Jan. 25, 2012
Notre Dame, Ind. –
– The Games: #4/#4 Notre Dame Fighting Irish (14-9-3/9-6-3-0) at Alaska Nanooks (8-12-4/5-11-4-2)
– Date/Site/Time:Friday, January 27, 2012 – Carlson Center (4,595) – 7:05 p.m. (AT)
Saturday, January 28, 2012 – Carlson Center (4,595) – 7:05 p.m. (AT)
– Broadcast Information: Radio: Notre Dame hockey can be heard live on Real Country 99.9 FM, starting with the pre-game show 20 minutes before the opening face off. Darin Pritchett will call the action for the Irish.
– Internet: Audio: Notre Dame will stream the audio for both games of the Alaska series live and free of charge on the Notre Dame website at UND.com. Video: The University of Alaska has live video streaming of both games available at www.b2livetv.com/partner_members.asp?id=184. There is a charge for this service. Twitter: Follow the Irish icers on Twitter at ND_hockey.
OFF TO ALASKA: Notre Dame travels to Fairbanks, Alaska this week for a pair of games with the Alaska Nanooks on Friday and Saturday, Jan. 27-28. Game time each night at the Carlson Center is set for 7:05 p.m. (AT) – 11:05 p.m. in Michiana. Both teams are coming off splits last weekend as the Irish split a series with Michigan at home, winning, 3-1, and then dropping a 2-1 decision. The Nanooks split a pair with Bowling Green at home, losing, 3-1, on Friday before bouncing back with a 4-1 win on Saturday. Notre Dame enters the weekend series with a 14-9-3 overall record and is 9-6-3-0 in the CCHA, good for 30 points and a share of sixth place in the conference, just three points out of second and five behind first-place Ohio State with two games in hand. Alaska is 8-12-4 on the season and 5-11-4-2 in conference action, good for 21 points and 10th place. The Nanooks are four points behind ninth-place Northern Michigan (25). Following this weekend’s series, Notre Dame returns home to face Bowling Green in a pair of games on Feb. 3-4 at the Compton Family Ice Arena. Both games start at 7:05 p.m.
IRISH VERSUS NANOOKS: Notre Dame and Alaska meet for the second time this season. The two teams played Nov. 11-12 at the Compton Family Ice Arena with the Irish winning 5-4 and 3-2 in overtime. The teams have now met 55 times in the all-time series with the Irish holding a 29-22-4 advanatage. Going back to the start of the 2006-07 season, Notre Dame is 13-2-1 against Alaska in that 16-game span. At the Carlson Center, the Nanooks lead the all-time series, 13-10-3, with the Irish being 4-1-1 since `06-’07. The last time they won in Fairbanks was Nov. 6, 2009, a 3-2 win.
RANKINGS: Notre Dame enters the series with Alaska ranked fourth in both the USA Today/American Hockey Magazine poll and the USCHO.com poll. The Irish have been ranked in both polls all 16 weeks of the 2011-12 season. Alaska is not ranked in either poll. Five teams from the CCHA are ranked in the USA Today poll that ranks the top 15 teams. The conference has eight schools ranked in the USCHO.com poll that ranks the top 20 teams in the nation.
MICHIGAN RECAP: Friday, Jan. 21 – Notre Dame’s defense was on display Friday night at the Compton Family Ice Arena both defensively and in the offensive zone. Sophomore goaltender Steven Summerhays (Anchorage, Alaska) stopped 30-of-31 shots and defensemen Sam Calabrese (Jr., Park Ridge, Ill.) and Sean Lorenz (Sr., Littleton, Colo.) scored goals along with forward Billy Maday (Sr., Burr Ridge, Ill.) in Notre Dame’s 3-1 win over the Wolverines in front of a sell-out crowd. Alex Guptill scored Michigan’s lone goal on a third-period, power-play marker. Calabrese scored the only goal of the first period at 15:39 as he beat Shawn Hunwick on a centering pass from T.J. Tynan (So., Orland Park, Ill.). Michigan poured on the attack in the second period, peppering Summerhays with 18 shots but the Irish would get the only goal. Lorenz made it 2-0 at 10:19 of the middle stanza when he banged a rebound of a Calabrese shot from the top of the crease past Hunwick for his third of the season and Notre Dame took a 2-0 lead into the second intermission. In the third, the Wolverines finally solved Summerhays as Guptill deflected a shot by Greg Pateryn past the Irish goaltender at 4:30 of the final period on a power play for his 13th of the year to cut the lead to 2-1. Summerhays protected the one-goal lead until 19:35 when Maday blocked a shot at the blue line and scored into an empty net after Michigan pulled Hunwick for a sixth attacker. The goal was his seventh of the season. The Irish outshot the Wolverines, 35-31, in the game. Hunwick finished with 32 saves.
Saturday, January 21 – The Michigan Wolverines used a pair of first-period, power-play goals and a 38-save performance by goaltender Shawn Hunwick to hand Notre Dame a 2-1 loss in the second game of the series with the Irish. Alex Guptill and AJ Treais scored with the man advantage, as Michigan was 2-for-4 with the power play while Notre Dame was 0-for-4. Freshman Austin Wuthrich (Anchorage, Alaska) scored the lone goal for the Irish. Sophomore goaltender Steven Summerhays, making the first back-to-back starts of his career, had 22 saves in the one-goal loss. Michigan took the lead at 11:36 of the first period on Guptill’s power-play deflection. Defenseman Greg Pateryn fired a low shot at Summerhays. Guptill moved to the front of the net and deflected the shot over Summerhays for his 14th goal of the year. The Wolverine lead would go to 2-0 at 19:37 of the first when Treais picked up a loose puck inside the Notre Dame blue line and fired a shot from the slot over Summerhays’ stick hand for his ninth of the year and a 2-0 Michigan lead. In the second period, the Irish fired 17 shots at Hunwick but could score just once as Wuthrich took a feed from Anders Lee (So., Edina, Minn.) from perhind the net and beat Hunwick from the bottom of the left circle for his sixth goal of the season just 1:24 into the middle stanza. From there it was a goaltending clinic as Hunwick and Summerhays stopped everything that was thrown at them. Hunwick stopped 28-of-29 shots over the final two periods and Summerhays stopped all 14 he faced as Michigan held on for the 2-1 win.
STREAK STOPPED: Michigan’s win on Jan. 21 was the first for the Wolverines at Notre Dame since Jan. 30, 2009, a 2-1 win. Since that victory, the Irish had won three straight at home versus Michigan.
Riley Sheahan: Junior center Riley Sheahan (St. Catharine’s, Ont.) is eligible to return to the Irish lineup versus Alaska. Sheahan served a one-game CCHA-imposed suspension for a hit that occured in Notre Dame’s game with Western Michigan on Jan. 13. The suspension was supposed to take place on Jan. 20, but Notre Dame appealed it to the CCHA Executive Committee on Jan. 20, allowing Sheahan to play on Friday night. The Committee rejected the appeal and upheld the suspension, meaning Sheahan had to sit out the Jan. 21 game with Michigan.
SHORT CIRCUITED: Notre Dame was 0-for-8 on the power play in the split with Michigan, going 0-for-4 in both games. That marked the first time this season that the Irish were held without a power-play goal in a weekend series. Notre Dame came into the weekend series with the Wolverines having scored at least one power-play goal in19 of their first 24 games.
HOT HAND: Goaltender Steven Summerhays has started six of Notre Dame’s last seven games going back to Dec. 10. In that span he is 4-2-0 with a 2.01 goals-against average and a .929 save percentage. Versus Michigan, Summerhays started both games of the weekend series for the first time in his Irish career. On the season, he has appeared in 12 games, making nine starts and is 7-3-0 with a 2.50 goals-against average and a .903 save percentage.
CENTURY CLUB: Senior forward Billy Maday inched a little closer to the 100-point mark with his seventh goal of the season on Jan. 20 versus Michigan. He is on the verge of becoming the 46th player in the history of the Notre Dame hockey program to score 100 or more points in his career. He needs just three more points to reach the “Century Mark,” as he now has 40 goals and 57 assists for 97 career points in 139 games. Maday now has seven goals and 12 assists for 19 points on the year.
"Century Club" Name (Seasons) G A Pts1. Brian Walsh (1973-77) 89 145 2342. John Noble (1969-73) 81 145 2263. Eddie Bumbacco (1970-74) 103 117 220
40. Tim Reilly (1981-86) 43 65 10841. Aniket Dhadphale (1995-99) 61 44 10542. Bob Thebeau (1982-86) 40 63 10343. Kevin Hoene (1968-71) 50 51 101 Matt Hanzel (1985-89) 50 51 10145. Paul Clarke (1973-77) 38 62 100-- Billy Maday (2008- ) 40 57 97
ROAD DOGS: Notre Dame visits Alaska with a 5-4-3 record on the road this season. In CCHA contests, the Irish are 3-3-3 away from the Compton Family Ice Arena. Notre Dame’s three non-league games came at Minnesota- Duluth (a split) and at Minnesota (a win).
HOBEY BAKER CANDIDATES: Notre Dame sophomores Anders Lee (So., Edina, Minn.) and T.J. Tynan are on the list of 77 players that have been nominated for the 2012 Hobey Baker Award. Fan voting for the award has begun at hobeybakeraward.com and will continue through March 1st. Lee leads the Irish in goals this season and is second on the team in scoring with 14 lamplighters and nine assists for 23 points 26 games. Tynan is the top scorer on the Notre Dame roster with nine goals and 24 assists for 33 points and leads the CCHA in scoring and is eighth in the national scoring race.
HOCKEY HUMANITARIAN AWARD: Senior defenseman Sean Lorenz (Littleton, Colo.) is one of 23 nominees on the national level for the College Hockey Humanitarian Award, presented by BNY Wealth Management. The award is presented every year to college hockey’s finest citizen for their contributions to society in all areas. This is the 17th year for the Hockey Humanitarian Award that will be presented in a special ceremony on Friday, April 6th at the 2012 NCAA Men’s Frozen Four in Tampa, Fla. Lorenz is in his fourth season as a regular on the Notre Dame blue line and is in his first season as one of the team captains. He is currently second on the team in scoring among defensemen with three goals and 10 assists for 13 points with a power-play goal and two game winners in 26 games. For his career, he enters this weekend’s games with Alaska having played in 143 career games with nine goals and 25 assists for 34 points. As a junior, Lorenz was selected as the CCHA Defensive Defenseman of the Year and was Notre Dame’s winner of the William Donald Nyrop Award as the team’s top defenseman. Throughout his career, Lorenz has been heavily involved in Notre Dame’s community service projects and as a senior he is the team’s liaison to Notre Dame’s Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC) that plans service work within the Notre Dame and local community for student athletes. That committee also works to initiate change within the athletic department to improve the student-athlete experience and relations in the community. For four years, the Littleton, Colo., native has has participated in the annual Buddy Walk for kids with Down’s syndrome and the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation walk. For the past three years, Lorenz and his teammates have worked with the South Bend Robinson Center, working with inner-city kids, teaching them how to play hockey. This year, the team has set up a program with Life Work’s Dream Teams to visit area schools to talk to kids about setting goals and striving for their dreams and adopted a local family for Christmas. The team also spends time with the Irish Youth Hockey League (IYHL), assisting with clinics and working with the younger kids in teaching them the finer points of the game of hockey. Off the ice, Lorenz has a 3.412 grade-point average in finance in the Mendoza College of Business and had a Dean’s List semester in the spring of 2011 when he turned in a 3.80 grade point for the semester.
NATIONAL LEADERS: Center T.J. Tynan and left wing Anders Lee are among the nation’s leaders in goals, assists, points and points per game moving into the second half of the season. Tynan currently leads the CCHA and is eighth nationally with 33 points (9g, 24a). His 1.32 points per game leads the CCHA and is tied for 10th nationally. His 24 assists are tops in the CCHA and tie him for fifth in the nation. Lee is tied for second in the CCHA in goals with 14 and is tied for 14th nationally. He is tied for ninth in the CCHA in points with 23 and his six power-play goals tie him for second in the CCHA and tie him for 16th on the national level.
National Scoring Race (by points): GP G A PTSJack Connolly (UMD) 24 15 25 40Austin Smith (Colgate) 24 24 14 38Spencer Abbott (ME) 23 12 26 38Mark Zengerle (UW) 24 10 28 38Justin Schultz (UW) 24 12 25 37Drew Shore (DU) 23 15 20 35Brian Flynn (ME) 23 13 22 35T.J.Tynan (ND) 25 9 24 33Nick Bjugstad (UMinn) 25 20 12 32Matt White (UNO) 26 12 20 32J.T. Brown (UMD) 24 11 20 31Travis Oleksuk (UMD) 24 16 14 30Chris Wagner (Colgate) 23 9 21 30Joey Diamond ME) 22 17 12 29Jason Zucker (DU) 20 13 16 29
ON A ROLL: Center T.J. Tynan has not missed a beat since returning from the World Junior Championships. Since Dec. 10, he has scored eight points (3g, 5a), picking up points in five of his last six games. Michigan stopped his five-game point streak on Jan. 21. Tynan leads Notre Dame and the CCHA in scoring with nine goals and 24 assists for 33 points.
IRISH VERSUS TOP-RANKED TEAMS: With a split against Michigan (Jan. 20-21) Notre Dame improved to 8-6-3 versus ranked teams. The Irish are coming off a streak of eight straight games versus ranked teams, going 4-4-0 in that streak. Versus ranked teams this season, the Irish are 6-3-1 at home and 2-3-2 on the road. In 2010-11, the Irish played 24 games versus nationally ranked teams and finished 11-9-4 for the year.
ROLLER COASTER RIDE: The 2011-12 season has been a series of ups and downs for the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. After starting the season with a 2-2-0 mark after the first four games, the Irish went on an 11-game unbeaten streak (8-0-3) from Oct. 21 through Nov. 25. Notre Dame then lost its next four games from Nov. 26 through Dec. 9. The season took an upturn on Dec. 10 as the Irish won the first of three in a row against ranked teams (Ferris State, Boston University and Minnesota) through Jan. 7. That was followed by back-to-back losses on Jan. 13-14 to Western Michigan. Against Michigan, in their last series, the Irish were 1-1 for the weekend.
HOME SWEET HOME: Notre Dame is now 8-4-0 in its first 12 games at the new Compton Family Ice Arena and 9-5-0 on home ice this season. In the 12 games played at the Compton Family Ice Arena this season, Notre Dame has played in front of six sellout crowds of 5,022. In the 12 games at the CFIA to date, the Irish have drawn 52,808 for an average of 4,819 per game.
OVERTIME MAGIC: Five of Notre Dame’s nine games during the month of November ended in overtime. In those games, the Irish were 2-0-3. Prior to the 2-2 tie with Western Michigan on Nov. 22, the Irish defeated Boston College, 3-2, in overtime. They also have an overtime win against Alaska (Nov. 12) and ties at Northern Michigan (Nov. 4-5). The tie with Western Michigan extended Notre Dame’s unbeaten streak in overtime to 26 games (7-0-19) with the streak going back to March 21, 2008 when the Irish lost in overtime (2-1) to Miami in the CCHA semifinals. The Irish have not lost a CCHA regular-season game in overtime since a Jan. 8, 2005, 2-1 loss at Lake Superior. Last season, Notre Dame was 2-0-5 in overtime and this year the Irish are 2-0-3.
POWER-PLAY POINT PRODUCERS: The Notre Dame roster includes five of the CCHA’s top 10 power-play point producers this season. Leading the way is center T.J. Tynan who leads the conference with 16 points (5g, 11a) on the power play. He is followed in third by fellow center Riley Sheahan (Jr., St. Catharine’s, Ont.) who has 12 power-play points (4g, 8a). Tied for fifth in the CCHA is left wing Anders Lee who has six goals and four assists for 10 points and freshman defenseman Robbie Russo who has 10 points on three goals and seven assists. Senior left wing Billy Maday (Burr Ridge, Ill.) is tied for ninth with three goals and six assists for nine points.
THE KIDS ARE ALRIGHT: Freshman right wing Austin Wuthrich leads Notre Dame rookies in scoring with six goals and seven assists for 13 points. That ties him for eighth in the CCHA among freshman scorers. Rookie defenseman Robbie Russo (Westmont, Ill.) is right behind him with three goals and nine assists for 12 points. That ties him for 11th among CCHA rookies in scoring and makes him the top scoring rookie defenseman in the CCHA this season. Wuthrich was recently ranked 73rd among North American skaters in the NHL Central Scouting’s mid-term rankings. Wuthrich is also the answer to a Notre Dame trivial pursuit question – Who scored the last goal in the Joyce Center? Austin Wuthrich at 18:35 of the third period on Oct. 15.
TURNING ON THE POWER: Notre Dame will look to get its power play back on track this weekend after going 0-for-8 in the series with Michigan. The Irish have scored at least one power-play goal in 19 of its 26 games so far this season. Over the last seven games, the Irish are 7-for-37 (18.9%) with a man advantage. For the year, Notre Dame is 25-for-129, a 19.4% success rate. That ranks the Irish first in the CCHA and 23rd on the national level.
SPECIAL TEAMS: The Irish have struggled on the penalty kill over the last four games, giving up three power-play goals in eight chances to Michigan (Jan. 20-21) and three to Western Michigan (3-for-9) in the previous two games. Over the last four games, Notre Dame penalty killers have given up six goals on 17 chances for a 64.7% penalty-killing ratio. For the season, the Irish have killed 80-of-99 opponent power plays for an 80.8% success rate. That ranks Notre Dame 11th in the CCHA and 37th nationally. The Irish have scored two short-handed goals in the first 26 games this season.
LEFTY SMITH: Former Irish head coach and college hockey coaching legend, Charles “Lefty” Smith passed away on Tuesday, Jan. 3 from natural causes. The 81-year old Smith was a native of South St. Paul, Minn., and was planning on traveling with the Irish to the Hall of Fame game last weekend to attend a dinner in his honorheld by the Notre Dame Club of Minnesota. Smith started the Notre Dame hockey program in 1968 and served as head coach for 19 years, retiring in 1987 with 307 career wins. Under his tutelage, Notre Dame produced six All-Americans — Eddie Bumbacco (1973), Bill Nyrop (1973), Jack Brownschidle (1976, 1977), Brian Walsh(1977), Greg Meredith (1980) and Kirt Bjork(1983)–and finished second in the Western Collegiate Hockey Association (WCHA) twice (1972-73, 1976-77). He was named WCHA coach of the year following the1972-73 season. In 1981-82, the Irish moved to the Central Collegiate Hockey Association (CCHA) where Smith guided the Irish to the Great Lakes Invitational Championship and the CCHA championship game that season. Among players on that team was former Irish head coach Dave Poulin (current vice president of hockey operations for the NHL Toronto Maple Leafs). Smith remained the head coach through the 1986-87 season and retiredwith a career record of 307-320-30. In his 19 seasons, all 126 players who played for him completed their collegiate eligibility and earned college degrees. Smith served two years as president of the American Hockey Coaches Association (AHCA) and also coached the Central team at the 1978 National Sports Festival. Eight members of that team would go on to be members of the gold-medal winning 1980 United States Olympic team. In 1992 he was inducted into the Minnesota Hockey Coaches Association Hall of Fame and in 2003 was named a “Legend of Hockey” by the Hobey Baker Memorial Award Foundation. Smith and longtime Irish assistant Tim McNeill combined to start the Irish Youth Hockey League that first brought youth hockey to the South Bend area. Born Jan. 5, 1930, Smith got his start in coaching in South St. Paul, Minn., where he was instrumental in developing the fabled South St. Paul high school program before moving to South Bend. A 1951 graduate of St. Thomas University, where he was a standout hockey and baseball player, Smith became an assistant coach at South St. Paul in 1953 and took over as head coach in 1958. He remained there until 1968, turning in a record of201-69-11 before leaving to start the hockey program at Notre Dame. Smith and his late wife Mickey (Mary McNally of New Richmond, Wis.) are the parents of seven living children (the Smiths were preceded in death by a son Greg), 16 grandchildren and five great grandchildren.