DENVER-- Senior captain
Colton Poolman scored in the 3-on-3 overtime in a game that officially ends in a 1-1 tie with No. 2/1 Denver, but gives visiting North Dakota a second point in the National Collegiate Hockey Conference standings Friday night at Magness Arena.
The script played out just as it has in the last three seasons with the Pioneers with the 10th game decided by either one goal or tied in the past 14 contests between these rivals.
After a scoreless first period,
Jasper Weatherby scored his third power play goal in as many games to open the scoring midway through the second period.
Jordan Kawaguchi's point shot was redirected by Weatherby in the slot and found its way past Magnus Chrona for a 1-0 lead at the 10:58 mark of the middle frame.
The lead would be short-lived, however, as Denver's Kohen Olischefski slipped one past
Adam Scheel in a scramble in front just 57 seconds later to tie the score.
Both teams had multiple Grade A chances to claim the lead in a fantastic up-and-down hockey game between two of college hockey's heavyweights.
Adam Scheel made a handful of huge saves, including several on breakaway chances, to keep the game at 1-1. Scheel would make 30 stops on the night--the third-most of his career-- and remains unbeaten in his last six games.
After the teams did not score in the first overtime session, they began a five-nimute frame of 3-on-3 hockey with any winning team grabbing an extra point in the league standings. Poolman made good on it, corralling a loose puck in the slot and firing it inside the crossbar above Chrona's blocker side to electrify a heavily-green-clad crowd that was in that end of the listed sold-out rink.
The teams conclude the series Saturday at 8:07 p.m. Central.
NOTES: The last UND player to score a PPG in three consecutive games was Rhett Gardner, who turned the trick from Nov. 17-24 last season ... The last player to make it four was Shane Gersich, who had a string of four straight games with a PPG from Nov. 12-25, 2017... Jordan Kawaguchi has either scored or assisted on UND's first goal in six of this season's 10 games and five of the last six ... He leads UND with 14 points (3g, 11a) ... North Dakota came into the game with the NCAA's fifth-best penalty kill unit and was 4-for-4 tonight to improve to 31-33 (93.9%) ... Scheel has allowed one goal or fewer in seven of 10 games this season ... 10 of the last 14 games between these teams have either been tied or decided by a single goal, dating back to the 2016-17 regular season ... SIx of those games went to overtime ... Scheel recorded his third career game with 30+ saves.
