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8 — Friday, March 9, 2018
Sports
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
In Big Ten Tournament Semifinal, ‘M’ faces toughest foe: Buckeyes
Ohio State is a very good
hockey team.
The Buckeyes are ranked
sixth in the nation in both the
USCHO and USA Today polls,
and fourth in Pairwise. They’re
11th nationally in scoring and
fourth in goals against. Their
power play percentage is better
than that of all but seven teams,
and their penalty kill is second to
none. They’ve won 23 games, lost
eight and tied five.
“Personally,” said Michigan
senior forward Dexter Dancs, “I
think they’re the best team in the
Big Ten that we’ve played so far.”
Notre Dame may have won the
Big Ten regular-season title and
might be ranked ahead of Ohio
State in every poll. But it’s easy to
see where Dancs is coming from.
Back in late November, the
Buckeyes walked into Yost Ice
Arena and stomped all over the
Wolverines, leaving with wins
of 3-2 and 5-1. Two months later,
Michigan traveled to Columbus
a different team, coming off
four straight wins against then-
No. 9 Minnesota and then-No.
12 Penn State — and Ohio State
walloped the Wolverines again,
by a combined score of 9-3.
This Saturday, in the Big
Ten
Tournament
semifinal
in Columbus (7:30, Big Ten
Network), they’ll get a chance
to change that with a spot in
next
Saturday’s
conference
championship game on the line.
Michigan is rolling right now.
Two straight wins over the
nation’s top-ranked team and a
12-3-1 record in its last 16 games
prove as much.
But none of those victories
have
come
against
the
Wolverines’ fiercest rival.
“We love to hate Ohio State,”
said
senior
forward
Tony
Calderone. “So definitely just
playing them even if we’ve beat
them already, I think (not having
beaten Ohio State) gives us a
little extra fire.”
What makes the Buckeyes just
so tough? For one, they appear
to be specifically engineered
to exploit any and all opposing
weaknesses.
Their
sterling
statistics with the man advantage
and when shorthanded attest to
that.
At the same time, it’s been
inconsistency and little mistakes
— such as neutral and defensive-
zone turnovers and meaningless
penalties — that have cost
Michigan more than anything
throughout the season, even
during its most recent surge.
The Wolverines’ four losses to
Ohio State, then, went exactly
how you might have expected.
They outshot the Buckeyes, 131-
120, during the season series, but
allowed five goals on 14 Buckeye
power plays while failing to
score on any of their 12 chances.
“That’s
how
Ohio
State
plays,” said Michigan coach
Mel Pearson, who stated that
his
team
“beat
themselves”
in January’s series. “... (The
Buckeyes are) very patient and
they just wait to capitalize on
your mistakes and they’re very
good at it. But we just tried to
do too much. We were getting
behind and then we pressed, we
started pressing, and when you
start pressing sometimes you
try to do too much and get out of
position, you play on the offense
and that’s what happens, you
turn it over.”
Added Calderone: “We got
to stay out of the box, we got
to
eliminate
our
turnovers
around the blue lines, which is
something we’ve
struggled
with
recently.
So
as
long as we can
eliminate
their
chances we won’t
beat ourselves.”
But
even
if
the
Wolverines
eradicate
most,
if not all, of their
prior mistakes, it
may not make a
difference.
Ohio State possesses a deep
forward corps, with six in
double-digit goals this season.
Their top line — Big Ten Player
of the Year finalist Tanner
Laczynski (41 points), Mason
Jobst (41) and Matthew Weis
(36) — is one of the few anywhere
that
can
go
blow-for-blow
with Michigan’s “DMC” trio of
Dancs, Calderone and Cooper
Marody. Sean Romeo (.925 save
percentage), meanwhile, might
be the best goaltender in the
conference
not
named
Cale
Morris, and is liable to steal any
game at any time.
“They’re the favorite. To me
they’re one of the top three,
four teams in the country,
easily, easily,” Pearson said. “So
it’s just like you’re going to be
playing somebody in the (NCAA)
Tournament if you get in. Good
opportunity,
good
measuring
stick for us, and we’ll be ready.”
Now,
about
that
NCAA
Tournament.
Saturday’s contest begins a
new phase of the Wolverines’
season.
Their
previous
36
games held no win-or-go-home
implications — save for the Great
Lakes Invitational in January.
But from this weekend on, there
are no more Friday-Saturday
matchups. No more best-of-
however-many series. For the
rest of the season, Michigan
has only one game at a time to
achieve its goals.
“You play to win. You can play
a shorter bench because you only
have one game,” Pearson said.
“… So you’re not
concerned about
resting guys or
not giving them
as much ice time
because
you
know you have
to play the next
day. This is it. It’s
all on the table
and you don’t
play again for
another week. …
You play for that moment, to win
that game.”
This game, however, is likely
the Wolverines’ biggest test of
the season.
Thus, coming out on top will
take their strongest performance
of the season as well.
HOCKEY
JACOB SHAMES
Daily Sports Writer
“Good
opportunity,
good measuring
stick for us ...”