Miami scored goals a minute apart to pull within one, but No. 2 North Dakota ran off three straight tallies put the series opener out of reach.
The RedHawks netted a pair of late goals to close the final deficit but ultimately lost 6-4 at North Dakota on Friday.
Miami fell to 1-12-1 (.107) vs. the Fighting Hawks in the teams’ last 14 meetings.
RECAP: North Dakota (8-2-1) took the lead with 8:01 left in the first period when Cameron Berg centered a pass from the left corner to Hunter Johannes, who stepped into a shot from the high slot and beat Miami goalie Logan Neaton stick side on the power play.
Jayden Perron extended the UND lead less than three minutes later. He tried to flip a pass through the crease to a teammate, but the puck popped into the air off a Miami body and landed on the left side of the cage, where Perron punched it in.
Eight minutes into the middle frame, UND’s Jackson Blake connected with a streaking Owen McLaughlin at the left side of the cage, and McLaughlin shoveled the feed in to give the Fighting Hawks a 3-0 lead.
Miami (4-6-1) finally got on the board 87 seconds later, as P.J. Fletcher tipped home a wrister by Hampus Rydqvist from the right point to make it 3-1.
Just 51 seconds passed before the RedHawks made it a one-score game. Matthew Barbolini took a cross-ice feed from Jack Clement in stride, carried it to the inside of the left faceoff circle and buried a shot far post.
But North Dakota’s Jackson Blake was able to redirect a pinballing loose puck at the top of the crease just inside the post to give the Fighting Hawks a 4-2 lead with 7:18 remaining in the second stanza.
At the 16:21 mark of the period, Carson Albrecht tapped in a 2-on-1 point-blank feed from McLaughlin, who toe-dragged around the remaining Miami defender.
Off the opening third-period faceoff, North Dakota bulled its way through the RedHawks’ defense, and Albrecht chopped a pass to Dylan James, who fired in a bad-angle shot from the left side of the net.
Miami did trim the lead to three with 2:28 left in regulation and a second left on a 4-on-3 power play. Spencer Cox wound up and whipped a shot past Persson on the stick side from the high slot.
With three seconds remaining in the game, the RedHawks’ Blake Mesenburg tipped home a left-point blast by Jack Clement at the top of the crease to wrap up the scoring.
STATS: Fletcher and Barbolini both finished 1-1-2, and Clement also ended the night with two points, both on assists.
It was Barbolini’s fourth multi-point game of the season, but the first of 2023-24 for Fletcher and Clement.
Clement recorded two points for just the third time in his career, with the other two occurrences coming his freshman season in 2019-20.
Mesenburg scored his third career goal, and all have come in his three games in Grand Forks. He has potted one marker in each contest at North Dakota and has zero tallies in the 33 games not played in the Peace Garden State.
Cox’s goal was the ninth of his collegiate career but his first in a Miami sweater.
— With an assist on the late Mesenburg marker, Rihards Simanovics picked up his first NCAA point.
— The RedHawks were outshot, 42-13 but managed to score four goals off Persson.
ANALYSIS: Miami scored twice to pull within one, 3-2, but Blake scored unassisted on a loose-puck-gone-wrong near the RedHawks’ net.
MU chose to challenge the call of a neutral zone hand pass, but it was ruled that didn’t directly contribute to the goal. That seemed to be the turning point.
The RedHawks did battle hard the rest of the way, sneaking in two late goals to trim the final deficit, but that fourth UND goal was a dagger.
The final score isn’t exactly directly proportional to the shots, as Miami was outshot by more than a 3-to-1 deficit (42-13) for the first time since the finale of 19-1 weekend at St. Cloud State, when MU was blanked, 8-0 and gave up 43 shots while managing just 14 itself.
While Miami didn’t win, the effort was obvious, especially late. North Dakota is one of the teams in the Division I and the RedHawks are trying to rebuild and missing multiple key players.
Earning points this weekend was always going to be a tough task.
— My apologies for not posting a preview. Work issues and other life obligations took priority.
LINEUP CHANGES: Raimonds Vitolins returned to the first line up front, and defenseman Dylan Moulton was scratched for the first time this season.
FINAL THOUGHTS: Just a better team beating a lesser team.
North Dakota is impressive and looked like a national championship contender in this game.
View From the Glass 