![\"Bruckler\"](\"http:\/\/www.uscho.com\/images\/headshots\/20012002\/uw_b_bruckler.jpg\")
<\/p>\nBruckler was stretched to the limit — literally — by the Warriors (1-3) before his shutout went into the books. From one post the other and back again, he sprawled late to keep Wayne State off the board.<\/p>\n
“I couldn’t sprawl out any more,” said Bruckler, who made 25 saves.<\/p>\n
He didn’t have to. He made the initial save every time and saw his defensemen clear everything else.<\/p>\n
“It’s another sign we had a great team effort,” Bruckler said.<\/p>\n
It’s tough to argue, though, that the Warriors didn’t get what they were looking for in Madison. Friday’s 5-4 victory will go down as one of the building blocks of a program in just its third season.<\/p>\n
But after winning the first one, Warriors coach Bill Wilkinson couldn’t help being just a bit on the greedy side. Coaches will tell you during the week that their goal is just one win on the road, but…<\/p>\n
“If you had asked me coming in, I would say yes [to that],” Wilkinson said. “After last night, I’d say no. I’d rather have lost the second game tonight but played well.”<\/p>\n
Wisconsin looked lost Friday night in searching for a late tying goal that didn’t materialize.<\/p>\n
An even-strength goal, a 5-on-3 goal and 5-on-4 goal later, the Badgers on Saturday had the spark that wasn’t there in the series opener in jumping out to a 3-0, first-period lead.<\/p>\n
The power-play goals — by Alex Leavitt and Matt Doman — came 25 seconds apart and helped the Badgers do what they couldn’t in the opener: take complete command.<\/p>\n
The odd-man rushes the Badgers allowed one night before were history. They didn’t take as many shots on goal (35, compared to 54 in the opener) but didn’t need to.<\/p>\n
Leavitt’s slap shot from the top of the right circle eluded Wayne State goaltender Dave Guerrera (30 saves) as he struggled to gain his footing. Doman followed up with a goal off a turnover behind the Warriors’ net for the three-goal advantage.<\/p>\n
Combined with Winchester’s second goal of the night, for a 5-0 lead in the third period, the Badgers were 3-for-3 on the power play. They held Wayne State scoreless in seven attempts.<\/p>\n
“Our special teams right now are very poor,” Wilkinson said. “We have to work on improving those, but we will. It’s just a matter of someone stepping to the forefront and getting it done.”<\/p>\n
Bruckler got it done for the Badgers, and in circumstances a goaltender hates. He got his new red and white pads — replacing the blue ones he brought over from Austria last year — on Tuesday and didn’t have much time to break them in.<\/p>\n
Bruckler played in a manner, though, that negated that situation. He flashed the talent that made him a highly coveted prospect last season.<\/p>\n
“He showed us why we selected him as a goaltender,” Wisconsin coach Jeff Sauer said. “He wasn’t our first choice — I’ll be up front about that. In the end, I’m very pleased with the one we got.”<\/p>\n
Bruckler said he didn’t allow thoughts of a shutout creep into his mind until he saw two minutes on the clock, but even then he had to endure one final Warriors power play.<\/p>\n
He got plenty of help in the form of blocked shots and cleared rebounds.<\/p>\n
“He got a shutout in his first game,” Winchester said. “That’s pretty special.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
His team’s two-man disadvantage having lapsed, Bernd Bruckler finally found time to relax a bit Saturday night. The Wisconsin freshman goaltender, having made a pair of key saves to preserve a shutout in his first collegiate game, leaned back, rested his head on the top of his goal and let out a sigh of relief. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":22374,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2250"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2250"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2250\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22374"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2250"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=2250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}