It was a weekend the Badgers had been waiting for. But with Wisconsin's recent lack of wins, who would have expected the excitement that was to ensue?
The No. 9 Wisconsin men's hockey team (11-6-5 Western Collegiate Hockey Association, 17-9-6 overall) had been facing hard times, but they put everything on the table against the No. 1 North Dakota Fighting Sioux (13-4-3, 19-5-3) and it showed. The Badgers earned a miraculous 4-3 comeback victory in overtime on Friday and then garnered a 5-2 win on Saturday.
Friday night's game did not look good for the Badgers at the start. Fighting Sioux junior defenseman Matt Jones scored a power play goal just two minutes into the game to give his squad a 1-0 lead. North Dakota freshman forward Chris Porter and sophomore forward Zach Parise also tallied goals in the first period, and a sluggish UW team entered the locker room with a 3-0 deficit at the first intermission.
\Nobody really took charge,"" Badger Head Coach Mike Eaves said. ""So we went into the locker rooms in between the first and second and had a heart-to-heart about that. I told them 'If you guys want to be a contending team, you have to take charge of this game.'""
