Michael Gill

The Jackrabbits had studied well. Being good students, they welcomed the St. Cloud State hockey club to the Larson Ice Center to prove that this time they were ready for the test.

Not forgetting the embarrassment of the second weekend of the season, the Jacks brought out their A game and gave the hard- skating SCSU a much improved weekend series.

The Jacks were able to split the series, getting a much needed win out over the weekend. Friday night the Jacks took SCSU to overtime winning 5-4 but were not quite able to compete for a win on Saturday due to penalty troubles losing 6-1.

Starting off the weekend, St. Cloud started fast by out shooting the Jacks 15-6 and getting two past Heath Isaacson to take a 2-0 score into the first intermission.

Down 2-0 it took the Jacks until the 13:50 mark before they were able to light up the lamps with a power-play goal by Ben Bofenkamp with assists going to Nate Bofenkamp and Mike Schaub.

With the energy back on their bench, the Jacks didn’t relent and Billy Schneider scored the first in his eventual hat trick with an unassissted goal 37 seconds after the Jacks celebrated their first. Schneider would add the Jacks 3rd goal of the period with another unasissted goal with 4:07 left in the period.

After St. Cloud finally answered the Jacks streak to end the 2nd period. With 15:13 left to go in the period, Schneider burned the St. Cloud goalie for the hattrick assisted by Adam Nelson.

St. Cloud was quick to answer with a goal by Dan Score assited by Lyle Honsey and Derek Gessel at the 14:41 left in the 3rd. Score’s goal tied it up at 4-4 where the score would stay until overtime.

Not being satisfied to get one point for a tie, the Jacks outplayed St. Cloud and won the game with 3:21 left in the extra period on a shot from the point by Pat Deniger, assisted by Schaub and Jon Samuelson to end it at 5-4.

The Jacks finished the game with only 4 penalties for 14 minutes and 35 shots on goal, compared to St. Cloud’s 7 penalties for 18 minutes and 29 shots on goal.

Saturday would prove not to be as exciting as penalty trouble handcuffed the Jacks against the talented St. Cloud squad. After playing disicplined hockey all night Firday and only racking up 14 penalty minutes, the Jacks were tagged with 12 on Saturday for 34 minutes. Hampered by penalties, the Jacks couldn’t muster more than one goal Saturday despite a few stretches of impressive skating.

St. Cloud took advantage and scored four power play goals play goals and were able to score five unanswered goals. St. Cloud was the first to get on the scoreboard with a goal by Nick Belford at the 12:40 mark. The Jacks held tight throughout the 1st period with play that won them the game got them to overtime on Friday.

Ending out the period, the Jacks started colagulating in the penalty box and let the game get away. With 17:57 left in the second St. Cloud started taking advantage of Jackrabbit penalties with a goal by Dan Score. Within a three minute stretch St. Cloud would add two more goals to end the period up 4-0. The only high point for the Jacks beyond the 1st period was a goal by Ryan Taylor assisted by John Cramer with 6:23 left to play in the 3rd.

With the weekend split, the Jacks now stand at 14-5-2 for the season heading into their final two weekends of GPCHA conference play and ranked 3rd in their region.

“If we have aspirations for the national tournament, we need to win all four games, each of the four one at a time. We have at least gotten to the point where we are in our own tournament (GPCHA),” said head coach Marty Schipull.

#1.887473:537582177.jpg:hockey.jpg:Tom Wilson, of St. Cloud State, trys to pin a Jackrabbit to the boards in Saturday?s game. St. Cloud won the game which saw 19 penalties called. SDSU did split the weekend showing their ability to play with one of the better teams in the conference.: