GRAND FORKS, N.D. -- The University of North Dakota Fighting Hawks completed their third straight home sweep of the season Saturday night, beating the Miami (Ohio) RedHawks 5-4 to move into sole possession of first place in the National Collegiate Hockey Conference just one week into the season.

The home win, the ninth in a row at Ralph Engelstad Arena over the last two seasons, is the second longest since the new Ralph opened, the longest being 12 games from 2016 into the 2017-18 season.

Once again junior wing Jordan Kawaguchi was the offensive key for the Fighting Hawks (7-1-1 overall), 2-0 in the NCHC) with a goal and two assists. He had a 6-point weekend after assisting on UND's first three goals Friday night in a 7-1 win.

Junior center Colin Adams scored twice, giving him four goals for the season, doubling his total of all last season. Linemate Grant Mismash added an assist to give the Adams-Mismash-Kawaguchi a 6-point game and a 10-point weekend.

Miami (2-5-2, 0-2) had a big push-back after Friday's whipping. The RedHawks outshot UND 7-2 in the last period and pulled to within 5-4 at 12:15 on a power play goal by defenseman Derek Daschke just seconds after UND had killed the front half of a 5-on-3 power play for 62 seconds. 

But UND goalie Adam Scheel (19 saves) made two key stops in the closing minute when Miami pulled goalie Ryan Larkin for a sixth attacker.

"When you blow a team out on Friday like we did,'' Adams said, "you know they're going to have a tough day of it today, watch film and try to get better and fix their mistakes. We knew it was going to be a tough one, that it wasn't going to be like last night.''

He was right. Miami answered opening goals by Adams and Jasper Weatherby in the first period within two minutes of each goal as the RedHawks' Ryan Savage and Phil Knies responded for a 2-2 tie.

But Kawaguchi and Westin Michaud shoved UND's lead to 4-2 after one period with goals and Adams pushed it to 5-2 at 7:50 of the second period. Yet Miami battled back, getting goals from Chaz Switzer in the second period and from Dashke in the third to pressure the Fighting Hawks.

"We expected them to come out hard, and they did,'' Adams said. "They gave us a little push-back today.''

But the RedHawks couldn't give UND a defeat even though Scheel struggled a bit, giving up more than one goal for just the third time this season in his nine starts.

Adams credits his success this year to the calendar. "I think it's being older, the confidence level, and knowing that I can play in this league and make an impact. And Bubs (coach Brad Berry) having confidence in me, putting me out there on the ice has really helped me grow as a player.''

Adams has yet to be on the ice this season when the opposing team scored with teams at even strength and his plus-minus rating of plus 13 leads the team. He also led the team to a 40-23 edge in faceoffs Saturday, winning 11 draws out of 14 tries.

"I think out team grew a little bit this weekend again,'' Berry said. "We've got to move it to the rear-view mirror and focus on Denver.''

The Pioneers, who have been ranked No. 1 in the nation, are UND's next opponent in Denver at Magness Arena next weekend. 

Berry gave credit to Scheel. "I'm sure he probably wanted one of them back,'' Berry said, "but I thought he was solid in a lot of areas. He's been called upon the whole year to make key saves at key times. That's the last thing I'm going to say as far as his performance tonight, because I thought it was solid. Anytime you win a game against a good team like that, you're goaltender has to play well. I thought he did.''

Weatherby, UND's top faceoff man this season, won 9 of 14 draws and added his second goal of the season on a prime feed in the slot from Westin Michaud.

"Last year guys were kind of holding their sticks a little tight and this year we're just playing hockey,'' Weatherby said. "We've got a lot of good guys on the roster. Every night, we've got a belief that the pucks going to go in the net. We work hard, and good things happen.''

No doubt. The early first-place standing in the NCHC and a No. 6 position in the Pairwise Rankings is an encouraging sign for a team that has missed the NCAA tournament two years in a row.

Game notes: Kawaguchi, Adams and Michaud were named the three stars of the game by media voting, in that order . . . UND was 1-5 on the power play with 11 shots, Miami 1-6 with 9 shots....It was only the second power-play goal UND has given up this season in 29 attempts for the foe . . Adams and Shane Pinto led UND in shots on goal with 4 . . . The win was the 97th in Berry's career....former UND coach Dean Blais, now retired and living in Arizona, was at the game and welcomed with warm applause from the crowd of 10,775 when shown on the Jumbotron Scoreboard. Blais won two NCAA titles (1997 and 2000) in his tenure as coach at UND . . Adams, Mismash and Kawaguchi all finished at plus-3 . . . 10 of UND's 19 skaters had at least one point after 12 of them did on Friday.

Virg Foss is in his 15th season of reporting on UND home games exclusively for UNDsports.com. He covered UND hockey for 35 seasons for the Grand Forks Herald until his retirement from newspapers. This is his 50th season of covering UND hockey.