Minnesota Men Win 7-1 Exhibition; Prepare For North Dakota

(image credit: @gopherhockey on Twitter)

After two consecutive weeks of lopsided exhibition wins, Minnesota is ready to face, in Cullen Munson’s words, “the green team.”

The Gophers returned to 3M Arena at Mariucci for the second time this season, defeating Trinity Western by a 7-1 score. Ryan Norman scored twice and added an assist against the Canadian college. Munson, who played in two games his freshman year, ended up with three assists.

“It’s awesome whenever you can get on the scoreboard, but I know we got a great group of guys here,” said Munson. “Just keep working together and good things will happen.”

https://twitter.com/GopherHockey/status/1053849208892153856

Minnesota (1-0-1) head coach Bob Motzko used much of Saturday’s exhibition — the team’s second in as many Saturdays — as an audition for his lineup as the Gophers prepare for a three-week stretch against North Dakota, Minnesota State and Wisconsin. In addition, freshman Blake McLaughlin made his first appearance in maroon and gold after suffering a lower-body injury in his first practice.

“He’s catching up right now. You can see he’s a talented hockey player, but he’ll have to keep catching up,” Motzko said about McLaughlin, a third-round pick of the Anaheim Ducks. “I liked what I saw.”

After a scoreless first period where Minnesota outshot Trinity Western 16-3, Norman got on the board 1:31 into the second period. The senior forward dove to get to the puck and put it past Spartans goaltender Lucas Mills.

Sammy Walker set up Brent Gates Jr. less than three minutes later on a one-timer before Munson did the same for Tyler Nanne.

“Our guys feel good right now,” said Motzko. “It doesn’t matter if you score some goals, hockey players want to feel good about their game.”

Pitlick kicked off a four-goal third period for Minnesota with an opening minute power play goal. Trinity Western’s Travis Verveda matched him with a power play goal of his own, but freshmen Sampo Ranta and McLaughlin put the game out of reach.

Norman, who had six shots on net, added his second goal with 1:02 remaining.

“I thought our line got into the dirty areas and we had a lot of good opportunities from our forecheck. If you look at the stats, our forecheck is where we got most of our opportunities from,” he said. “We definitely did well in that aspect.”

All three of Minnesota’s goaltenders played Saturday. Mat Robson got the start and finished with three saves in the first period. Eric Schierhorn, who played the entire game of last week’s 7-1 exhibition win, stopped all nine second period shots. Brock Kautz, meanwhile, played the third period and had 8 saves.

Mills finished with 43 saves on 50 shots.

The Gophers next travel to Las Vegas for the United States Hall of Fame Game against North Dakota on Saturday. After two weeks of where Norman said it was a time for the team to find out where it is at through practice and exhibitions, Minnesota returns to games that count with one against one of its biggest rivals.

“I know the boys are excited to get the season going and we’re real excited about facing the green team this weekend,” Munson said.


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