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THIS WEEKEND: UW-Stout (10-13-2, 5-13-0) will have to take the show on the road this weekend, as they travel to
St. Norbert College (19-5-1, 13-4-1 NCHA) for the NCHA quarterfinals. The teams will meet Friday, Feb. 15 and Saturday, Feb. 16, with both games of the best-of-two series starting at 7 p.m. If necessary, the teams will engage in a 20-minute "mini-game" immediately following Saturday's game in order to break a 1-1 tie. St. Norbert took two of three games against Stout this season, but the teams split the pair of games played in De Pere.
2012-13 BLUE DEVILS (10-13-2, 5-13-0 NCHA): After a hot start to the season, Stout has fizzled lately, limping their way into the seventh seed for the NCHA playoffs. Since opening their season 6-3-2, Stout has dropped 10 of their last 14 games, including their past four contests, three of which came at home. Stout has just two road wins compared to eight losses, but one of those wins came at St. Norbert, when the Knights were ranked first in the nation. Stout is being outshot, 830-691, by their opponents, and are being outscored, 83-70. The Blue Devils have allowed 19 goals over their four-game losing streak, nearly five per game, while they have scored just seven during that stretch. The Blue Devils have a power play percentage of 19.3 percent (17-88) and have a penalty kill percentage of 84.1 percent (18-113). Eighteen players have scored goals for the Blue Devils and 20 have recorded at least one point.
Kevin O'Donnell leads the team in scoring with 11 goals and 11 assists for 22 points.
Garrett Grimstad is leading the team in assists with 13 and has seven goals to go along
. Jason Cohen and
Joe Beaudette each have 12 assists. Beaudette has three goals and Cohen five goals.
Zach Vierling trails O'Donnell in goals with eight (8-8-16).
Sam Carr has six goals and nine assists after a two-point weekend.
Nick Hopper has a 9-9-2 overall record with a goals against average of 2.93 and a .908 saves percentage. Hopper has played in 1188 of the total 1520 minutes of action (78.2 percent). |
2012-13 Statistics
STOUT'S LAST TIME OUT: UW-Stout was saddled with two losses this past weekend, both coming in blowout fashion. Stevens Point stacked up six straight goals to take a commanding 6-1 lead, Friday, before turning it into an 8-3 win, their third win against Stout in as many tries this year. |
Stevens Point 8, Stout 3 | The following evening, St. Norbert scored the first three goals of the game and comfortably coasted to a 4-1 in, their second 4-1 win over Stout this season. |
St. Norbert 4, Stout 1 |
Sam Carr and
Matt Millis each recorded a goal and an assist on the weekend, marking Millis' first two points of the season.
SCOUTING ST. NORBERT COLLEGE (19-5-1, 13-4-1 NCHA): St. Norbert finished the regular season one game behind UW-Eau Claire, who will now get to enjoy a weekend off with a first-round bye. The Green Knights were 0-2-1 against Eau Claire this season, but rolled up a 13-2-0 record against the rest of the NCHA. St. Norbert finished the regular season with three straight wins, in each of which they allowed just one goal. The Knights are out-scoring their opponents, 107-44, and doing a lot of their damage on both ends of the power play. They are converting their power plays at a rate of .292 (38-of-130), while they kill just under 90 percent of their opponents' opportunities (9-of-88). St. Norbert has just three home losses this season, but one of those losses was to Stout, who ended Norbert's eight-game winning streak with a 4-3 road victory, Jan. 18. Kyle Stroh leads the Knights - and the NCHA - with 37 points, coming from 17 goals and 22 assists. Cody Keefer (15), Joe Perry (11), and Cullen Bradshaw (13) each have at least as many goals as Stout's leader,
Kevin O'Donnell. The three of them have 30, 28, and 26 points respectively. David Jacobsen has been St. Norbert's primary goalie this season, playing 23 of their 25 games. He boasts a GAA of 1.66 and a save percentage of .928, both of which lead the conference. |
2012-13 Statistics
ST. NORBERT'S LAST TIME OUT: The Knights picked up two road wins last weekend to close out the regular season. After defeating Stout, 4-1, on Friday night, St. Norbert's road trip took them to Stevens Point, where they dealt the Pointers a 3-1 loss. Against Stout, the Green Knights scored the game's first three goals en route to a comfortable win. |
St. Nortbert 4, Stout 1 | On Saturday night, goals from Cody Keefer and Chris Rial gave St. Norbert a 2-0 lead, before their third goal of the night came on an empty net. |
St. Norbert 3, Stevens Point 1
THE SERIES: St. Norbert leads the series, 35-6-3. Following Saturday's win, the Knights have won 10 of the past 13 meetings. The last time Stout won two games in a year against St. Norbert was during the 2008-09 season, the year Stout went to the Frozen Four.
STOUT vs. ST. NORBERT THIS SEASON: St. Norbert took two of the teams' three meetings this season. The teams split a weekend series back in January, with Stout winning the opening game, 4-3, and St. Norbert coming back to win the next afternoon, 4-1.
Kevin O'Donnell and
Tate Rusk each scored a pair of goals to give Stout a 4-1 lead before St. Norbert came charging back to score a pair of goals within 10 seconds of each other with about five minutes left in the fame. Blue Devil goalie
Nick Hopper shut the Knights out in the final five minutes and finished the night with 29 saves, 11 in the third period. |
Stout 4, St. Norbert 3 | The following evening, St. Norbert took a 2-0 lead into the second period before Stout's
Jason Cohen cut the lead in half. The Knights answered back minutes later was Sam Higgins returned the game to a two goal contest and Kyle Stroh scored an empty net goal for the final score. |
St. Norbert 4, Stout 1 | This past Saturday,
Sam Carr scored Stout's only goal as the Knights rolled to another 4-1 victory. St. Norbert scored the game's first three goals and comfortably coasted to victory. |
St. Norbert 4, Stout 1
|
|
Jan. 18 |
Jan. 19 |
Feb. 8 |
Total |
|
|
Stout |
SNC |
Stout |
SNC |
Stout |
SNC |
Stout |
SNC |
|
Score |
4 |
3 |
1 |
4 |
1 |
4 |
6 |
11 |
|
Shots |
21 |
32 |
29 |
38 |
29 |
26 |
79 |
96 |
|
Power Plays |
1/5 |
0/6 |
0/3 |
1/6 |
0/1 |
0/2 |
1/9 |
1/14 |
|
Penalties/Min. |
6/12 |
5/10 |
7/14 |
4/8 |
9/42 |
8/40 |
22/68 |
17/58 |
STOUT'S PETERS CUP HISTORY: Since they joined the NCHA for the 1996-97 season, UW-Stout has compiled an overall record of 14-21-3 in Peters Cup games. Upon joining the league, Stout went winless in their first eight playoff series. Since their first victory in 2004-05, Stout is 14-7-1. In recent years, Stout's record is not terrible, but they have not advanced out of the first round for three years. In both the 2009-10 and 2010-11 seasons, Stout went 1-1 on their home ice before losing a mini-game to end their season. Then last year, as the seventh seed, they went 0-1-1 at St. Scholastica to again end their season early. As it pertains to their series this weekend, Stout has not fared well on the road, especially against St. Norbert. The Blue Devils are 4-17-3 in road Peters Cup games and are 0-5-0 against the Green Knights, with each loss coming in De Pere.
USCHO.com POLL: St. Norbert was ranked sixth in the most recent edition of the USCHO.com Division III Men's Poll.
RECORDS AND MILESTONES: Sam Carr needs to duplicate his assist total from last season in order to pass Joel Gaulrapp and current head coach
Terry Watkins for fourth all time in assists. He currently has nine assists, and eight more would put him at 55 for his career. Over the weekend, Carr played in the 100th game of his career, against Stevens Point. The last player to reach 100 games in their Blue Devil career was his brother, Robert Carr, along with two others in the 2010-11 season...
Charles Lachance has recorded 188 penalty minutes over his career, and is fifth on the all-time list. Three Blue Devis have exceeded the 200-minute total, led by Bill Cutter with 277 minutes from 1979-83...
Kevin O'Donnell has worked his way onto the UW-Stout all-time career scoring list. His 66 total points (27-39-66) rank him 30th and his 39 assists rank him 24th. Thirty career goals is the cutoff to appear on the all-time goals list.
AWARDS AND HONORS: Tate Rusk was named the UW-Stout athlete of the week Jan. 22 after scoring two goals and one assists in a weekend split with top-ranked St. Norbert College...
Kevin O'Donnell was named the WIAC player of the week, Jan. 8, after scoring the game-winning goal in overtime against Hamline University and scoring two goals the day before against Bethel University...
Zach Vierling was named the NCHA player of the week, Dec. 3, after scoring two game-winning goals against St. Scholastica. Vierling scored his first collegiate game winner in overtime, then the following day scored a pair of goals in a 5-2 win, including the unassisted game winner. Vierling was also named the UW-Stout athlete of the week...
Nick Hopper was named the NCHA player of the week, Nov. 19, after posting a pair of wins over nationally ranked St. Thomas and UW-Superior. Hopper was also named the UW-Stout athlete of the week.
THE COACHES: UW-Stout: Terry Watkins (207-229-28) is in his 17th season as the head coach of the Blue Devils' varsity program. Watkins spent eight years coaching the club team (104-102-16) as Stout prepared to return to varsity status in 1997. Watkins was the 2006-07 NCHA coach of the year when Stout finished in a three-way tie for first. Watkins had a Hall of Fame career at Stout as a defenseman. Stout won a WIAC title in 2010-11, and an NCHA title during the 2006-07 season
. St. Norbert College:.
Tim Coghlin is in his 20th season as the head coach of the Green Knights. Coghlin's teams have won three national titles and three times have finished as runner-up.
THE CONFERENCES: Stout and
St. Norbert are members of the seven-team Northern Collegiate Hockey Association (NCHA). Stout and Stevens Point are members of the five team Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC). The WIAC is made up of Stout, UW-Eau Claire, UW-Stevens Point, UW-Superior and UW-River Falls. The NCHA includes the five WIAC schools as well as St. Norbert and St. Scholastica. This is the final year of the existence of the NCHA.
STOUT'S RANKED HISTORY: Stout finished the 2008-09 season as the second ranked team in the USCHO.com poll. With the exception of the Nov. 17, 2008, USCHO.com poll, Stout had been ranked in the top 15 since the Nov. 13, 2006, poll. Stout made their first appearance in the poll on Nov. 27, 2000, when they received one vote, then moved up to 10th the following week. The 2008-09 season ending poll matched Stout's previous high mark of second in the Jan. 29, 2007, poll. Stout opened the 2009-10 season ranked third, their highest-ever season-opening ranking, but fell out of the polls midway through the season and returned to the top 15, Nov. 22, 2010. Stout was in the 2011-12 USCHO.com poll early in the season, dropped out, returned again, but dropped out. Stout returned to the poll after a win over top-ranked St. Norbert, Jan. 18, garnering eight votes in the Jan. 21 poll, effectively ranking the Blue Devils 19th. |
USCHO.com Division III poll
UP NEXT: The semifinal of the Peters Cup will be Saturday, Feb. 23 and the championship game will be Saturday, March 1. The Peters Cup champion receives the automatic bid to the NCAA Division III Tournament.
