GRAND FORKS, N.D. (Ralph Engelstad Arena) - The No. 2 University of North Dakota men’s ice hockey team netted three-first period power-play goals and did not look back dropping Bemidji State University, 5-1, in non-conference play Saturday afternoon in front of a capacity (11,842) crowd at Ralph Engelstad Arena in Grand Forks, N.D. Chris VandeVelde and T.J. Oshie paced UND scoring three points apiece while Ryan Duncan’s two goals led all scorers.

Bemidji State was whistled for four penalties in the first stanza opening the door for a potent Fighting Sioux power-play unit to get the home team on the board. UND got three goals in 91 seconds to put it up 3-0 with over five minutes to go in the period and the Beavers would never recover.

“Coming in against a team like this in this building, obviously going down 5-on-3 and then having to come back and kill off four more minutes can really deflate and demoralize a team, there is no question,” commented BSU head coach Tom Serratore in the post-game press conference.

“It was tough from the get go,” continued Serratore. “It reminded me of when we first began playing at the Division I level. We just didn’t have intensity in our game and that’s not Beaver Hockey.”

North Dakota head coach Mark Hakstol added, “The power-play goals were the difference. Our power-play was very sharp tonight. Along with that, in the first two periods, I thought we did a very nice job 5-on-5 against a very good team.”

The teams used the first 10 minutes of the game feel each other out, but when BSU’s Cody Bostock (Jr., Salmon, Arm, British Columbia) was sent to the box for cross-checking at the 12:12 mark and Matt Read (Fr., Ilderton, Ontario) earned five minutes and a game misconduct for checking from behind 20 seconds later, it put the Fighting Sioux on a 5-on-3 advantage for 1:40. The Sioux capitalized on the opportunity.

Twenty-seven seconds into the two-man advantage, UND’s Taylor Chorney took a shot from the point. Although Matt Climie (Sr., Leduc, Alberta) made the save, Robbie Bina was on the doorstep to cleanup the rebound sliding the puck past the BSU goaltender on the third try.

The goal opened the floodgates for UND. The Fighting Sioux would add two more goals during the next 1:31 building a 3-0 lead before the Read penalty expired.

Duncan put UND up 2-0 at the 13:36 mark when he took a pass from Chris VandeVelde and beat Climie five-hole on the breakaway. Fifty-four seconds later (14:30), Matt Watkins netted his seventh goal of the season lifting one past Climie top shelf on a one-time laser form the left face off circle.

UND dominated play for a majority of the second period out shooting BSU 18-4 with 11 shots coming on four Fighting Sioux’s power-play opportunities. The Beavers failed to register a shot on goal until the 9:28 mark and would get just three more in the period.

BSU would, however, claim a power-play goal of their own in the second. Travis Winter (Jr., St. Cloud, Minn.) found Riley Weselowski (Sr., Pilot Mound, Manitoba) with a pass from behind the net and the blue liner banked a slap shot form the right face off dot off the left pipe and into the back of the net for his second marker of the season.

But UND would reclaim its three-goal lead before the end of the frame when Duncan potted the Fighting Sioux’s fourth power-play goal of the afternoon on a cross-ice one-timer from Oshie. The play marked the second time the duo had teamed up in the game and the third assist for Oshie on the day

The Fighting Sioux would add an empty-net goal in the game’s final minutes (18:52) to push the score to 5-1 where it would stay.

The Beavers were out shot in the game 41-18 giving up 21 shots on UND’s 10 power-play opportunities. The Fighting Sioux went 4-for-10 on the man advantage while BSU was 1-for-5.

Climie was stellar in net for BSU. Despite allowing the four UND power-play goals, he recorded 36 saves in 58:19 between the pipes. His record moves to 12-7-3 on the seasons.

UND’s J.P. Lamoureux posted 17 saves as he improved to 20-8-2 on the season.

The victory helps UND improve its lead over BSU in the all-time series to 14-1-1 while BSU is now 0-10-1 versus the Fighting Sioux in Grand Forks, N.D.

Bemidji State, now 14-14-3 overall with a 11-4-3 mark in College Hockey America play, and the Fighting Sioux (20-8-2/16-7-1 WCHA) will be back in action again tomorrow. The finale of the two-game series is set for a 3:37 p.m. face off at the Ralph Engelstad Arena.

--bsu--