OXFORD, Ohio — In Miami’s final home game of 2023-24, its special teams were anything but special.
The RedHawks were swept by No. 18 Omaha, 2-1 at Cady Arena on Saturday, giving up both goals on the power play and failing to generate any scoring chances on their lone man-advantage.
The loss extends Miami’s winless streak to 12 games, tied for the fifth-longest skid in team history.
The RedHawks wrap up their regular season at Western Michigan next weekend.
RECAP: After a scoreless first 20 minutes, Miami (7-22-3) took the lead at the 2:12 mark of the second period when Artur Turansky tipped home a right-point wrister by Axel Kumlin from the top of the crease.
Five minutes later on a two-man advantage, Omaha’s Griffin Ludtke beat RedHawks goalie Logan Neaton on a one-timer from the high slot, glove side to tie the score.
With 5:55 left in that frame, the Mavericks’ Matt Miller slid a pass from behind the net to Jack Randl in the slot, and he one-timed it through Neaton for the eventual game-winner.
Miami had a Grade-A chance denied by goalie Simon Latkoczy in the final minute of regulation to preserve the win for Omaha (18-10-4).
STATS: Turansky snapped an eight-game points skid, netting his third marker of the season.
His other two goals both came on Oct. 13 vs. Canisius.
Kumlin picked up the primary assist, giving him points in consecutive games and 10 on the campaign.
Albin Nilsson earned the secondary helper, as he has seven points in 14 games in 2023-24.
— Miami finished 2-for-4 on the penalty kill and is now just 12 of 20 (60.0 percent) in its last six games.
— Jack Clement moved into fourth place on the team’s all-time games-played leaderboard. He has dressed for 162 contests, behind only Chris Wideman (163), Pat Cannone (166) and Jarod Palmer (169).
Miami would need to win the NCHC Tournament and advance to the NCAAs for Clement to have a shot a breaking the school record.
Clement is a graduate senior in his fifth season with the RedHawks, while everyone else on the top 10 games-played leaderboard played four years in Oxford.
— The RedHawks have lost 20 straight games in March. MU also dropped its sixth consecutive contest vs. Omaha.
Its current 12-game winless streak (0-11-1) ties its slump from Dec. 31 to Feb. 25 last season, during which the RedHawks were 0-10-2.
Miami has only gone more than 12 games without a victory once in the past 33 years, suffering an 0-11-4 snap Nov. 23, 2018-Feb. 8, 2019.
— Omaha won both games this weekend by one, improving to a ridiculous 14-1 in one-goal games.
ANALYSIS: The storylines for this game weren’t very complicated: 1) Miami had all kinds of trouble breaching a very good Omaha defense corps, and 2) the Mavericks dominated the special teams battle.
The RedHawks were limited to 21 shots on goal, their sixth-lowest total of the season, and a handful were from the perimeter without traffic in front of the net.
Completing passes was difficult, skating through zones was difficult, advancing the puck at all seemed like a challenge much of the game — again, more a compliment to UNO, as the Miami effort was solid.
Then there was special teams. UNO had four power play chances, including a 5-on-3 slated for 1:47. Both goals were scored on the man-advantage.
Miami finished with one power play chance and fumbled the puck for most of that.
(As someone who rarely criticizes officiating because it hurts credibility and can reek of homerism, the RedHawks deserved better than one power play chance when UNO was given four including such an extensive two-man advantage)
Miami was only down one heading into the third period but it felt like more. It didn’t help that Latkoczy was superb in net.
The RedHawks’ roster will look very different in seven months, and it would’ve been great if they could’ve finished their home slate on a high note.
— Excellent crowd of nearly 3,000. A lot of the prime SRO areas were actually populated, which hasn’t happened much in recent years.
And they were loud. A goal in that final minute would’ve jacked the decibel meter to triple digits.
It seemed like half of the home schedule was played on holiday weekends, during breaks or J-term, but considering the standings, Miami generated some impressive crowds at Cady Arena in 2023-24.
Hopefully that carries over to this fall.
— A glass pane shattered in the same row for the second time in a month. This one happened in the second period moments after Turansky’s goal.
From the NCHC highlight footage, it was not broken seconds before the goal, so perhaps a fan was able to fracture it?
It happened on Feb. 2 and now March 2 only a few panes apart. Weird. #cadyarenapanegate
— After being called for interference, Blake Mesenburg lobbied the officials that he wasn’t the guilty party, and the officials reviewed it. Ultimately they concluded Turansky should’ve received the minor. Didn’t know that was something that was reviewable.
Mesenburg is one of Miami’s top penalty killers, so that was a smart play on his part. Just surprised it went to the booth and was changed.
LINEUP CHANGES: In goal, Neaton missed 11 games with an ankle injury and replaced Bruno Bruveris, who started Friday in net.
Miami reverted to its unorthodox 11-forward, eight-defenseman lineup on Saturday, with D-man Spencer Cox dressing in place of Teddy Lagerback.
STANDINGS: At 1-19-2 (.091) in the league, Miami has already clinched last place in the NCHC, and with North Dakota winning the Penrose, that means the RedHawks will be heading to Grand Forks for a best-of-3 series to open the conference tournament in two weeks.
MU is 46th out of 64 teams in the PairWise.
GRADES
FORWARDS: D. Turansky scored and Nilsson picked up a secondary assist on the goal. That was the highlight from this corps, which combined for just 12 shots. In fairness, a couple of key points producers were banged up and the top six has logged a ton of minutes the past couple of months.
DEFENSEMEN: B+. The D-men racked up nine SOG, including three by Kumlin, who also notched the primary assist on MU’s lone goal. Kumlin struggled at times earlier this season but has been much better lately. Clement and Moulton were solid on the top pairing as well. This corps helped hold Omaha to very few quality chances and even fewer odd-man rushes.
GOALTENDING: A-. Neaton missed 11 games with an ankle injury and was in mid-season form from the opening faceoff. He faced six shots in the opening minutes and denied all of them. The first goal was a snipe from the high slot and the second was on a centering feed from behind the net. Neither were bad goals. His return in top form makes Miami a much more dangerous team heading into the tournament.
FINAL THOUGHTS: Coach Chris Bergeron talked about the seniors who were honored tonight in his postgame presser.
In a way it seems like last month but strangely it also feels like it was decades ago, but the current true fourth-year Miami senior class — defensemen Dylan Moulton, Robby Drazner and Hampus Rydqvist and stud forward Matthew Barbolini — began their RedHawks careers in the Omaha bubble in early December of 2020.
Because of COVID, they opened their freshman seasons by playing 10 games in 21 days at neutral-site Baxter Arena in Omaha, where all eight league teams were basically quarantined save their practices and scheduled games.
Since that most peculiar first month of their collegiate careers, all four have managed to carve out solid careers at Miami. And hopefully all will advance to successful pro careers, if they don’t return for their COVID-redshirt fifth seasons.
Clement, who came in the season before, as well as P.J. Fletcher and Neaton, have exhausted their eligibility and have almost certainly played their last collegiate games in front of home fans as well.
All have gone through immense adversity, worked extremely hard both on the ice and in the classroom and have represented the program and the school well.
Obviously we hope they buck the odds the next few weeks and make an NCAA Tournament run, but however that plays out we wish all of them the very best on the ice and in life moving forward.
View From the Glass 