Bulldogs fall victim to Pioneers for second night in a row in series finale

Written by Austin Rush | Archived Nov. 10, 2020

DU's game winning goal by Jake Durflinger. Photo courtesy of Brett Groehler

It took the University of Minnesota Duluth until the 8:32 mark of the 3rd period tonight to find the scoreboard for the first time this weekend, but the Bulldogs come up short for the second night in a row, falling 2-1 to the defending national champions. Senior forward Blake Young's spin-o-rama goal from the slot equalized the game at one apiece against the top ranked Denver Pioneers at.

Junior forward Jared Lukosevicius (Yes the guy that scored all three goals for Denver in last year's Frozen Four national championship against the Bulldogs) struck first for Denver burying a pass out front from junior forward Logan O' Connor with just 21 tics left in the 2nd period.  A gutsy fore-check by Jake Durflinger sealed the victory for DU with 4:04 left in regulation as the junior winger knocked in a rebound out front the Bulldog net.

"I thought we did a great job tonight," said UMD Head Coach Scott Sandelin. "Defensively, we changed some things and our guys executed well. They scored on a couple of their opportunities and that was the difference, but tonight I had a totally different feeling about our effort than I did last night."

As Sandelin stated, the Bulldogs held the Pioneers to just 15 shots on net tonight and a mere four shots in the final 20 minutes of play.

The Pioneers sweep the now 7-7-2 Bulldogs at home to close out UMD's 2017 home schedule. The Bulldogs haven't been swept at home since Dec. 11-12, 2015 against North Dakota where they lost 3-0 both nights.

Special teams shined for UMD this weekend as they blank the nations top power play squad(29.0%) on all five of their opportunities.

The Bulldogs head to Nebraska, Omaha next weekend for more National Collegiate Hockey Conference engagements to take on the Mavericks in their final series before the holiday break.