percent of the offense -- coming into the series against the Sioux.
"Any time you take two of your top players out of your lineup, it's going to affect you,'' Gwozdecky said. "If you take (Ryan) Duncan and (T.J.) Oshie out of their lineup, it's probably going to affect them. They were pretty good this weekend.''
Despite being swept, Denver (19-10-1 overall, 13-8-1 WCHA) remained in third place in the WCHA, six points behind Colorado College and North Dakota.
SIOUX NOTES: Kozek led the Sioux in shots on goal with five, followed by Genoway with four and Oshie, Duncan and Matt Watkins (Jr., Aylesbury Saskatchewan) with three each . . The Sioux were 1-of-4 on the power play with three total shots, Denver 0-of-4 with two shots . . . Each team drew 17 penalties for 61 minutes from referee Marco Hunt . . . UND's Kyle Radke (Sr., Bashaw, Alberta) and Denver's Brandon Vossberg were ejected for fighting at the end of the second period, meaning both will sit out the next game each team plays.
