MINNEAPOLIS – The No. 12/14 Wisconsin men's hockey team played hard in a special-teams battle and rallied back from a 5-2 deficit, but fell to Minnesota on Friday night at Mariucci Arena, 5-4.
 
Wisconsin (9-7-2, 3-3-1-0 Big Ten) outshot the Gophers 39-28 and went 2-for 6 on the power play, but No. 7 Minnesota (10-6-1, 4-4-1-1 Big Ten) scored four goals in the second period to take a lead the Badgers couldn't recover from.
 
Freshman Sean Dhooghe scored the first goal of the game, collecting a pass from behind the Minnesota net and shooting it high to the short side. The goal gave Wisconsin the 1-0 lead at 7:14 with his power-play tally.
 
Minnesota would knot the game up 1-1 at 9:20, but the Badgers went into the first intermission with a 2-1 lead thanks to a late strike by junior Jarod Zirbel. Dhooghe streaked down the ice, cutting wide and sending a shot towards the net. Netminder Eric Schierhorn made the initial save, but Zirbel crashed in on the paint and deposited the rebound for his second goal of the year.
 
Wisconsin controlled play for the first half of the the second period, but it was the Gophers who scored the goals, tallying four unanswered goals to lead 5-2. After UM scored its fourth and fifth goals 20 seconds apart, sophomore goaltender Jack Berry took to the net for Wisconsin, relieving senior Kyle Hayton, who ended his night with 14 saves.
 
Freshman Tarek Baker broke the Gopher momentum heading into the second break, cutting the UM lead to 5-3 at the 17:09 mark of the second frame. Senior Ryan Wagner walked the puck to the front of the net and had his shot saved, but Baker smacked the rebound through traffic and past Schierhorn.
 
Sophomore Trent Frederic kept the rally going with a shot through from the point on a man-advantage to make it a one-goal game, 5-4, but the clock ran out before the Badgers could pot another.
 
Berry stood strong in his relief appearance, making nine saves. 
 
Notes to Know
-Freshman Wyatt Kalynuk and senior Ryan Wagner led in points with two assists apiece.
-Junior Matthew Freytag led all Badgers with six shots on net, followed by Trent Frederic with five.
-Wisconsin outblocked Minnesota, 14-8.
-The Badgers took a season-high 20 shots in the second period.
 
Straight From the Rink
Head Coach Tony Granato
On the second period
"They're a great team. They took advantage of some momentum that they had created. They beat us to the net, they skated. They made some plays and they made more plays than we did.
 
"We had three chances with loose pucks in front of the net, two of them easily could have been goals. So we got bad breaks on that. They hit a couple posts, we hit a couple posts. It was a heck of a hockey game, they got one more by our goalie than we could get by theirs."
 
On changing around lines
"We were playing a lot of guys in the third period, we had a good push there. Thought (Trent Frederic) had three or four really good chances in the third. Obviously he got the one, hit the post on another, I think hit the goalie's knob on another one. He had his chances."
 
On the attitude on the bench
"College hockey is a lot of momentum changes; it shifts the game. When the other team gets it you've got to find a way to stop it. They got that power play, we took another penalty on a 5-on-3 and that gave them a little life. All in all, it was a heck of a hockey game."
 
Sophomore Trent Frederic
On momentum shifts
"They went on a little tear there, a hot streak. If you take that out of the game, it's all us pretty much. For 50 minutes of the game we out-played them. You've gotta play all 60.
 
On coming back late in the game
"I think when (Ryan Wagner) took it to the net and Bakes put it in, it's now a 5-3 game and they say the hardest lead in hockey is a two-goal lead. I think everyone knew going into the third, we all knew we had a chance to win it. For most of the game I felt like we controlled the puck, controlled the passing."
 
On getting better from this
"Play 60 minutes. I mean, good teams are good, they capitalize if you step off the pedal. They're a good team and that's what they did."
 
 
Up Next
Wisconsin closes out the series with Minnesota at 7 p.m. on Saturday evening at Mariucci Arena. The game will be broadcast on WTSO 1070 and be televised on Fox Sports Wisconsin Plus.