MANKATO — One big play is all you need.
Just ask No. 16 Minnesota State men’s hockey. All it needed was one drive to the net and a tip to claim a 1-0 win over Bemidji State Friday at Mayo Clinic Health System Event Center.
“It turned into a rock fight,” MSU head coach Luke Strand said. “I thought (Bemidji) did a good job of being thick and staying over some pucks. We didn’t get away from people. Then, on the looks we had, we didn’t score.”
With the game tied 0-0 early in the third period junior Ean Somoza carried the puck in on his backhand with a Beaver defender on his back. Somoza squared up to rip a shot on net.
His shot was going to be a bit wide before hitting a Beaver. Then senior Jack Smith was in front of the net at the right time, deflecting the ricochet into the net for a 1-0 lead 6:15 into the third.
“I thought ‘just get to the net,’” Smith recalled. “It went off my shin pad. I wasn’t even expecting to get the puck. It just went off me.”
Senior Alex Tracy, a Hoby Baker and Mike Richter award finalist, slammed the door shut. In a vintage Tracy outing he turned away all 20 shots in the win. No save was bigger than his pad save on a Beavers’ one-timer with 1:13 to go during 6 on 5 play to preserve his 11th career shutout.
In the game’s opening moments the Mavericks thought they struck first when Luigi Benincasa delivered a pass to Tristan Lemyre for a 1-0 lead 1:36 into the game. Except, well, technically they didn’t.
After fans assumed Lemyre gave MSU the lead Beavers’ head coach Tom Serratore challenged a potential major penalty in a sequence which happened in the game’s opening seconds. MSU’s Sawyer Scholl and BSU’s Hudson Thorton could be seen exchanging cross checks away from the play.
After video review Scholl was found guilty of spearing during the scrum. He was issued a five-minute major and a game misconduct. Lemyre’s goal was waved off. The clock was reset to 19:34.
MSU’s 1-0 lead turned into a five-minute penalty kill in the blink of an eye.
“We have to be smarter than that,” Strand said. “That was foolish on our part.”
The Mavericks and Beaver finish their series at 6 p.m. Saturday in Mankato.