Four Hawks find the net; Driscoll stops 30 in return to Bemidji
BEMIDJI, Minn. (UND Athletics) – In its first road test of the season, No. 7 North Dakota used a pair of goals from Grand Forks products to improve to 3-0 on the season with a hard-fought 4-3 victory over No. 20 Bemidji State at the Sanford Center.
Freshman wing Jackson Kunz scored his first-career goal and junior wing Judd Caufield netted what proved to be the game winner as the two products of Grand Forks youth and prep hockey came up big for the Fighting Hawks.
Senior goalie Zach Driscoll, who played for the Beavers for three seasons before transferring to UND this season, played through some heckling from BSU fans and stopped 30 of the 33 shots he faced in a strong performance to best his old team.
The Beavers, down 4-2 late in the third period, pulled goalie Gavin Enright (25 saves) for a sixth attacker with 2:32 left in the game and got a man-advantage goal from Owen Sillinger with 28 seconds left to make for a frantic finish.
“They came out hard, like I knew they would,” Driscoll said of the Beavers. “They’re a really, really good team.”
Kunz buried a wrist shot off a set play on a faceoff win by rookie center Matteo Costantini at 6:53 of the second period to make it 3-1. Then after Ethan Somoza buried a rebound early in the third period to make it 3-2, Caulfield scored his first of the season on a rising wrist shot to the far side on Enright to make it 4-2 at 12:23, enough to survive Bemidji’s final push.
“That was a full-blown man-game tonight,” Driscoll said. “That was a 60-minute college hockey game. That’s good for our young guys to take. That’s what we’ll see the rest of the year.”
It was indeed a typical UND-BSU contest, close, hard-fought and with moments of suspense sprinkled throughout the game.
The Beavers dominated the opening period, outshooting UND 14-7 and ending the period ahead 1-0 on Tyler Kirkup’s goal at 5:40 on BSU’s first shot on goal.
But UND came back strong in the second period, scoring three goals in a span of 3 minutes, 42 seconds to grab a 3-1 lead. Sophomore center Louis Jamernik scored on a wraparound on a BSU turnover at 3:11, Gavin Hain on a deflection off a BSU defenseman at 5:13 and Kunz on a bullet off the faceoff win at 6:53 to change the momentum of the game.
The heckling from the BSU fans who once cheered Driscoll as we twice won all-league honors in a Beaver jersey, didn’t bother him. “I love it, actually,” Driscoll said. “They can say what they want to say. I kind of use it as energy. So, thanks to them, I guess.”
Jamernik said the message in the UND dressing room after the lackluster first period was simple.
“The leaders just stepped up and said, ‘hey, we can say all we want, but at the end of the day, guys just got to step up.’ ”
That they did with the Jamernik line scoring two goals (Jamernik, Hain) and Costantini, who centers the fourth line, winning the draw to set up his left wing Kunz for a goal. UND’s top line of Connor Ford, Ashton Calder and Mark Senden was held without a point.
”I think we just had to simplify our game, be a little bit harder in a few different areas. I thought we got a little too fancy (in the first period). Credit them. I’m kind of proud of the way our guys responded in the second. Challenge them in the locker-room to be better and harder in a lot of different areas.”
And on this night, it was enough to pull out a victory for the Fighting Hawks, who’ll meet the Beavers (0-3) in a rematch at Ralph Engelstad Arena in Grand Forks Saturday night.
NOTES: Among the saves for Driscoll was a breakaway stop on Somoza in the first period that would have given the Beavers a 2-0 lead . . . UND was credited with 17 blocked shots to 7 for BSU . . . UND was 0-3 on the power play, the Beavers 0-4 . .. Jamernik had a goal and an assist for a 2-point game to pace UND while Kirkup had the same for BSU . . . Kunz, Jamernik and Kirkup were voted the three stars of the game by the media, in that order.
Game Recap: Men’s Hockey | 10/15/2021 11:56:00 PM | Virg Foss, FightingHawks.com
