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Sports desk: 647-3336
sportsdesk@umich.edu
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Icers score 16 goals in stellar weekend
By Uma Subramanian
Daily Sports Writer
As Jeff Reynaert flung his stick to the ice,
you could almost feel his frustration.
Bill Trainor's even-strength goal, late in
the third period of Saturday's game, was the
15th Michigan tally the Western Michigan
netminder had allowed in two days.
Reynaert was furious and probably rightly
so - after all, the Wolverines obliterated his
Broncos 7-2 on Friday and 9-3 on Saturday.
By doing so, in many ways, Michigan
righted its offensive ship, which had been
sailing through murky waters. The Wolver-
ines had only scored seven goals in its previ-
ous three games. In the two-day scoring
barrage, nearly every Michigan forward
recorded at least one point, making for a
complete team performance. Mike Comrie
found the back of the net three times, and
Mark Mink, Mark Kosick, Geoff Koch, Scott
Matzka and Jed Ortmeyer each had two
goals apiece.
"This definitely is a huge boost our confi-
dence as a team," said Michigan forward
Andy Hilbert, who scored a goal and four
points on the weekend. "We were struggling
a little bit to get some goals. But it all comes
with better defense and it definitely feels
good for the puck to go in the net and for
everyone to get their share of points."
The victories could not have come at any
better time for the Wolverines. With only five
games left in the regular season, the race for
the CCHA crown will come down to the
wire. Currently, with a 17-5-1 CCHA record,
Michigan is in the driver's seat, but Michigan
State and Northern Michigan are close on its
heels.
Regardless of what happens the next two
weekends, with Saturday's victory the
Wolverines clinched home-ice for the first
round of the CCHA tournament.
But perhaps even more significant than the
victories themselves was the nature of the
wins. All season long, the Michigan coaches
have preached the importance of peaking at
the right time. Peaking, as Michigan coach
Red Berenson defined it, is getting every
player to play together and push themselves
one step farther in the best interest of the
DAVID KATZ/Daily
Mark Mink was one of five Wolverines who scored at least
two goals in Michigan's weekend sweep over Western.
team.
On Saturday, the Wolverines, who are 22-
7-1 overall, took a giant step closer to arriv-.
ing at that plateau.
Coming off Friday's prolific win, Michi-
gan came out firing on Saturday, outshooting
the Broncos (8-13-3 CCHA, 9-16-3 overall)
18-7 in the first period. Reynaert was stellar
in that period, making 17 saves, but his suc-
cess in the first 20 minutes was misleading.
By 13 minutes into the second period, the
Wolverines had amassed a 4-1 lead.
But as things seem to go in college hock-
ey, no lead is ever entirely secure. The Bron-
cos mounted a resurgent attack of their own,
pulling to within one goal.
Early in the third period, with the Broncos
surging, defenseman Dave Huntzicker
brushed a loose puck off the goal line to pre-
vent the tie.
From that moment on, it was all Michigan.
The Wolverines blasted five shots past
Reynaert in that stanza, including an improb-
able off-balance score from Andy Hilbert
that found the back of the net while he was
being catapulted into the boards with 10 sec-
onds left on the clock - sweet icing on a
delicious cake.
"This was the game we wanted," Berenson
said. "The game was on the line when it was
4-3, no question. That's how the game goes.
You'll see a scoring chance missed at one
end and sure enough it'll go in at the other
end. But I liked the feeling. I liked our team."
Hilbert and linemates Comrie and Jed Ort-
meyer accounted for 12 points in the series.
That line was a new creation by the Michi-
gan coaches, instituted for the first time in
Friday's game. Comrie and Hilbert have
played together consistently since Thanksgiv-
ing, but Ortmeyer has rotated through the
lines.
With this combination, the coaches may
have found the perfect and most effective tn-
fecta.
Playing on the top line "is great," Ortmey-
er said. "You just have to work hard. You
know you're going to get the puck and you
know they're going to put the puck on your
stick no matter what.
"You just have to find the seam, get open
See BRONCOS, Page 4B
Skid
row
Women win fourth
straight in Big Ten
vThat's six
don 't be too
surprised
Six big games, six big losses. The Michigan
basketball team hasn't seen the win column in
almost a month.
Surprised? You shouldn't be.
The Wolverines just endured their toughest stretch
of a grueling Big Ten season. Michigan faced Indi-
ana - twice, Michigan State, Ohio State and two
tough road contests at Iowa and Illinois - four of
hem without their leading scorer.
And things were going so well up until now.
Replenished with a top recruiting class, Michigan
marched to a 9-2 conference
record. After the Big Ten sea-
son began, the Wolverines
edged out Purdue on the road,
and Illinois and Northwestern
at home to push their record to ,
12-3 and 3-1 in the confer-
nmee.
Things were looking good.
Michigan had won only 12 MARK
games in the 1998-99 season, FRANCESCUTI'L
and already in January, these The Cutting
new millennium Wolverines Edge
were celebrating their 12th
victory.
Everything looked great from the budding Maize
Rage and the increased excitement at Crisler Arena,
to the crystal clear media image.
Forget Ed Martin, forget last year's 12-19 record
*- Michigan basketball was back.
One could smell the NCAA tournament in the
Wolverines' future like cookies in the oven.
Butoh how the stench of NCAA violations can
change things.
A couple years ago, Jamal Crawford took some
items from a man he thought of as a father-guardian
figure. No one found out, and maybe no one ever
would, until Michigan self-reported the incident at
the end of January.
What a terrible time for a scandal.
The Spartans came into town on Feb. 1. Despite
losses on the road to Iowa and Indiana, Michigan
fans came in hordes, wearing their Jamal Crawford
headbands in stride, and primed to think the Wolver-
ines could upset Mateen and the Spartans.
Michigan even gave out 5,000 headbands at the
game to honor its team idol.
One problem - Jamal didn't play.
Crawford's absence due to a six-game suspension
for violating an NCAA bylaw may push the image
of Michigan basketball deeper in the mud, but on the
*ourt, it's destroyed what could have been a Cin-
derella season.
Okay, maybe Michigan would have won only one
or two out of the past four games with Crawford.
But wouldn't 5-5 in the Big Ten look a lot better
than the reality of 3-7?
Now the Wolverines see an ending stretch of
games that they could have had success in. At Wis-
consin and Northwestern, home against Purdue,
Penn State and Iowa. With Jamal in the lineup,
three-to-four wins would not be out of the question.
But after all the 20-point losses, after all the
embarrassment on television, and after all the scan-
dalous rumors - can this team hope to find a gold-
en road to some sort of postseason tournament?
Kevin Gaines, a fighter in every sense, was still 0-
15 from the field yesterday. He can't lead this team
alone.
By Arun Gopal
Daily Sports Writer
There is an old proverb that goes
something like, "Revenge is a dish best
served cold." Apparently, this, is a
phrase quite familiar to the Michigan
women's basketball team.
While a snowstorm raged outside
Criser
Arena, the y INDIANA 58
Wolverines
dismantled MICHIGAN 85
Indiana
inside the building's friendly confines,
85-58. The win, which came on Par-
ents' Day, left Michigan (17-6, 9-3 Big
Ten) in no worse than a second-place
tie in the conference.
The key for the Wolverines in the
game was their defense. When the two
teams played in Bloomington on Jan. 6,
Hoosier center Jill Chapman abused the
Michigan interior defense to the tune of
29 points and 10 rebounds, while point
guard Heather Cassady tore apart the
Wolverine guards with 23 points of her
own.
This time, Chapman scored just 12
points before fouling out midway
through the second half. Though Cas-
sady did hit for 19 points, many of
them came after Michigan had the
game well in hand.
"I thought we did a great job today of
executing on both ends of the floor,"
Michigan coach Sue Guevara said.
"Cassady had nine in the second half
and Chapman had two, and that was
due to our defense."
Given that Stacy Thomas, Anne Tho-
rius, and Alayne Ingram combined for
just 23 points on 10-25 shooting, one
might wonder how Michigan was able
to score 85 points. The answers came
from the frontcourt - 22 points from
LeeAnn Bies, 14 points for Raina
Goodlow - and the bench which
scored 41 points.
"Our bench did a tremendous job
today," Guevara said. "Kenisha Walker
got her hands on a lot of things, and I
thought Bies came in and did a nice job
for us also.
"I thought we were smart getting the
ball inside. We challenged our post
players today that we needed 30 points
between the three of them, and if I'm
not mistaken, we got a little bit more
than that:'
When Indiana beat Michigan in
Bloomington, the Hoosiers were able to
come back from a double-digit deficit
in the second half en route to a 77-72
upset victory. The scenario was similar
yesterday - the Wolverines jumped
out to a 40-25 halftime lead.
See HOOSIERS, Page 6B
DAVID KATZ/Daily
Indiana. Young had a career-high
Michigan center Chris Young earned his first start yesterday againstI
12 points, but the Wolverines fell again, 86-65.
Hoosiers embarrass M' again
By David Den Herder
Daily Sports Editor
The 1989 championship banner between the
black rafters of Crisler Arena seemed lonelier
than ever yesterday.
In another nationally televised debacle,
Michigan was
embarrassed by Indi- INDIANA 86
ana, 86-65. The
Wolverines have now g MICHIGAN 65
lost six in a row by
an average of 19.7 points. With six games
remaining on the schedule, Michigan needs to
win at least two more games to finish at .500 in
the conference and have any hope of securing an
NIT bid.
"It's totally demoralizing," Michigan starting
center Chris Young said. "It's real hard to just
look people in the face."
Michigan coach Brian Ellerbe said the past
six games - four of which had a national audi-
ence - would have been a tough stretch for any
team.
"These are very, very good basketball
teams," Ellerbe said.
But after matching last season's win total of
12 games back on Jan. 19, the closest Michigan
has come to victory is a five-point loss at
unranked Iowa on Jan. 22.
Since then, the Wolverines have come no
closer than 16.
Yesterday freshman guard Kevin Gaines went
0-for-15 shooting and played 35 minutes in
PELR CORNUE/Daily
Although Joe DeGain could not beat Indiana's No. 6 Victor Sveda on Saturday, his win
on Friday night over Minnesota's No. 10 Owen Elzen was one of only two for the team.
Grappers earn split.
DAVID KATZ/Daily
Bob Knight called the Michigan fans' reception of
Dane Fife "bullshit."
By Jon Schwartz
Daily Sports Writer
If a group of people had chosen to
attend only the first matchups of the
two wrestling meets this weekend,
they would have seen enough to
draw conclusions for the rest of the.
evenings.
Each of the two bouts, heavy-
weights Matt Brink and Minnesota's
Brock Lesner on Friday night and
133-pound Joe Warren against Gabe
Cook of Indiana, were telling of how
the rest of the matchups would turn
out and of how the Wolverines would
fare in their final home-stretch of the
season.
On Friday night, the No. 2 Golden
Gophers beat the tenth-ranked
Wolverines in just about every way
imaginable, squandering only two
matches, a Warren victory, and one
an intimidating giant vying for a
chance to wrestle in the WWF,
pinned No. 15 Brink in only 3:26,
continuing his so-far undefeated pur-
suit of the national championship.
"Every opponent for me is trying
to take the national title away from
me," Lesner said. "I'm wrestling to
win it."
From that point on, Minnesota
proved its superiority, winning two
matches by falls and another two by
major decisions. In truth, the
Gophers put on a clinic for those in
attendance -- but more importantly,
for the awe-filled Michigan
wrestlers.
"Minnesota showed tonight why
it's the number two team in the coun-
try," Michigan coach Joe McFarland
said. "A lot of the stuff was just a
mindset. They were aggressive, and
often times, we found ourselves
wasn't able to get himself out of holes."
Meanwhile, freshman LaVell Blanchard had
23 points and 10 rebounds. The forward's ath-
leticism and ability to create - and hit - a shot
was the only consistently good thing Michigan
had going for it yesterday.
Despite falling into an 8-0 hole early, the
Wolverines were able to keep the crowd into the
first half, especially after Brandon Smith's put-
back jam brought Michigan within five. But for
I
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