The women’s team will look to win the WCHA Final Faceoff, while the men’s team opens up Big Ten Tournament play.
While the eyes of the hockey world were on the Columbus Blue Jackets over the weekend because of the NHL’s Stadium Series game, both Ohio State hockey teams had notable weekend series.
The Buckeye men’s team closed out their regular season schedule by splitting a series with the Michigan Wolverines. The women’s team had little trouble with St. Thomas in the first round of the WCHA Tournament, securing a spot in the WCHA Final Faceoff this weekend.
Now both squads will look to add to their resumés to bolster their seeding for their upcoming NCAA Tournament runs.
Women’s hockey
We’ll start off with the Ohio State women’s hockey team, since they will be wrapping up their conference tournament, while the men’s team will just be starting the Big Ten Tournament this weekend.
Nadine Muzerall’s squad swept St. Thomas in Columbus over the weekend, beating the Tommies 5-1 on Friday, followed by a 4-1 win on Saturday. With the victories, the Buckeyes will now face Minnesota on Friday afternoon in a WCHA Final Faceoff semifinal.
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Joy Dunne opened up the scoring for Ohio State 1:31 into the game on Friday night. Dunne also scored the first goal of Saturday’s game at the 1:36 mark of the first period. With goals in both games, Dunne has now put a puck in the back of the net in each of the last six games. The Buckeye star also added three assists over the two games, increasing her team-high point total to 52 points on the season. The 23 goals Dunne has scored is just two shy of tying Jocelyn Amos for the team lead.
The star of Friday night’s game was undoubtedly Mira Jungåker, who scored two goals and dished out two assists in the 5-1 win over St. Thomas. The freshman defenseman from Sweden also had an assist in Saturday’s victory. After a slow start to the season, it is obvious that Jungåker is gaining comfort on the ice and could be a big factor for the Buckeyes the rest of the season.
Winning both games for Ohio State over the weekend was goaltender Amanda Thiele, who continues to add to her impressive Buckeye career between the pipes. Thiele is now 18-5-2 on the season, giving her 69 career wins as an Ohio State goaltender. Although Hailey MacLeod has seen a decent amount of time at goalie for the Buckeyes, expect to see Thiele the rest of the way because of her tremendous amount of experience in high pressure postseason games.
Now Ohio State will take on a Minnesota team who they defeated in three of their four meetings during the regular season. The Buckeyes won the first game between the teams 4-3 on October 11th in Columbus, followed by a shootout win the next night.
The Golden Gophers and Buckeyes would meet in Minneapolis a few months later. Minnesota’s 3-1 win on Jan. 31 would be their only one over Ohio State so far this season, but the Buckeyes did earn some revenge the next day with a 7-3 triumph. The most notable performance in those games was in the final matchup when Sloane Matthews recorded a hat trick to lead Ohio State to victory.
The Golden Gophers enter Friday’s semifinal with a 27-10-1 record after winning two of three games over Minnesota State over the weekend. Minnesota won the first game 6-1 but Minnesota State was able to avoid the sweep by winning the second game 5-4 in double overtime. The Golden Gophers righted the ship in Sunday’s game, winning 6-2. Emma Kreisz had two goals and three assists to lead the way in game one, while Abbey Murphy netted two goals in game three.
There’s no question that Abbey Murphy is the star for Minnesota after she has recorded 29 goals and 30 assists so far this season. The only other Golden Gopher skater with more than 40 points is Ella Huber, who has 44 points on the season. Peyton Hemp and Natalie Mlynkova each have been credited with 31 points.
In goal, Hannah Clark has done the bulk of the work this season, starting 32 games, posting a 23-8-1 record with a 2.25 goals against average and .907 save percentage.
The winner of Friday’s second semifinal will go on to face the winner of the game between Wisconsin and Minnesota-Duluth that will be played first on Friday. The final will take place on Saturday afternoon at 3:00 p.m. ET. All games from the WCHA Final Faceoff can be seen on B1G+.
Men’s hockey
When it comes to Ohio State’s men’s hockey team, the Buckeyes already had clinched a top-three spot in the Big Ten standings heading into last weekend’s action, ensuring they would play at home in the first round of the Big Ten Tournament. Even though the pressure was off when it came to having an edge in the first round, Ohio State still wanted to best their rival when the Michigan Wolverines came to Columbus for two games last week.
Ohio State opened up the two-game series with a 2-1 overtime victory over the Wolverines before Michigan was able to win Friday night’s game 4-3. William Smith scored the game-winner 1:22 in overtime on Thursday to earn the win for the Buckeyes. Friday night’s game saw Michigan jump out to a 4-1 lead.
While Ohio State showed fight with two goals in the third period, they weren’t able to complete the comeback and send the game into overtime.
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With how the last weekend of the Big Ten regular season shook out, the Buckeyes will host Wisconsin in a best-of-three series this weekend at Nationwide Arena. Ohio State swept all four meetings with the Badgers this season, winning 2-1 in overtime and 2-1 in regulation in Madison back in October, followed by 4-1 and 4-2 wins in Columbus last month. Wisconsin enters this weekend’s games with a 12-19-3 record on the season.
Max Montes was a force in the games in Madison, scoring both goals in the overtime win in the first meeting between the schools. Riley Thompson would score 21 seconds into the second game, while Montes added some insurance with a goal a minute into the third to win the next night. Thompson would go on to score two goals in the first game in Columbus, and Montes would tie the final meeting of the regular season in the second period before Damien Carfagna and Davis Burnside netted goals to complete the regular season sweep of the Badgers.
Ohio State can’t take Wisconsin lightly because anything can happen on the ice. While Ohio State has Gunnerwolfe Fontaine, Riley Thompson, and Davis Burnside as 30-point scores this season, the Badgers counter with Quinn Finley, Ryland Mosley, and Gavin Morrissey. At goaltender, Tommy Scarfone can be tough to get pucks past, posting a 2.64 goals against average and three shutouts this season.
All of this weekend’s games between Ohio State and Wisconsin are scheduled to start at 7:00 p.m. ET, and can be seen on B1G+. The winner will move on to the next round of the Big Ten Tournament, with their opponent depending on how the rest of the action around the conference over the weekend shakes out.