UND men's hockey: Sioux can't seal the deal

Earning a win and a tie against a nationally ranked foe usually is reason to be pleased.

Not so for the UND men's hockey team and captain Chay Genoway.

Immediately after the coaches left the dressing room in the wake of a 2-2 tie against No. 11 Notre Dame on Saturday, Genoway grabbed a practice jersey, went over to the Olympic ice sheet at Ralph Engelstad Arena and bag-skated himself for 25 minutes.

Then, he returned to the main rink alone and went back to the dressing room, where some of his teammates had already finished changing.

Genoway, who had an assist on Saturday, was on the ice for both of Notre Dame's goals, including the crease-crashing, game-tying goal by Sam Calabrese with 3 minutes, 3 seconds left. That tally tied the game 2-2, and after a wild overtime, that's how it finished in front of a sold-out crowd of 11,742.

"When we have a one-goal lead, these are games we want to close out," UND coach Dave Hakstol said. "We're going to take it for what it is. It is a good three points. It is a series win. But at the same time, we had a lead with a little over three minutes to go.

"(The Irish) are a good team. They have a lot of great players. Their guy made a hell of a play to get the puck to the net. He made a real good inside to outside move to drive the net and they knocked a rebound in. It wasn't a mental error on our part. We've had a couple of mental errors that have cost us late. This wasn't one of those cases."

The Sioux (9-5-2) had a couple of great chances to win the game in overtime. Danny Kristo drew a hooking penalty with three seconds left in regulation. The Sioux didn't capitalize on that power play, which stretched into overtime, but Matt Frattin drew another one with 36.3 seconds left.

During the second advantage, Frattin ripped a point shot through a Jason Gregoire screen, but it hit the crossbar with about 20 seconds left.

"They had one guy coming out to me pretty quick and I pulled it around him," said Frattin, who scored UND's second goal and leads the Western Collegiate Hockey Association with 13. "Gregs had a good screen and the goalie didn't see anything. It went bar-up instead of bar-down. If it would have stayed around the crease, Gregs would have had that rebound, but it jumped out pretty quickly.

"They turned it back and I got pretty burnt, but thank God we've got (Aaron) Dell in net back there."

Irish forward Riley Sheahan had a breakaway in the final seconds of overtime, but Frattin got back fast enough to make sure that Sheahan's shot was a weak one.

"Fratts was back," Dell said. "It's always a little scary when the only guy back is a forward. But he got in his way enough that he bobbled it a little bit and didn't get a great shot off. It wasn't a great (shot), but it still made it to me."

Dell was perhaps UND's No. 1 star of the weekend. He put together another strong performance against the Irish, stopping 26 of 28 shots.

Notre Dame goalie Mike Johnson might have been the best player for the Golden Domers as well. He stopped 39 of 41 shots one night after allowing six goals.

"Great goaltending on both ends of the rink," Hakstol said. "That's what you're going to run into when you play good teams. Good teams have good goaltending at this level. Aaron has given us consistently solid goaltending. It was fun to watch at both ends."

Notre Dame coach Jeff Jackson said, for the most part, he was pleased with his team's play.

"It's a great building, it's a great crowd," said Jackson, who led Lake Superior State to national titles in 1992 and 1994. "It makes it a very challenging place to play. This is as intimidating of a place as I've ever coached in.

"It was a good learning experience for us. We're a young team. Playing in games like this are hopefully only going to make us better when we move toward the second half."

Notes: Sioux forward Brett Hextall suffered what appeared to be an upper-body injury at the end of the first period and did not return. . . UND had two changes in the lineup. Derek Forbort replaced Dillon Simpson on defense, while Carter Rowney replaced Joe Gleason up front. . . For Notre Dame, Jared Beers replaced Kevin Lind on the blue line.