DULUTH — Minnesota Duluth enters the final two weeks of the regular season with the best overall power play in the NCHC at 28%. That percentage also ranks in the top five for all of NCAA Division I men’s hockey, however, the Bulldogs are dismissive of their ranking.
As coach Scott Sandelin pointed out Wednesday, much of that success came in the month of October when UMD was 38.7% (12-for-31) on the power play over its first seven games. Of UMD’s 26 power-play goals this year, 17 came during the first two months of the season.
“Honestly, I think our power play hasn’t been great the last few weeks,” said UMD junior defenseman Owen Gallatin. “I know early on in the season, we were clicking almost every power play it felt like. But the last few weeks, it felt like we haven’t really been connecting that well.”
The Bulldogs travel to Colorado College this week for a pair of NCHC contests slated for 8 p.m. CST on Friday and 7 p.m. CST on Saturday at Ed Robson Arena in Colorado Springs. UMD has lost six straight games, and scored just two power-play goals during the skid.
Of course, to score power-play goals, you have to be on the power play, and man advantages have been hard to come by for the Bulldogs this season.
Through 20 of 24 regular season conference contests, UMD has had a league-low 93 power play attempts overall. Only 49 of those have come in NCHC play, which is also a league low.
The next lowest overall for power play attempts is Western Michigan’s 103, followed by 104 each for Miami and St. Cloud State. The Huskies have the second-fewest power play attempts in league play at 55.
Denver leads the league with 138 overall power play attempts, including 79 in conference play.
Over the last six games — where UMD has been swept at Omaha, at home vs. Denver and on the road last week at North Dakota — the Bulldogs have only had 10 power plays, spanning 20 minutes and 32 seconds.
The 20-percent success rate over the last six games mirrors UMD’s 20.4% conversion rate on the power play in NCHC play, which ranks fourth.
“It is tough to get into a groove when you’re only getting one or two (power plays) a game, because you only get one chance,” Gallatin said. “Then you aren’t able to get a read off of how they’re killing, see what’s open, figure it out after that. You only get one chance or two chances — maybe — and then that’s it. It does make it a lot…
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