2/25/2022 – Notre Dame 4, Michigan 1 – 25-8-1 (16-4-0-3 B1G) 

2/26/2022 – Notre Dame 2, Michigan 1 – 25-9-1 (16-5-0-3 B1G) 

Playing Notre Dame in hockey is a decent microcosm of what it's like to play any team in the NCAA Hockey Tournament. In my five years covering the Michigan hockey team, one thing has always been true about playing Notre Dame: you have to get the first goal in order to have a good chance of winning. If you get the first goal, you force Notre Dame to open it up. They have to send defensemen up in the neutral zone, they have to be more aggressive pinching at the point in the offensive zone, and thus are more exposed to the sorts of 3v3 entries or even odd-man rushes that Michigan has become so reliant on as Mel Pearson has built his roster exclusively around NHL caliber talent. If you score first, your probability of scoring 3 or 4 on the Irish goes up considerably.

If you don't score first, your chance of scoring 3 or 4 plummets like a couch thrown from a tenth story window. Notre Dame plays impeccable in-zone defense when they're allowed to focus on their defense (i.e. when they have the lead). Some people make comparisons to Michigan State in terms of putting bodies in the defensive zone, but that's where the similarities end. MSU just parks guys in front of the net, makes no attempt to cut off passing lanes or shooting angles, and doesn't pressure the puck carrier. They put out five bodies and let the opponent shoot 60 times. That's not a winning formula, and it's why MSU has sucked under Danton Cole. 

Notre Dame, on the other hand, does all the little schematic things necessary to actually shut you down. The five bodies in the neutral zone aren't corpses stacked in front of the net, they're stationed in specific positions designed to cut off all high danger passing lanes while also taking away any good shooting angles. Notre Dame blocked 44 shots this weekend between the two games, and the number of passes they intercepted has to be even higher. I wrote last week about how good Michigan's defensive positioning was in the final minutes of the Ohio State game, but if you want to see the true MasterClass session on how to position your skaters perfectly in the defensive zone, then it is Jeff Jackson and Notre Dame you need to watch. 

[Zoey Holmstrom]

The Irish have been like this forever. As long as I've been covering college hockey, and well before it. I joked to David and Brian on Friday night while watching the game that the names on Notre Dame's roster are irrelevant. If you give me a list of names from Ohio State or Minnesota or Michigan State's roster from a few years ago, I can tell you who is still in college and who is long gone. Scott Reedy? Off to the NHL. Sammy Walker? Somehow still at Minnesota. Taro Hirose? Gone. Mitchell Lewandowski? Still at MSU. But you could list off the roster of Notre Dame from two or three years ago and I'd have little or no idea which guys are still in college and which guys aren't (outside of the goalies), because no players on their team stand out.

Notre Dame doesn't have shining stars or big names, it's just 19 skaters who all wear the same color jerseys and helmets, with no distinctive features. They're robots programmed to be in the right place at the right time in the defensive zone if they have the lead, to use their sticks perfectly to obstruct passes, to block shots, and to forecheck well. It hurts their ability to get a high end NHL-caliber forward in the recruiting market (hello, Rutger McGroarty/Logan Cooley), but this weekend I don't think it was the team with all the high end NHL-caliber forwards that was laughing. 

That's the trap Michigan fell into this weekend. They got the first goal on Friday, couldn't scratch out a second when they had Notre Dame out of the comfort zone, got unlucky on a bad bounce that tied the game up, and then forked over the lead thanks to a Johnny Beecher five minute major and Erik Portillo making one of the biggest gaffes of the season handling the puck. With 35 minutes to play on Friday, Michigan was behind. Uh oh. On Saturday, the opening goal didn't come until midway through the second when two disastrous defensive plays by Nick Blankenburg and Luke Hughes gave up a rush chance that ND scored on to go up 1-0. Uh oh.

[Zoey Holmstrom]

The problem with falling a goal down to these guys is even if you manage to scratch out the equalizer (as Michigan did on Saturday), it typically takes you so long to get the goal that it gives you little time to snag another before regulation runs out (hence why ND has played so many OT games). Michigan needed a regulation win on Saturday and likely weren't going to get it, even if they didn't get colossally f***** by the referees in the final three minutes (more on that later). 

Michigan went into South Bend needing at least four points for a share of the conference title and came away with a goose egg. Their power play looked stale and toothless against the top notch ND penalty kill, Michigan struggled physically against a Notre Dame team that was finishing every check, looked bamboozled when having to penetrate the ND defensive structure, and appeared unprepared to deal with this sort of team. Considering that Notre Dame is a conference opponent they've already played before this season and not some non-conference foe Michigan sees once in a decade, the lack of offensive preparation was concerning.

The two teams Michigan has struggled against the most this season (WMU and Notre Dame) are both teams that love to hit and engage physically. They're also the 1st and 8th heaviest teams in NCAA Hockey based on average weight, per CollegeHockeyNews. It is reasonable to think that the blueprint on how to beat Michigan has now been written: push the Wolverines around physically, slow them down in the neutral zone, and take away passing lanes in the defensive zone. And of course, have a good goalie. There aren't too many teams that can do all those things, but at least a few already exist and have had good success. Michigan will need to figure out how to solve this problem, and doesn't have too long to do it. Only a month remains until the NCAA Tournament, and they'll likely need to beat Notre Dame in two weekends to have a shot to raise any sort of B1G hardware. 

[AFTER THE JUMP: HockeyBullets]

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Minnesota won this conference fair and square [James Coller]

It's hard to deal with the knowledge that Michigan did not win the B1G regular season crown despite being the most talented team on paper. They entered this year with sky high expectations and yet were unable to come away with the one meaningful piece of hardware that could be accomplished in the first 35 games. Give Minnesota immense amounts of credit for winning the conference with a sterling record, one that improved considerably in the last months after the Gophers surprisingly caught fire despite losing Jack LaFontaine and their Olympians. Michigan was also hot in the second half, but they weren't hot enough. 

Minnesota is an immensely talented team, no question. But Michigan should be better, and should have been better in the regular season. The Gophers have some great future NHLers, but they also only have two first rounders in Ryan Johnson and Chaz Lucius. Michigan has seven. Bump it out to consider second rounders (which includes arguably Minnesota's best forward and best defenseman), and Minnesota has six players in the first two rounds. Michigan has eight + their goalie being drafted in the early third, which, for a goalie, is equivalent to the first round. Minnesota's goalie is an undrafted backup. You cannot conclude anything other than Minnesota did less with more than Michigan did in 2021-22, which is a bitter pill to swallow. 

This isn't to say that Minnesota is the better team. I think Michigan is still a bit better when they play head-to-head (Michigan took 7/12 points off Minnesota in the regular season), but Minnesota was better where it mattered to win the regular season crown. Notably, the ability to beat every team in the conference. Minnesota finished with a winning record against every non-Michigan team in the conference. The Wolverines couldn't win a single game against Notre Dame in four tries, despite leading in three of the four games, and leading by two goals twice. That's the difference right there. 

Games like this one really hurt [Marc-Gregor Campredon]

For the nth time in the Mel Pearson era, we're sitting here talking about how Michigan's play in the first half of the season held them back from what was possible. Now, of course, Michigan isn't going to miss the tournament or in a situation where they have to have a monster conference tournament to get in like in 2018-2020. But that wasn't going to happen with this level of talent. They also weren't mired in some nose dive in the first half like in preceding years... they finished with a very nice 13-4-3 record overall, but all but one of those losses came in conference play and three of them (the two to ND + a regulation loss to Wisconsin) are extremely difficult to swallow. Especially because none were really due to puck luck or randomness, but mostly sloppy defense and/or individual mistakes. The team has improved on that in the second half, as they always do, but I thought that the year Michigan returned 80% of their roster from the preceding season would be the time that they wouldn't show up in October/November having to re-learn the fundamentals of defense. I was wrong. 

Of course, the way Michigan has progressed as a team means they are still an excellent squad. The version of Michigan now, except for when they play Notre Dame, remains among the national championship favorites. They're going to get into the NCAA Tourney, and likely as a #1 seed so long as they take care of MSU this weekend. Once you're into the tourney, anything can happen. This team could easily win the B1G Tournament and then the NCAA Tournament and all this will be forgotten. It just sucks to feel like the team needs to win an exceptionally random single elimination hockey tournament (or at least win two consecutive single elimination games in the NCAAs) in order to come away from this season with a banner to hang in Yost. If Michigan ends this season, a year in which they iced a roster with the most NHL Draft talent in college hockey history, hoisting only the Iron D and the IceBreaker Trophy, it will feel like a failed campaign, regardless of the record. 

Michigan had a chance to secure lasting hardware before the single elimination tourneys set in over 24 games in the B1G conference slate and they didn't win enough of them. That's going to sting, unless we get an exorcism of some kind in March, which is certainly possible. If nothing else, hopefully that feeling of coming up short serves as the ultimate fuel for the next month of play. 

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Bad Zebras! [James Coller]

HockeyBullets 

- There is no way to describe what happened at the tail end of Saturday's game other than a catastrophic officiating mistake. Michigan is responsible for themselves being tied 1-1 with three minutes to go on Saturday, including the ugly defensive sequence on the first Notre Dame goal and scuffling offensive play for much of the contest, but their loss in regulation is completely attributable to the referees. I cut officials a lot of slack and have done so often using my platform here at MGoBlog, but this one is the worst mistake I've seen in a B1G game all season: 

Hell of a lead block here. pic.twitter.com/VmTFHtQjEk

— Bryan Mac (@Bry_Mac) February 27, 2022

Really, really bad. Dylan Duke is not playing the puck, he has not been playing the puck anytime during the preceding 5-10 seconds, and he gets completely steamrolled. That is the definition of interference (you could also probably call charging here), and it wasn't a situation where the call was hard to see in real time. If you watch the clip, the whole Michigan bench goes "HEY!!!!!" (I was screaming that as well) as soon as Duke gets trucked, and yet the play continues. Moments later, Notre Dame scores the go-ahead goal. About as easy of a call as it gets, and no excuse for a referee at this level to miss that. 

For non-hockey people, it is akin to the mistake by referees on the non-called DPI in the Saints/Rams NFC Championship Game some years ago. A humongous, game-altering mistake. Not just does the offending player not get called for a penalty, but he is the one who scores the go-ahead goal. And with only three minutes left, and with the scoring team being as good defensively as Notre Dame is, a goal in that circumstance isn't far off from a "golden goal" you'd see in OT when it comes to implications. Moreover, if called correctly, it would have given Michigan a power play, which would've set up the Wolverines with a chance to win the game in regulation. Never fun when the highest leverage moment in the game was a decision made by referees. After seeing the way this lone refereeing decision could shape the whole game, I hope you are sufficiently terrified of the idea of a single elimination hockey tournament. 

Shoot the puck before this happens!! [James Coller]

- When you're facing a team like Notre Dame, you just need to shoot. I've been recently watching some late 90s/early 00s NHL and while the comparisons to what Notre Dame does aren't perfect, there are some stylistic similarities. What I came away from my viewings thinking about was how many of the goals scored in that era when two good teams played were either goofy puck luck or gritty deflection goals (or both). That was the era of the Nick Lidstrom PP slapshot through eight bodies with Tomas Holmstrom screening the goalie that caroms off three different entities and then goes in. Michigan found themselves in that sort of game this weekend. 

Trapped in a slogfest against a very technically sound defense, Michigan seemed averse to shooting, especially on the PP. The high-skill passing angles that they use to rip apart lesser teams were blocked by ND's positioning, and their shooting lanes were not great either. You don't have any good options for offense, but the truth is, you just have to shoot. It doesn't matter if it gets blocked, because then you have a chance for a rebound. If you shoot enough, you might get one of those lucky caroms that goes in. Or, you get a puck battle at the netfront and then there's a chance of the scramble breaking down the Irish defense. The chance that passing endlessly around the perimeter is going to break down a defense as well-coached and executed as ND's was this weekend, even with the NHL talent Michigan has, is next to nil. Your best option is to shoot. 

- One storyline I'm watching this weekend is the power play. Michigan is facing MSU this weekend (I guess I'll do a short preview at the end of this piece) in the B1G Tournament Quarterfinals and it will be a good opportunity to sharpen up the power play, which looked baffled this weekend against Notre Dame and wasn't as sharp against Ohio State either. The Wolverines did finally get a goal from Matty Beniers on the PP, one of their two on the weekend: 

Matty Beniers ties it up on the power play! Assists to Owen Power and Brendan Brisson pic.twitter.com/PluQBO4sFG

— Michigan Hockey (@umichhockey) February 27, 2022

That said, the PP looked stale and unoriginal. Power strolling back and forth on the blue line, waiting to set up the one-timer in the circle of either Beniers or Brisson, and Notre Dame almost always being ready for it. Not much motion down below the goal line or attempts to the slot, nor much movement of bodies. Michigan is going to need a better PP to achieve their dreams in March and it's something I'm watching for this weekend against the Spartans. Being tied for the 8th-best man-advantage in the NCAA when you have a roster with this offensive talent is not good enough. 

- A quick look at PairWise: I said last week that Michigan could probably stomach a regulation loss and keep #1 in PWR. I was right about that, as Michigan ended Friday night on top of the PairWise. Unfortunately, they could not survive two, which is where the aforementioned refereeing catastrophe really hurts. Just pushing that game to OT would've been big. Michigan has slipped behind Minnesota State in the national rankings, but there is potential to move back into first. A 4-0 performance in the B1G Tournament (including a win over Minnesota) with perhaps one Minn. State loss somewhere in there should get the job done. Regardless, those two teams remain pretty close to locked into one seeds.

The NCHC continues to beat each other up, with WMU slipping off the one line and Minnesota jumping on. If the tourney started today, the B1G would have two #1 seeds for the second straight year. Denver remains a good bit back of Michigan and the Wolverines retain a large gap between themselves and the 2-line when it comes to RPI. Just dispatch MSU and you're feeling good about at least the 2nd-overall seed. 

Hello, old friends [James Coller]

- Obligatory MSU preview: These guys again. Michigan bloodied MSU just a few weeks back in mid-February during a swift two-game sweep. They now draw the Spartans in a best two-out-of-three at Yost Ice Arena this weekend, the same playoff matchup as two years ago. Those were the last games before COVID-19 canceled the season, when Michigan swept MSU on the backs of two Strauss Mann shutouts. MSU continues to struggle, but they finally won a game this weekend. That brings their January/February record up to 1-13. The Green & White finished B1G play dead last, with just 17 points on a 5-18-1 record and have a -32 goal differential on the season. They are extremely bad. 

Michigan is 4-0 against MSU this season, scoring 5.75 goals per contest against their rivals and winning by an average of 3.5 goals. MSU cannot score to save their lives, putting up just 2.21 goals per game this season. Drew DeRidder remains a good goaltender, with a .924 SV%, but he faces nearly 34 shots on average. Michigan won the possession battle at even strength 59.6%-40.4% in the head-to-head meetings this season, and the quality chances were even more lopsided. I would be surprised if MSU took a game off Michigan in this series, but it's hockey. It could happen. But the thought of MSU (or any of the underdogs in these quarterfinal matchups, really) winning the series is very difficult to imagine.