The Wisconsin goaltender is new to Madison, but not to Minnesota. Hayton faced the Gophers last season when the now-senior was a member of St. Lawrence prior to coming to the Badgers as a graduate transfer.
Minnesota tied the Saints 2-2 on the road in dramatic fashion. It took everything the Gophers had to get a goal past him.
"He was good. He stopped a lot of shots. I think we put up 40-something (author's note: 42 to be exact) on him and didn't score until we had the goalie pulled in the last minute or so," said Jack Ramsey. "Good goalie. I think he comes out of the net pretty far so hopefully we can get rebounds and try to crash the net."
With Wisconsin (9-6-2, 3-2-1-0 Big Ten) coming to town for games Friday and Saturday (both are 7 pm starts), Hayton is the latest top-tier goalie to face Minnesota.
Of the 20 goaltenders named to the preseason Mike Richter Award watch list, he'll be the fifth to face the Gophers this season following PSU's Peyton Jones, Clarkson's Jake Kielly, North Dakota's Cam Johnson and Harvard's Merrick Madsen. (A sixth nominee is Gopher goaltender Eric Schierhorn, who Minnesota sees every week in practice.) That slate doesn't include the nation's leader in save percentage (Notre Dame's Cale Morris).
Next week doesn't get easier with Ohio State's Sean Romeo being eighth in the nation with a .931 save percentage.
Ramsey believes playing many of college hockey's top goalies will help the team at the end of the season when the seventh-ranked Gophers are hopefully competing for Big Ten and NCAA titles. For now, the stretch has forced Minnesota to focus on getting better at getting the puck on net. Against Harvard and Notre Dame, the Gophers have put up 40 or more shots on goal in three consecutive games for the first time since 2013.
"As a shooter, you've got to change the angle of the shot or guys have to screen for you and take away (the goaltender's) eyes," said Rem Pitlick, whose eight-game point streak came to an end last weekend. "It's the quantity. We really have to get a lot of shots. Some are going to go in."
Still, the number of shots last wekeend, like when the Gophers (9-6-1, 3-4-1-1 Big Ten) last faced Hayton, did not translate to a number of goals.
Notre Dame's defense and Morris limited Minnesota's second chances in a pair of wins. Head coach Don Lucia said after Saturday's game his team needed to be more willing to go into dirty areas, something the team has worked on in practice this week. The Gophers had two on 86 shots, both of which came from Mike Szmatula in front of the net on the power play.
"I liked so many things about our game (last weekend). That was the disappointing or frustrating part is that five of the six periods last weekend we played really well and probably deserved better," he said earlier this week. "Notre Dame's a good team, a veteran in so many ways. They made it hard.
"We generated a lot of chances. Now it's just finding a way to get those in the back of the net."
Minnesota also spent the week focusing on getting to more rebounds and dirty goals against Hayton and Wisconsin.
"(Notre Dame) had a lot of guys, they all came back to the house and slot and putting sticks on the ice," said Ramsey. "That's an emphasis coach has put on us (this week). We need to do that. Guys need to come back, little details and habits like that. Guys stopping in front of the net and getting sticks on the ice."
Welcomed to the offensive-friendly Big Ten, Hayton, whose .900 save percentage is down from two seasons at St. Lawrence averaging around .930, may not have gotten off to the start expected of him.
That isn't stopping the Gophers from taking lessons from last week or last year and applying them to this weekend.
"He's an All-American goalie and obviously that's a big deal. He's going to be a good goaltender in there so we're going to have to have that same mindset, get a lot of shots," Pitlick said. "That's our mindset."
#14 Wisconsin (9-6-2, 3-2-1-0 Big Ten) at #7 Minnesota (9-6-1, 3-4-1-1 Big Ten)
Dates: Friday December 1st and Saturday December 2nd
Times: 7:00 pm both nights
Location: 3M Arena at Mariucci in Minneapolis, MN
TV: Fox Sports North PLUS both nights
Radio: 1130 KTLK AM in Twin Cities both nights
Stream: BTN2Go/Fox Sports Go/TSN Go both nights
--
In case you missed it, I have a new professional Facebook page for my college hockey writing. Please like and follow at www.facebook.com/natewellswriteshockey/
You can also follow Nate on Twitter @gopherstate
No comments:
Post a Comment