Thanks to an outstanding road effort and a late rally, Miami halted its losing streak at eight games.
But the RedHawks’ winless string reached nine.
No. 3 Denver and Miami skated to a 3-3 tie at Magness Arena on Friday, and the Pioneers earned the second league point by winning the shootout.
The RedHawks’ overall skid vs. DU likewise ended at 12 games, but Miami’s winless streak vs. the Pioneers is now 13 contests (0-12-1).
The teams will wrap up their lone season series at 8 p.m. on Saturday.
RECAP: Miami (7-19-3) took the lead with 6:56 left in the opening period when it broke out of its zone for a 4-on-2 and Raimonds Vitolins threaded a pass from the high slot to the left side of the net for a streaking Matthew Barbolini, who reached out and redirected the puck past sprawling goalie Matt Davis on the power play.
Denver (20-8-3) tied it on its first man-advantage, as Shai Buium slid a lateral pass to Jared Wright from right to left through the top of the crease for a one-time tap-in with 1:29 left in the first frame.
Sam Harris put the Pioneers ahead on a 2-on-1, streaking down the left wing and beating Miami goalie Bruno Bruveris far post midway through the second period.
Denver took a 3-1 lead with 9:33 left in regulation when Zeev Buium fed a pass through traffic to a wide-open Wright on the left wing, and he buried the one-timer from the inside edge of the left faceoff circle.
Less than two minutes later, Miami trimmed its deficit to one on a Vitolins deflection in the slot off a wrister from the point by Rihards Simanovics on the power play.
Barbolini struck again with 2:57 left in regulation, tipping home a chest-high blue-line wrister from Spencer Cox at the top of the crease, tying the score and forcing overtime.
Bruveris made a highlight-reel glove save on a one-timer late in overtime to help Miami salvage the tie.
DU’s Tristan Broz scored on his team’s first shootout attempt, and the RedHawks went 0-for-3.
STATS: Three RedHawks finished with two points.
Barbolini recorded his second multi-goal game with Miami, and both have come this season. He also scored twice in the RedHawks’ 4-3 home loss to Mercyhurst on Nov. 24.
Vitolins finished 1-1-2 and boasts the RedHawks’ longest scoring streak at three games, going 2-2-4 since returning from injury.
John Waldron picked up two assists, giving him six points in five games. It was his second career two-helper contest, with his other coming Oct. 27 in a 5-4 win over Arizona State.
— Cox, Simanovics and Robby Drazner also picked up assists.
Drazner’s helper was his first of the season and the eighth of his career.
Cox has two in his last four games and Simanovics has picked up three in five.
— Miami scored twice in four chances on the power play, its first two-PPG game since Oct. 13 vs. Canisius.
— Denver scored once in each period, meaning the RedHawks have allowed a goal in 14 of their last 15 stanzas.
— Talk about 3s being wild. Bruveris stopped 33 shots and allowed three goals in Miami’s last game vs. St. Cloud State and again surrendered three goals while stopping 33 in this contest.
The final in this game was 3-3.
ANALYSIS: Similar to the home opener vs. North Dakota three weeks ago, Miami left it all on the ice, nearly upsetting the third-ranked team in college hockey.
Unlike the past couple of recent stretch runs when one pondered the which Miami team would show up on a given night, the hard-working, energetic squad has hit the ice for the RedHawks most nights and most periods this calendar year.
Especially impressive was the third period, which saw MU fall behind by two but rally to tie the score and force OT at altitude. The RedHawks outshot Denver, 15-8 in the final 20 minutes of regulation.
Denver didn’t bring its proverbial ‘A’ game and may have been caught looking beyond this series, but unfortunately for Miami, the third-ranked Pioneers are talented enough to get away with that and were able to earn two of three points anyway.
— Bad defensive breakdowns were costly for Miami.
Poor down-low coverage resulted in basically a Denver 2-on-0 in front of the net on its first goal, scored on the power play set up by two lateral cross-crease passes (remember that was an issue two weeks ago too?).
Miami completely lost Wright on DU’s third goal, as he was wide open in the left faceoff circle. The top line was complacent on those goals defensively.
— Loved the Cox-to-Barbolini goal, a high-low combination we salivated about early in the season. Hopefully we see more offensive chances resulting from Cox’s super-accurate blue line wristers and Barbolini’s tip-in ability.
Barbolini is one of the best at redirecting outside shots into the net in Miami history.
— Excellent game overall by Bruveris, and his posts deserve credit as well for shutting down the same skater in the third period and OT.
— Entertaining overtime, and credit to Bruveris for sprinting across to glove that late one-time blast.
— I’m waiting for the NHL to introduce an over-and-back delay-of-game rule Elliotte Friedman has waxed about. I’m definitely in favor.
— Miami couldn’t score on a major power play but found the net on two minors. Power play chances were 4-2 RedHawks in this game.
LINEUP CHANGES: Just one, and it was up front: Teddy Lagerback dressed in place of Brayden Morrison.
After dressing for 19 straight games, shut-down D-man Zane Demsey was scratched for the second consecutive contest.
STANDINGS: Well, with five games left in the regular season and Miami just now picking up its seventh league point, the RedHawks are pretty much locked into eighth place.
The only chance MU has to climb out of the NCHC cellar is if it wins out and seventh-place Minn.-Duluth (which leads Miami by 14 with 21 points) drops its last five.
With the tie against the third-ranked team in college hockey, Miami moved up to 45th in the Pairwise rankings.
FINAL THOUGHTS: For the way-too-many-th time in recent years, what should be an exciting time of scoreboard watching and examining potential postseason matchups has been relegated to figuring out which team will win the Penrose and become Miami’s first-round NCHC foe that will probably end the RedHawks’ season.
This season has become a situation of too little, too late, and now MU will have to beat one of the top D-I teams in a best-of-3 road series and win two more single-elimination games in St. Paul to advance to the NCAA Tournament.
If there is any bright side, it’s that if Miami is able to give this kind of effort — tying the third-ranked team in college hockey on its home ice — the RedHawks will be a tough out come tournament time.
View From the Glass 