Bulldogs blank Miami in opener

OXFORD, Ohio — Miami has struggled to score the past couple weekends, but on Friday the RedHawks couldn’t find the net with a GPS.

Minn.-Duluth tallied a pair of goals late in the first period and coasted to a 5-0 win over MU at Cady Arena in the teams’ series opener.

It was the first time in 41 games the RedHawks were shut out, as their last blanking came Nov. 8, 2023 at St. Cloud State.

Miami (3-8-2) has lost five straight games and eight of its last nine.

RECAP: UMD’s Carter Loney opened the scoring when he jammed home a rebound from the left side of the net off a shot from Joe Molenaar with 4:52 left in the first period.

Just three minutes later, a centering feed from the Bulldogs’ Blake Bechen along the half boards deflected in off teammate Jack Smith at the right of the cage.

With 7:48 left in the middle frame, Minn.-Duluth’s Dominic James skated into the offensive zone 1-on-1 and wired a shot past Miami goalie Ethan Dahlmeir from the slot glove side to make it 3-0.

The Bulldogs’ Anthony Menghini wired a wrister just under the crossbar near post from the top of the left faceoff circle to extend UMD’s lead to four with six minutes left in regulation, and Aiden Dubinsky slammed a rebound with under two minutes remaining to seal it.

Miami first-line forward Max Dukovac left with an apparent knee injury late in the first period, and Menghini was assessed a five-minute major.

Dukovac did not return.

STATS: The positive — Miami did hold Minn.-Duluth (4-6) to one power play and killed it, improving to 93.5 percent on the season?

— The RedHawks’ offense was downgraded from D1 to D2 on the drought index monitor, transitioning from a moderate drought to severe. Miami has netted just 14 goals in its last nine games (1.56 average), including four markers in the RedHawks’ last four games.

This was also the worst loss of Anthony Noreen’s young Division I career in terms of scoring differential.

ANALYSIS: After struggling to get its legs the first few shifts when it was largely pinned in its zone, Miami played a pretty good first period but was beaten in front of its net on the first goal, saw a second one hit off a skate for the second one and suddenly its 2-0 at first intermission.

But the killer was the RedHawks’ inability to do anything on their major power play to start the second period.

Minn.-Duluth scored again eight minutes after that man-advantage expired and the game was essentially over, despite a solid effort overall by MU that period.

The final was 5-0 and the Bulldogs earned every bit of it, but it didn’t feel like Miami played as badly as the score indicated.

— The RedHawks had 11 minutes of power play time and couldn’t score, which was one of the key reasons the final score was so lopsided.

A lot of credit is due to an aggressive Minn.-Duluth penalty kill, and still some was a result of forced passes and overaggression on Miami’s end, which has been a recurring issue early this season.

— On a related note, the past couple of weeks and the first two periods of this game, Casper Nassen has been wide open in the left faceoff circle, where he’s buried multiple howitzers already this season and his teammates failed to recognize it and haven’t been lobbing one-time feeds to him, but they finally got him a couple of pucks late and he nearly scored twice.

Nassen is going to be a major force on the RedHawks’ top power play unit and one of the most lethal man-advantage threats in the conference for multiple years.

— Dukovac’s injury looked pretty bad, as he was down for multiple minutes and put little pressure on his leg as he was helped off.

Hoping for the best, as he’s a major asset for the RedHawks up front.

— For the second time, Miami used its review on a play it probably shouldn’t have. The RedHawks reviewed a play on the first goal in which they alleged Christophe Fillion was hit in the head.

By rule, that would be a major, but any review for a penalty has to come back as either a major or nothing — a minor isn’t an option.

It definitely didn’t look the evidence supported that claim, and Miami lost its time out as a result.

LINEUP CHANGES: None among the skaters, and Dahlmeir alternated with Bruno Bruveris for the fifth straight game.

STANDINGS: Miami has one point three games into the NCHC slate, tied with Arizona State for last place in the league.

The RedHawks have slipped to 57th out of 64 in the PairWise, leading 2024-25 non-conference opponents Ferris State (No. 60) and Alaska-Anchorage (No. 61).

GRADES

FORWARDS: D. Effort definitely matters, and Miami definitely spent a lot of time in the UMD zone and generated a ton of good shots, but all either missed or were saved. Losing Dukovac for 40 minutes didn’t help. Credit to UMD goalie and Chicago Blackhawks second-round pick Adam Gajan, who was 21-for-21 to earn his first career shutout.

DEFENSEMEN: D. Again, a grade based on results and not effort. Outlet passes were a major struggle for this corps, as almost all were intercepted, deflected or went for icing. This unit combined for just three shots on goal.

GOALTENDING: C-. Another tough one to score, as Dahlmeir made several excellent saves early and deserved a better fate than a 24 of 29 line. He definitely didn’t allow any soft goals — all five were on close-range snipes or blasts that picked the corners.

FINAL THOUGHTS: Here goes probably the boldest stance of the season…

There probably should’ve been more of a physical response by Miami in this game, if not while Dukovac was injured, later in the game after the outcome was decided.

Minn.-Duluth knocked one of the RedHawks’ top players out on a borderline dirty hit, took two boarding penalties and blew up John Waldron near the benches on a clean but hard hit.

Not advocating taking dangerous runs at players or stupid penalties, but after getting it handed to them on home ice, both physically as well as on the scoreboard, a more aggressive response by Miami would’ve been welcome and probably helped the morale of a team that has now lost eight of nine.

Plus it could’ve set a better tone for Miami heading into Saturday’s finale.