8A - Wednesday, February 15, 2012 T h and
The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
Hunwick learned from early-season ejection
By EVERETT COOK
Daily Sports Editor
In late October, the Michigan
hockey team embarked on its first
road trip of the year, traveling
up to Marquette - a town that is
basically the Great White North
- to take on Northern Michigan.
It was the first CCHA test for the
fifth-ranked Wolverines.
In the series opener, fifth-year
senior goaltender Shawn Hun-
wick was posting a shutout, mak-
ing 17 saves through a period and
a half.
But then a Wildcat forward
ran into Hunwick after a shot -
Hunwick responded by sending
him to the ice with a mean right
hook. He was ejected from the
game, forcing untested sopho-
more Adam Janecyk into the
game. Michigan lost 5-3, then
fell in a shootout the next night.
Michigan took one out of six
points in its first CCHA series of
the year - and Hunwick was a
big reason for that unsuccessful
first weekend.
On a team with eight fresh-
men, it's hard to imagine that the
24-year-old Hunwick would be
the poster child for improvement
in the maturity department. But
Aw,-
f
times, including a scary moment
when he was blindsided and
needed a couple minutes to right
himself. He stuck to his post.
"Before that Northern game, I
didn't think something like that
was going to happen," Hunwick
said. "But after you have that
experience in the back of your
head, you know that you aren't
going to get to that point again."
Hunwick has been Michigan's
best player this year, earning a
spot among the handful of Hobey
Baker contenders. When he's
on - and he has been for about
the last two months - Michigan
is one of the best teams in the
country. Hunwick keeping his
cool and focusing on goaltending *
instead of boxing is a major rea-
son the Wolverines are within
striking distance of first place in
the CCHA.
"I think he's definitelybeen the
difference in a handful of games
this year," Berenson said. "He
was the reason we won the game
on Saturday (against Michigan
State). He's having a great year."
When the Wildcats visit Ann
Arbor this weekend, they will
find a different, wiser Hunwick
in net --and they only have them-
selves to blame.
ALDEN REISS/Dal
Fifth-year senior goaltender Shawn Hunwick was ejected from a game in Marquette in October for his part in a goal-mouth skirmish with a Wildcat forward.
with the regular season wind-
ing down, it's become clear how
much Hunwick has changed
since the tussle in the Berry Cen-
ter.
"I think he's figured it out,"
said Michigan coach Red Beren-
son. "It's part of the game. We
need to protect him, but in the
same token, he's got to under-
react. It's not his battle. His battle
is to stop the puck.
"With any goalie, if they get
distracted, they aren't the same."
The Wolverines have com-
pleted their most physical three-
series stretch of the season,
playing on the road against Notre
Dame and Michigan State, and
taking on Miami (Ohio) at home.
In each of those series, but espe-
cially against the Fighting Irish
and RedHawks, Hunwick was
knocked down, beaten up and
battered.
In South Bend, there was a
scrum near the net after almost
every save. Freshman forward
Alex Guptill said Notre Dame
played dirty to try to incite Hun-
wick to repeat his knock-out per-
formance. But Hunwick stayed
out of the fray, letting the other
Wolverines around him deal with
the extracurricular activities.
"I feel like, in that Notre Dame
series, ifI didn't already have that
Northern Michigan experience,
I would have acted differently,"
Hunwick said.
When the RedHawks visited
Yost two weeks later, they seemed
to have a similar plan. Hunwick
was knocked to the ice several
I
Blue jams with 'The Rock'
WOMEN'S BASKETBALL
Week off helps 'M'
prep for stretch run
By NEAL ROTHSCHILD
Daily Sports Editor
Not all 30-inch, 21-ounce com-
posite orange spheres are made
equal.
Yes, even in today's progres-
sive, 21st-centurysociety, we still
see discrimination. Basketball
discrimination.
Between Nike, Adidas, Wil-
son, The Rock, Spalding and even
renegade Wisconsin's Sterling
ball, college basketball teams are
allowed to choose the.type of ball
they want going through their
nets from a bevy of options. Until
postseason play, when the Wil-
son Solution is used, each school
gets to choose the ball it uses for
home games. The preference of
Michigan coach John Beilein
dates back 20-plus years.
"I just have a long association
with The Rock," he said. "I used
it way back to LeMoyne and also
at the Division-I level. I've used
The Rock, I think, all the time.
They have a good product."
Though many teams choose to
stick with their school's sponsor
for their choice of ball, Michigan
passed over Adidas in favor of
The Rock - a brand from Ana-
conda Sports.
"It feels very much like the
Wilson, which we use in the
NCAA Tournament," Beilein
said. "That's why I like it."
Beilein also uses the ball for
other reasons - to support his
moonlighting job asa salesman.
"I have a great association
with them," he said. "And I also .
have my own ball that I sell
through The Rock, The Beilein
Ball, with the line on it. It's a rela-
tionship thing."
The Beilein Ball is a train-
ing tool with thick black stripes
TODD NttDLt/Daily
The Beilein Ball was created to aid players with analyzing correct hail rotation.
bearing his last name that form like that before," former Michi-
a circumference around the ball. gan guard Ron Coleman told The
Its function is to help players ana- Michigan Daily in 2007. "But
lyze ball rotation on their shots it really helps a lot to get your
and to help them position their hands in the seams, because you
hands correctly as they prepare do shoot better."
to shoot. In short, this training Throughout the year, when
mechanism is designed to help Michigan prepares to face its
the players put nylon between next road opponent, it practices
The Rock and with the same
a hard place - ball that team
the court. uses.
Beilein "I thought it "We have
invented the every ball
tool years was a joke." that we play
ago, by simply against . in
drawing lines storage,"
on the ball Beilein said.
with black marker, but he struck "So when we play a Nike school,
retail gold, as the ball has gone there will be 12 Nike balls on the
mainstream in recent years. rack."
"When I first saw the (Beilein Nike seems to be the ball of
Ball), I thought it was a joke choice in college basketball, as
because I had never seen a ball the majority of major-conference
schools play with a ball branded
with a swoosh. Seven of the 12
Big Ten schools use Nike, while
Wisconsin is the only school in
Division-I college basketball to
use the Sterling ball.
"I think it's fun a lot of times
going into a new stadium and
playing with a different ball,"
said senior guard Stu Douglass.
"I don't know if 're-focus' is the
right word, but you want to shoot
well, and it's a big part of getting
big road wins."
Each ball has its own idiosyn-
crasies that can affect a player's
comfort level.
Though each brand has eight
panels to the ball, there are cer-
tain discrepancies: the depth of
the seams, the toughness of the
leather and the stickiness of the
ball.
"The Adidas ball is different
from the Nike balls," Douglass
said. "And we play with The
Rock, so it's different. Some of
the things get a little monoto-
nous, so it's fun to kind of mix it
up."
The road - and foreign balls
- haven't been kind to the Wol-
verines this season. Michigan,
which has gone 5-7 away from
Crisler Center, is dominant at
home with The Rock, going
14-0.
But if Michigan fans are wor-
ried about the Wolverines' play
without The Rock in the postsea-
son, there is good news.
On Dec. 10, Michigan put up
a season-high 90 points in a vic-
tory over Oakland at the Palace at
Auburn Hills.
The ball? Wilson. The same
brand used for March Madness.
See more photos of Crisler
at MichigasDalycom
By COLLEEN THOMAS
Daily Sports Writer
A couple of weeks ago, the Michi-
gan hockeyteam whipped out a tro-
phy with a hockey helmet mounted
on a slab of wood and played a
three-on-three intrasquad match
for it. The Michigan women's bas-
ketball team had simpler plans for
its bye week.
"Just working on our plays and
defense - normal stuff," said junior
guard Nya Jordan.
. After the Wolverines upset then-
No. 13 Nebraska last Thursday, the
team didn't skip abeat going back to
its normal routine.
"We took Friday off," said Michi-
gan coach Kevin Borseth. "Satur-
day morning, we practiced, went
through a couple things to stay
fresh, took Sunday off, and we came
back Monday and (started) all over
again."
Michigan doesn't have much
time to relax, as the final push for
the postseason has begun. The Wol-
verines have fpur games left and
will continue their run to March on
Thursday against Iowa.
And they aren't wasting any of
their free time. Senior guard Car-
men Reynolds emphasized that
though the team has more time to
practice, its routine is the same. She
said the team focused on strength
training and taking advantage of
the extra rest this week.
With the extra time, Michigan
has been able to take a deeper look
into its game against the Hawkeyes
and take a detailed approach to the
gameplan.
"(Practice is) really focused,"
Reynolds said. "Each practice, we
focus on defense and offense. You
can break everything down and
spend more time on it, which really
helps."
Added fellow senior guard
Courtney Boylan: "A lot of the stuff
that we do in practice is oriented to
who we're playing. (It's) important
to look at, having a week to prepare
for a team. Maybe you could lose
sight of what you're doing, but for
us, I think it will be good overall."
So far, the Wolverines have kept
their eyes on making sure they earn
an NCAA Tournament bid. The
season has been a tough test for
Michigan, but the team has weath-
ered the schedule well, sitting at 7-5
in conference play and 18-7 overall.
The Wolverines have taken down
two ranked teams, Ohio State and
Nebraska, and they won 12 of their
first 14 games - a program-best.
But those games are behind
them, and right now, Michigan is
just looking to its next opponent.
The Wolverines are not looking at
Sunday's game in Bloomington, and
they haven't even thought aboutthe
Big ''en or NCAA tournaments -
this short-term focus is something
Borseth has been stressing all sea-
son.
"The job isn't over until the
paperwork's done, it's one of those
things," Borsethsaid. "We're at that
stage right now. We're just plugging
away one day, one game at a time,
trying to make sure we get what's
taken care of out of the way first."
And regardless of how much rest 0
they've gotten, Reynolds under-
stands that it's what happens on
Thursday that matters the most.
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