ALBANY, N.Y. — Sitting on UMD’s charter flight to Albany Wednesday, it dawned on me how long it had been since I had taken such a flight.
I didn’t cover the 2021 Frozen Four in Pittsburgh in person, the choice was made to work the event virtually on the back end of the pandemic. In 2022, I flew commercial to Colorado to cover UMD in the Loveland Regional (shout out to Fort Collins, which was an awesome place to shack up for a few days).
So this was my first charter flight with the team since 2019, when we flew to Allentown for a regional and then Buffalo for the Frozen Four.
Experiences I don’t take for granted, because you never know when it’s the last time.
9 THOUGHTS
1. UMD is hopeful that its experience in the NCHC Frozen Faceoff helps it on this stage. The Bulldogs have just one player — senior forward Kyler Kovich, a transfer from Cornell — who has played in the NCAA Tournament. Another, junior defenseman Brady Cleveland, got a taste of the tournament during his freshman season at Wisconsin, but he did not play in the Badgers’ game against eventual champion Quinnipiac.
Penn State was in the Frozen Four last year, losing to Boston University in the semifinals. The Nittany Lions return 14 players who partook in at least one game of that run. Those 14 players combine to bring 54 games of NCAA Tournament experience to Friday’s game, with 10 goals and 22 points.
Experience isn’t necessarily the be all, end all. But it does count for something.
For UMD, there are a lot of players who won in prep hockey or junior hockey. But junior hockey playoffs are not one-and-done the way the NCAA Tournament is.
“We know anyone can beat anyone in college hockey,” UMD senior Joey Pierce said. “We’ve learned that over our time here. We feel like it’s small margins. so we just have to think about what we can do. That’s when we’ve been our best this year, is when we’re worried about our game and playing our game at our level.”
2. For Joey Pierce and Riley Bodnarchuk, this might be more than just another road trip.
Both joined the UMD program for the 2022-23 season, part of a freshman class that included the likes of Issac Howard, Ben Steeves, Aiden Dubinsky, Jack Smith, and Cole Spicer. All five proved themselves to be very good Division I players.
Steeves turned pro after two really good years at UMD. Howard (Michigan State, won the Hobey Baker last year), Dubinsky (Wisconsin), Smith (Minnesota State), and Spicer (Western Michigan) either already did or will wrap up their careers at a different university, along with fellow 2022 freshmen Kyle Bettens (Northern Michigan) and Luke Johnson (Alaska, then Alaska-Anchorage).
Yes, Pierce and Bodnarchuk are the only players out of that 2022-23 recruiting class to play four years for the Bulldogs. This weekend marks their first chance to play in the NCAA Tournament.
For Bodnarchuk, the chance to play in this tournament was a big selling point as he made his way here from Okotoks, Alberta.
“I knew they were a big hockey school in a hockey town,” he said, “and I obviously knew Quinn Olson (played his junior hockey in Okotoks) went here and and so that that was about the extent I knew about it. When I was being recruited, (associate coach Adam) Krause sent me a video of the town and the rink and the school and all that. It just looked like a good place to play, and the history of NHL players they put through here as well was another another big thing.”
3. For Pierce, a native of Ely and a former standout at Hermantown, it’s a doubly special opportunity.
“Coming to this program, we want to be winners and we are expected to be winners at this program,” the UMD captain said. “That’s part of why we chose to come here and why we love playing here is the high expectations. This is obviously a first step in meeting those and so we’re excited for being able to be here but we also know there’s an opportunity in front of us, even bigger opportunity that we’re excited for.”
“We put a lot of work in to get here,” junior defenseman Aaron Pionk said, “the last two years weren’t where we wanted to be and we knew that. We’re glad doing it with the group that we have now. It’s been a lot of work, but it’s been a lot of fun getting here.”
Obviously, guys like Pierce, Pionk, the Plantes, and Ty Hanson have a different perspective, being from here. But as coach Scott Sandelin has said repeatedly, the leaders have been driving this team to this spot, basically since last season ended.
4. UMD has seemingly been building to this moment since Ryan Kirwan of Arizona State ended the Bulldogs’ season last March in Tempe.
“It was a huge driver for me,” Pionk said. “It was kind of same story as my freshman year as well. So kind of a sour taste in your mouth again, kind of a repeat of being out in the first round, first two games, it stunk. Just looking back with like all the guys that stayed in Duluth all summer and these guys to my left and right here (Pionk sat between Pierce and Zam Plante at Thursday’s media conference).
“We came from a program of success at Hermantown. We just thought we’d bring that back to Duluth. And so I think that was a big driving factor for us as well. Like we knew how to do it. And we’re glad we can show it now. So it’s a huge driver for the last two years though, just to get that, get that taste out of your mouth and get back to some winning hockey.”
“My whole life with my dad (Derek) in the program,” Plante said, “just watching success and then going in last year and not having that success, it felt like we had failed. And I know the guys in the room felt the same way. It was almost like the next day after we lost, guys were ready to get back at it because they knew what they wanted, chomping at the bit to get back to this spot and playing these games.”
Sandelin has been pleased with this aspect of his group, basically since the end of last season.
“It means you got the right players,” he said when asked what it means to him to hear his players talking about the motivation they got from last season. “Very driven. That have high expectations and high standards. It’s not easy to say it. You gotta go and do it. And we’re in a extremely difficult conference. And you go through a year where there’s a lot of ups and downs, nothing smooth.”
5. Kovich has played in four NCAA Tournament games, during the 2023 and 2025 postseasons at Cornell (he was out with an injury for the 2024 tourney, which is why he is here for a fifth year). He talked in late February about the kinds of things he will tell his younger teammates about playing under this spotlight.
“I think I was in the regionals my last three years (he was out injured for the 2024 NCAA Tournament), so I’ve had a decent amount of experience with it, it’s definitely trying to tell the young guys that it’s a different hockey atmosphere on the ice, off the ice. Playoffs is a completely new season, and everyone’s trying 95, 100 percent harder than you’ve experienced the entire season. So I think having conversation with those younger guys and kind of preparing them for essentially a new season is something that’s going to be important.”
Pierce said there were players coming to him with questions “I don’t have an answer to either right now, just because they think we’ve been here before.
“I think it’s fun for all of us to go through it together.”
6. One of the important things you can get out of a conference tournament is the “win or you’re done” mentality.
Given UMD’s relative lack of NCAA Tournament experience, the Bulldogs probably hope the last couple weeks can serve as a helper.
After two overtime wins over St. Cloud State to start this playoff run, UMD went to Grand Forks and ripped into NCHC regular season champ North Dakota, 5-1. Last weekend, the Bulldogs rallied from 3-0 down to tie Denver in the NCHC title game, but the Pioneers held UMD off the board long enough to pot the winner themselves in the second overtime.
“The atmospheres were super cool,” Pierce said. “Both of them. And Denver was, the most people, we’d played in front of it in that building, too. Tons of energy, obviously the excitement of a trophy being in the building, which we hadn’t played for either. And so all those things combined, definitely we liked that experience and we felt like we played well going into those games.”
Outside of UMD’s start on Saturday, which wasn’t great and can’t be repeated (and Denver may have played a role there), the Bulldogs have to be pleased with how they’re playing.
“I mean, obviously our first half was good,” Sandelin said. “Our January was just okay. But I think this group has grown through the year and they deserve to be here. We’ve played some really good hockey. The record may not indicate in the second half, but I really liked the way our team has grown and played in a lot of the games. It’s a fine line winning and losing. They’ve shown a lot of character and a lot of situations and they’ve shown what kind of team they can be. They also know which kind of team we don’t want to be. So hopefully (Friday) we get the team we want to be.”
7. The opponent Friday will be Penn State, a program in its 14th season that has never played against UMD. Day one head coach Guy Gadowsky is no stranger, however. He was the head coach at Princeton when UMD pulled off a miraculous comeback against the Tigers to win in the opening round of the 2009 NCAA Tournament in Minneapolis, a game dubbed the Miracle at Mariucci.
Fun night. I was sitting next to UMD operations assistant and Bulldog legend Bill Watson in the press box, and that might have been the closest I’ve ever come to death at a hockey game.
8. Anyway, UMD isn’t playing Princeton here Friday. Far from it.
The Nittany Lions are loaded. Gavin McKenna, who might go first overall in the NHL Draft this summer, has 51 points. Matt DiMarsico has 18 goals. Penn State has six guys with ten or more goals, including experienced horses like Aiden Fink and Reece Laubach. Freshman goalie Joshua Fleming has a .922 save percentage while seeing a lot of shots every night, as Penn State isn’t known for packing it in defensively.
Instead, Penn State has all sorts of giddy-up to its game. It’s very similar to Western Michigan’s teams in how they get the puck and go north. Sandelin knows managing the puck and keeping from having to defend transition offense all night will be critical.
“Any good transition team or a team that’s good off the rush, you got to take care of the puck,” he said. “Manage the puck through the neutral zone. Possess in the offensive zone, not giving back to them to start transition. But the neutral zone’s critical. And I think when you’re in your own zone, you gotta get out of there quick and clean, as fast as you can.
“It’s easier said than done, it’s not a lot different than the teams we’ve played in our league that play very similar. If you don’t manage the puck or you don’t get pucks out or turn pucks over, it makes the game (hard), because you’re chasing and they’ve got some really talented players and a couple of defensemen that aren’t afraid to get up and be involved in their offense. We’ve got to do a good job and play smart with the puck.”
9. Before we go, I need to acknowledge the passing of my friend, Jessi Pierce, who lost her life (along with her three children) in a house fire last weekend in White Bear Lake. I was busy last Saturday, getting ready for the NCHC title game, and I paid little to no attention to the Wild game that afternoon. Jessi wasn’t there, and I had no idea because I hadn’t been on social media very much. Got word of what had happened during the UMD-Denver game, and frankly five days later I’m not sure I’ve really processed that this is real.
Jessi was a bright light, a “ray of sunshine,” as Wild GM Bill Guerin said this week. I met her at the 2018 Frozen Four in St. Paul, and quickly figured out that she was an impressive person with a work ethic to match. Our paths didn’t cross often, but when they did, you would have thought we were best friends.
I saw her with the kids at the World Juniors, and we spoke for the last time on my radio show last week, where, among other things, she said she reminded her kids they were eligible to be pinched if they weren’t wearing green on St. Patrick’s Day.
Our last interaction, as it turned out, was after last Friday’s Wild practice. Jessi always posted the lines for her “Line Heathens,” as she playfully called them. When her line chart showed Marcus Johansson on the top line for Saturday, I knew I could get a laugh out of the message I sent her. Mission accomplished.
People like Jessi Pierce are a big reason why a job like this one can be so much fun. There are days where it feels a bit monotonous, and you can count on the Jessies of the world to keep everything light.
As my boss is prone to say, we aren’t curing cancer here. Thank heavens, because the world would be in a lot of trouble. But it’s okay to laugh and smile once in a while. Jessi didn’t let those around her go long without doing that.
My heart breaks for her husband, Mike, a man I do not know. But his world flipped upside down, and I don’t know what to say to someone like that. The GoFundMe is still active, if you’re so inclined.
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Late start here in Albany Friday, thanks to the nice people at ESPN.
7:30pm pregame, and that’s assuming Michigan and Bentley wrap up their business on time.
Either way, we’ll have it on the radio. Back pregame with lines.
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