OXFORD, Ohio — The major power play was not Miami’s friend on Friday.
The RedHawks gave up a shorthanded goal on an early five-minute power play and allowed two man-advantage goals later in the first period when they were killing a major.
In a battle of teams previously winless in league play, Colorado College ultimately rode that opening-period special-teams jackpot to a 5-1 win over Miami at Cady Arena.
Miami (4-4-1) is now winless in 10 straight games vs. CC, going 0-8-2 in that span.
RECAP: Colorado College’s Noah Laba carried the puck the length of the ice and shoveled a wrister from the right faceoff circle that snuck through Miami goalie Logan Neaton for a shorthanded marker 7:58 into the first period.
Then with 4:33 left in the opening stanza, Laba ripped home a one-timer from the slot off a centering feed by Zaccharya Wisdom from the right wing after a scramble had Neaton struggling to return to the net.
On the five-minute man-advantage, the Tigers’ Evan Werner threw a shot at the net that created a scrum in front of the Miami net, and Nicklas Andrews was able to poke the puck home to make it 3-0 with 2:16 to play in the first period.
Just 58 seconds later, Colorado College’s Gleb Veremyev added another power-play goal when he tipped in a wrister from the right point by Ryan Beck at the top of the right faceoff circle.
Veremyev extended the Tigers’ lead to five with 6:35 left in the middle frame when he buried an uncontested one-timer in from the slot off a feed by Andrews, making it 5-0.
Miami scored its lone goal on the power play at the 5:24 mark of the final stanza when a blueline wrister by defenseman Spencer Cox caught goalie Kaiden Mbereko by surprise, and the RedHawks’ Matthew Barbolini cashed in the rebound from the right side of the crease.
STATS: The glaring ones are: Miami has been outscored 11-1 in its last two games and slipped to 1-16-2 (.079) in its last 19 league matchups.
With St. Cloud State netting three goals both the second and third periods last Saturday and Colorado College (6-3) potting four in the first 20 minutes in this game, Miami was outscored, 10-0 over that 60-minute frame.
— Let’s inject some positive. Barbolini’s goal gives him the outright team lead with four on the season, as he pulled out of a tie with John Waldron, Raimonds Vitolins and P.J. Fletcher.
Cox earned the primary assist and is tied with now tied with Axel Kumlin for the team lead in defenseman points, as both are 0-4-4.
The other assist went to Waldron, his ninth point of the season. He trails only Barbolini in the RedHawks’ points race.
— This was just the second time this season MU outshot an opponent, edging Colorado College, 32-30 in that category.
— Miami averaged 4.4 goals in its first five games. The RedHawks are scoring at a 1.25-goal clip in their last four contests.
ANALYSIS: The final score obviously tells the story, but this segment will probably be more positive than expected.
To borrow baseball slang, Miami just can’t stop allowing crooked numbers by period and stop bleeding, a trend that has frankly dated back to the national championship game in 2009.
After falling behind, 4-0 early, the RedHawks played an excellent second period and were very solid in the third, outshooting Colorado College, 24-16 in the final 40 minutes.
Consistency has been a recurring long-term issue for the RedHawks, and this game was a prime example. For 40 minutes one could argue Miami was the better team, but it didn’t matter because the first 20 were no contest.
And credit belongs to the Tigers, who skated hard for 60 minutes, were opportunistic offensively, got sticks in lanes all night defensively, and Mbereko was excellent in net, stopping breakaways by Rihards Simanovics and Fletcher.
Was it easier for Miami to shine when the pressure was off, with the outcome already decided by a disastrous first period? Hard to say.
Either way, the RedHawks could’ve closed up shot and taken a 7-0 ‘L’, which we’ve seen far too many times the past few years.
At least the RedHawks enter Saturday riding the momentum of a quality final 40 minutes in this game.
— They combined for zero points and combined to finish minus-6, but the Tur-Duk-én line of Artur Turansky, Max Dukovac and William Hallén was still Miami’s best overall in terms of generating offensive chances.
— Once again, Cox was able to put a puck on net from the blue line that Barbolini scored on. Weird to talk about chemistry between a defenseman and power forward but they’re turning into a dangerous combo, largely on the power play.
— We usually don’t talk about referees but it was surprising that head zebra Sterling Egan (and to a lesser extent second ref Stephen Reneau), who normally does a good job handling rougher games, let this one get away to a degree.
Calling more coincidental minors in earlier skirmishes could’ve cut down the rough stuff later, but credit both teams for sticking up for themselves without doing anything egregiously stupid.
We could see a lot of whistles early on Saturday in an attempt to reestablish control.
LINEUP CHANGES: Miami’s locker room nearly doubles for a triage center these days.
Vitolins, who missed last Friday with an illness and was game-time for Game 2, was banged up in said contest and was still unavailable Friday.
Zane Demsey rejoined the lineup in his place, as Miami dressed all nine of its rostered defensemen, with Simanovics listed at forward.
Neaton returned to the net after sitting for Bruno Bruveris’ debut last Saturday.
Bruveris suffered an upper-body injury in practice and was not listed as Miami’s second or third goalie.
Five of the RedHawks’ six scratches on Saturday were due to injury.
Vitolins and Frankie Carogioiello will hopefully return soon, but it sounds like Ryan Sullivan — who made a very positive impression early this season — will miss significant time with an LBI.
GRADES
FORWARDS: D+. Worked hard, no doubt, but with little results. Thomas Daskas has been a very underrated forward this season. Teddy Lagerback was solid on the fourth line, and Simanovics — who actually predominantly back to defense — held his own up front. But just 18 shots from this corps isn’t good enough.
DEFENSEMEN: C-. With the unorthodox eight-defenseman lineup, plus Simanovics often dropping back to the blueline, it seems like the pairings were more randomized and communication at times seemed lacking. The slot was again left open multiple times in the game for a pair of easy goals. I’ll bet coming into the season this corps didn’t expect all nine of them to dress for games though. Right or wrong call, and I didn’t get a good look, the Dylan Moulton major was devastating. This nine-man unit did not generate a single point but did combine for 14 shots on goal.
GOALTENDING: C-. The shorthanded goal that opened the Colorado College scoring is one Neaton should’ve had, but he can’t be blamed for any of the other four, two of which were slam-dunks. With Bruveris now sidelined after allowing six goals in his debut, Neaton’s start total should only augment.
SCHEDULE/STANDINGS: These teams finish their weekend series at 7:05 p.m. on Saturday.
Miami fell to 4-4-1, the first time the RedHawks have slipped to .500 since Oct. 13.
MU and Minn.-Duluth are now the only NCHC teams that have not recorded a league point, but the Bulldogs have only played one conference game while the RedHawks are 0-3.
Miami is currently No. 34 out of 65 in the PairWise rankings.
FINAL THOUGHTS: ‘Throw the first period out and these teams tied’ isn’t really the right way to look at this game, or sports in general.
Both teams played 60 minutes on Friday, and wins and losses are based on that aggregate, not periods or portions thereof.
Colorado College ran Miami out of the building in the first period, which was a recipe for a 19-1 St. Cloud weekend-style blowout.
Fortunately for the RedHawks, that didn’t happen, but the first period still did.
Miami — again, 1-16-2 in its last 19 league games — just got outscored, 9-2 by a Huskies team with a .333 winning percentage last weekend, and on Friday lost 5-1 to the Tigers, who were beaten, 6-1 and 5-1 by Denver a week prior.
Again, the effort for the final 40 minutes was very impressive on Friday, but the schedule gets a lot tougher after this weekend and to this point, Miami hasn’t shown it can handle that major upcoming challenge.
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