Photo Courtesy UND Men’s Hockey Twitter

GRAND FORKS, ND– After a heart-breaking 2-1 lost in Bemidji, the University of North Dakota came back to the comfy confines of the Ralph Engelstad Arena for the back-end of the home-and-home against the Beavers. It was a different look for the Fighting Hawks, as freshman goalie Adam Scheel got the nod in net for his first career start.

“I thought it was exciting to wake up and find out I was playing,” said Scheel post-game. “This morning when I showed up to the rink and I found out after pre-game skate.”

However, the offense wasn’t able to muster up any goal support for the freshman, tying Bemidji State 1-1 and leaving a lot of questions to be answered for the North Dakota offense.

It didn’t look that way early, as UND struck first just 2:31 into the first with Grant Mismash picking up a rebound off a scramble in front over the reaching Zach Driscoll to put the Hawks up 1-0. Nick Jones and Gavin Hain had the helpers and were one of the more impressive lines in the first 20 minutes.

The second period was much more methodical in the play, with both teams not getting many quality chances, despite UND have two power plays in the period. It stayed that way until 16:46 in the third period, when Charlie Combs ripped a wrist-shot over the glove of Scheel to tie the game at one. It would stay that way at the end of regulation, with shots being 21-13 for UND over the sixty minutes.

North Dakota put the pedal to the metal in OT, with plenty of quality chances at the start of the period. However, Driscoll was equal to the task, shrugging off shot after shot. The game ended in a 1-1 tie, much to the dismay of the North Dakota players and fans.

“We got one point out of the weekend,” said coach Brad Berry, “And that’s not our expectations to come out of the weekend. Obviously we found out a little more information. We have to work on a few different things as far as our game.”

“When you take away both games, unacceptable, disappointing, we just can’t have that,” said senior Nick Jones when asked about the weekend games. “To come out with a loss and a tie, it’s…..embarrassing is the only word I’ve got.”

On the weekend, the Fighting Hawks were zero for eight on the power play and were only able to muster two goals total in six periods and overtime. Coupled with trouble mustering offense in their exhibition, there’s an aura of the offensive woes continuing in the short-term.

When asked about the offensive woes, Jones was quite blunt.: “It starts on the power play. The past two times I’ve been (in front of the media), I’ve been optimistic. Tonight, there’s nothing to be optimistic about. Couldn’t even get set-up. It was dreadful.”

“We didn’t start with the puck,” said Berry, “They won draws and they cleared the puck 90-95% of the time. You saw how tough it was to get the zone five-on-five, it was equally tough on the power play. Once we got in the zone, it was about trying to keep it simple and I think we didn’t do that.”

“The easy thing is to point fingers and go off in a different tangent and that’s not what do here,” continued Berry. “There’s a focus here. There’s a team and there’s a culture here. It’s early in the season, but that’s not excuse. We have a great leadership group and we have to get better in that area.”

Another non-conference weekend coming up next week with Minnesota State-Mankato coming into The Ralph for a Friday and Saturday set. Mankato is coming off two big wins against Boston University this past weekend and should be in the top-ten of the NCAA rankings by next week.