Minnesota Duluth coach Scott Sandelin, who has led the Bulldogs for longer than many of his current players have been alive, has been at it long enough to know the opportunity in front of his team this weekend is a rare one.
The first round of this season’s NCHC playoffs will see UMD travel to in-state rival St. Cloud State for a best-of-three series that begins Friday night. The Bulldogs are already plenty familiar with St. Cloud’s Herb Brooks National Hockey Center, mainly because they were just there.
UMD took three of four regular-season games against the sixth-ranked Huskies and split with them last weekend in St. Cloud. Eight UMD players had at least a point apiece in their 4-3 win Friday, and the Bulldogs got goals from three different players Saturday in a 4-3 overtime loss.
There’d be a lot to unpack there if hockey coaches, Sandelin included, didn’t famously like to talk about how the proverbial slate gets wiped ahead of the playoffs. That could be just as well for the Bulldogs, who at 23rd position in the PairWise Rankings may need to sweep its way through the NCHC playoffs in order to make the NCAA tournament.
“We had another good series there and would’ve liked to have won the last game or whatever, and give them credit because they battled back, but all of that doesn’t matter right now,” Sandelin said. “It’s a new season, you start clean, and somebody has to win two (games) to move on.
“They’re in a different situation because they’re going to be in the (NCAA) tournament, where for us, I call it having one freebie: you get one game Friday where you know you’re playing Saturday, and after that, for us, every game is life and death. That’s OK, though, because that’s what playoffs usually are. The further you go, those one games at a time, you’re playing for your season.”
UMD and SCSU might both have different looks this weekend, with a combined three defensemen potentially back in the picture. Bulldogs freshman Aiden Dubinsky missed last weekend’s trip to St. Cloud but is likely to be in the lineup Friday, while Sandelin is planning to see SCSU’s Jack Peart and Ondrej Trejbal return.
Duluth has also been without junior forward Blake Biondi out since mid-December with a season-ending shoulder injury. Otherwise, Sandelin is happy with his team’s health at this point.
“For this time of the year, we’re good,” he said. “We have some guys banged up, but that’s the way it should be because it means you’re playing the right way. We’re as good as we can be.”
The first round of this year’s NCHC playoffs have drawn together some interesting pairings, and not least for a UMD team in danger of failing to reach the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2014. Some say the NCHC is down this season as compared to before, but Sandelin rejects that notion.
“I think there’s still great parity,” he said. “Obviously Denver had a great year, and with Western (Michigan), Pat (Ferschweiler) did a great job with his team. I think there are some teams that have separated themselves, but if you look at every weekend, including last weekend, with how tight the games are, it’s a fine line between winning and losing in this league. That’s the way it has always been, so I don’t see it being any different.
“I feel some teams have gotten better, and for us, it has been a roller coaster and we’ve got a young team, but I like the growth in some areas of our team, and we’ve had some good wins against some really good teams. Anybody can beat anybody in our league, but you’ve got to bring it every night, and little stretches or lapses, you have to eliminate those as best you can.”
