Irish Host Top-Five Battle For Big Ten Title

March 16, 2018

NOTRE DAME, Indiana — The No. 3 Notre Dame hockey team will look to win a Big Ten title against Ohio State for the second time in as many months on Saturday night when the Irish host the Buckeyes for the title game of the Big Ten Men’s Ice Hockey Championship.

Puck drops at 8 p.m. ET at Compton Family Ice Arena. The contest can be seen live on Big Ten Network and heard on WCOZ 93.4 in South Bend and worldwide on UND.com. To purchase tickets, visit UND.com/BuyTickets.

Countdown To Puck Drop

• 154 Senior defenseman Jordan Gross has skated in 154 consecutive games (each game of his Irish career).
• 91 With 91 career assists, Jake Evans (38-91-125) ranks second in career assists by an active NCAA player (Brady Ferguson of Robert Morris has 96).
• 76 Junior defenseman Dennis Gilbert ranks 15th nationally with 76 blocked shots this season. He totaled 70 blocks as a freshman and 78 as a sophomore.
• 28 The Fighting Irish are outscoring opponents by a combined 28 goals over the second and third periods this season (78-50).
• 23 With a 23-7-1 record, sophomore goaltender Cale Morris is tied with Minnesota State’s Connor LaCouvee and Northern Michigan’s Atte Tolvanen for the most wins in the country.
• 20 Notre Dame is 20-2-2 this season when scoring first.
• 13 Head coach Jeff Jackson is in his 13th season behind the Notre Dame bench. He has led the Irish to eight NCAA tournament appearances and three Frozen Fours.
• 6 With the 2018 Big Ten regular-season title, Notre Dame has now won six conference championships in program history, each under Jeff Jackson (three regular season).
• .946 Cale Morris has a .946 save percentage, which leads the nation. He has posted the impressive save percentage while playing 20 games against the nation’s top-15 scoring offenses (ranked by goals per game).

For Starters

• Notre Dame will play to collect a Big Ten Tournament trophy to place in the case alongside its regular-season trophy on Saturday, March 17, against Ohio State.
• The No. 3/3 Irish host No. 5/4 Ohio State at 8 p.m. on the Big Ten Network. The game is being hosted by Notre Dame thanks to winning the regular-season title at top seed. The Irish clinched the regular-season title with a Feb. 9 victory over Ohio State at Compton Family Ice Arena. The Buckeyes rebounded with a victory the next day to earn the split.
• Notre Dame is looking to win its fourth conference tournament championship, having won the CCHA in 2007, 2009 and 2013. The 2013 run to the Mason Cup included a 3-1 CCHA semifinal win over Ohio State at Joe Louis Arena. The Irish own six total conference titles, including this year’s Big Ten regular-season title and the 2007 and 2009 CCHA regular-season titles.
• Earlier in the year, Notre Dame swept Ohio State in Columbus, Ohio, by scores of 4-1 and 3-2. Those were the first Big Ten competitions for the Irish during their inaugural season in the league.
• Hobey Baker Top 10 Finalist Cale Morris started all three games in goal for the Irish, going 3-1 while making 120 saves. Cal Burke (two goals, two assists), Dylan Malmquist (two goals, two assists) and Jake Evans (goal, three assists) each totaled four points against Ohio State this season. Evans owns a team-best plus-four rating against the Buckeyes this year.
• Notre Dame has won three previous conference tournament championships including CCHA Tournament titles in 2007, 2009 and 2013.

Quick Hits

• Jordan Gross and Jack Jenkins both carry point-scoring streaks into the B1G final. Jenkins has a point in three straight games (1-2-3), including the game-winning goal with 31 seconds remaining in the semifinal win over Penn State. Gross has a point in each of the last two games (1-1-2).
• Jake Evans (39-91-130) now ranks tied for 25th all-time in program history for career points and 16th in program history for career assists.
• Evans has skated in 126 consecutive games dating back to his freshman season.
• Dennis Gilbert is the only defenseman in the country with multiple shorthanded goals this season (two).
• Andrew Oglevie and Evans are tied for 15th in the country with four game-winning goals apiece.
• The Fighting Irish are eighth in the country in scoring defense with a 2.17 goals against per game mark and their penalty kill ranks second (88.5), trailing only Ohio State’s penalty kill of 89.9 percent.
• Jordan Gross, who has played in all 154 games of his Irish career, leads all active defensemen with 116 career points on 34 goals and 82 assists (Mark Auk of Michigan Tech and Garret Cockerill of Northeastern are tied for second with 84 points each).
• The Irish are 13-6-2 against ranked opponents this season.

Irish On St. Patrick’s Day

• The Fighting Irish are 1-2-0 all-time on St. Patrick’s Day and 1-1-0 under Jeff Jackson.
• Notre Dame’s first St. Patrick’s Day game was a 4-0 loss to Michigan State at the CCHA semifinals at Joe Louis Arena in 2000.
• The lone Irish victory on the day came in 2007 when the Irish won the Mason Cup at the 2007 CCHA Playoffs with a 2-1 title game win over Michigan.
• Last year on St. Patrick’s Day, Notre Dame fell to UMass Lowell in a Hockey East semifinal at TD Garden in Boston before rebounding to defeat the RiverHawks in the NCAA Northeast Regional Championship nine days later.

Twenty-Four Wins And Counting

• Notre Dame’s win over Penn State in the Big Ten semifinals on March 10 was its 24th victory of the season (24-9-2). It marks just the seventh time in school history the Irish have reached 24 wins (the school record for wins is 32, set by the 2006-07 team).
• It marks the 11th season in program history with at least 23 victories (out of 49 NCAA DI varsity seasons) and the eighth under head coach Jeff Jackson. Notre Dame’s last 24-win season came in 2012-13 when it finished the year 25-13-3.
• This season also marked just the fourth time the Irish reached 23 wins before the start of playoffs.
• The only other seasons the Irish recorded at least 23 wins in the regular season were 1987-88 (23 as a Div. I Independent), 2006-07 (27) and 2008-09 (27).