TAMPA, Fla. -- It wasn't hard to feel it, the mounting here-we-go-again vibe spreading through Amalie Arena late in the NCAA Frozen Four semifinal between North Dakota and Denver.
North Dakota, 0-for its last six national semifinal appearances, had seen a 2-0 third-period lead evaporate and was one more shot away from another empty trip to the national tournament.
Denver's tying goal midway through the frame was especially cruel, as Grand Forks native Matt VanVoorhis' centering pass deflected off the stick of UND captain Gage Ausmus and into the Fighting Hawks' net.
With that single bounce of the puck, the ghosts of recent Frozen Fours started to whisper and a familiar sense of dread took over the largely Green and White crowd.
Not on the UND bench, however.
“We've come too far, men,” shouted UND head coach Brad Berry to his players on the bench.
With sudden-death overtime and all of the heartbreak that can come with it a mere 60 seconds away, the Fighting Hawks' vaunted “CBS” line put the ghosts back in their graves. Sophomore Nick Schmaltz grabbed a loose puck in front of DU goalie Tanner Jaillet and slid it into an empty net with 57 seconds remaining, giving the Fighting Hawks a 3-2 lead.
Rhett Gardner added an empty-netter with three seconds left for a 4-2 win and a berth in Saturday's national championship game against top-ranked Quinnipiac.
“We went out there and made a play and won the game,” said Schmaltz matter-of-factly.
He added that the Denver rally in the third period did not faze his teammates.
“I thought we got away from our game a bit in the third period. When you do that against a good team, they're going to make you pay and Denver did that to us. I thought we regrouped pretty well.”
Schmaltz's winning goal was a combination of execution and good fortune.
After Brock Boeser won the offensive zone faceoff to Drake Caggiula at the top of the circle, Caggiula's shot was blocked. Boeser grabbed the loose puck in the slot and threw it at the net, but it too was blocked. However, it slid right to Schmaltz, who had gotten behind the DU defensemen and headed straight to the front of the net where he was able to tuck it around Jaillet.
“There was no panic on the bench,” said UND head coach Brad Berry. “Even though the game was going the wrong way the first 10 minutes of the third period, they caught their breath and said, 'We've got this.'”
The late-game dramatics may have been hard to envision after Caggiula had staked the Fighting Hawks to a 2-0 lead on a pair of second-period goals.
Boeser found him streaking alone behind the DU defense on the first goal, and Caggiula beat Jaillet to the blocker side to open the scoring 1:03 into the period.
His second goal came five minutes later after he stripped DU's Trevor Moore in the faceoff circle and wired a puck just inside the near post for a 2-0 lead.
“I just tried to hide behind a couple defenders and pick his pocket,” said Caggiula, whose 22nd and 23rd goals extended his career-long point streak to 12 games.
UND was then tasked with doing something it has done perfectly since November 2013: protect a lead after 40 minutes. But Will Butcher's goal off of a DU faceoff win 2:50 of the third period, followed by VanVoorhis' tying goal, threw a wrench into things for the Fighting Hawks.
“Our message after the second period was to keep the foot on the gas,” said Berry. “The only problem was we stopped making plays for a little bit. Being two goals up, you're playing against a very good team – they're going to make plays. It's a learning lesson for us tonight. You've got to keep the foot on the gas and keep making plays.”
Ultimately, it was Schmaltz's play that sealed the win, but that UND remained in position to win the game late was due in large part to the team's penalty kill. UND was a perfect 4-4 for the game and ended up going 23-23 in six games this season against the Pioneers.
The biggest of those 23 was a successful kill of a Trevor Olson elbowing minor with 6:25 left in regulation.
“Special teams are huge this time of year,” said Schmaltz. “We gave them four opportunities tonight and I thought our guys battled up when we went a man down. You've got to do that this time of year. We had guys blocking shots all over the place.”
Schmaltz was right. North Dakota blocked an incredible 27 Denver shot attempts, compared to 10 by the Pioneers.
“The penalty kill did a great job. It won us the game,” said Berry. “It's a shot-blocking mentality we had; everyone willing to get in front of a shot. I love it because that's the kind of player I was. It's kind of touching to my heart, seeing a guy get in front of a shot. When you see guys who aren't apt to do it doing it, that's contagious.”
Cam Johnson was the backbone once again for North Dakota, stopping 21 of 23 shots including several Grade A chances.
Now, North Dakota can finally turn its attention to the program's first championship game appearance since 2005 and bid for UND's first national championship in 16 years.
Senior forward Coltyn Sanderson said memories of his team's last two Frozen Four appearances, both semifinal losses, remained fresh.
“We didn't want to have to go through that again in the locker room,” said Sanderson. “Maybe it wasn't our best performance, but there was never any doubt in our minds that we were going to keep battling and keep clawing to get to Saturday night.”
Said classmate Caggiula: “As a senior class, we want to leave this program with a national championship.”
And leave the ghosts in their graves once and for all.
Notes: Saturday's game is scheduled for 8 p.m. Eastern on ESPN2 … Junior forward Luke Johnson left the game with an injury in the second period and did not return … Caggiula's first of two goals gave UND its first lead in a Frozen Four game since 2007, a stretch that covered 284 minutes, 18 seconds … Berry is bidding to become the only first-time head coach to win a Division I men's hockey championship. He can also join Jeff Sauer (Wisconsin, 1983) as the only coaches to win a national title in their first year as a school's head coach … UND's “CBS” line contributed three goals and three assists and was a plus-9, while DU's “Pacific Rim” line was held without a point and was minus-5.
