There is little solace in earning a single point for 120 minutes of hockey. For the Wisconsin men's hockey team, however, it will just have to do.
The Badgers (0-5-1) opened their home slate Friday against the No. 7 Minnesota Gophers (3-0-1). Wisconsin managed a 2-2 tie in the first game of the series but could not sustain momentum and fell 5-3 Saturday.
Right now, because of our schedule and the opponents that we're playing through and some of our injuries that we've had, it seems like we're biking uphill into the wind,"" Wisconsin head coach Mike Eaves said. ""We know there's going to be the top of the hill and we're going to go downhill and things will be good.""
Sophomore forward Podge Turnbull opened the Kohl Center scoring for the season, with a shot from just outside the crease eight minutes into Friday's game. The lead grew to two with sophomore defenseman Brendan Smith's second goal of the season.
The Badgers, however, could not hold the lead, giving up a goal to Gopher forward Ryan Stoa late in the second and then a rebound goal to freshman defenseman Sam Lofquist.
After the goal, Lofquist, the second Wisconsinite ever to don maroon and gold, cupped his ear to the crowd and popped the front of his jersey. The celebration mimicked one by Phil Kessel, a Madison native who played for Minnesota and now plays in the NHL, when he scored in the Kohl Center during his lone college season.
""[Lofquist] heard about it, let's put it that way,"" Minnesota head coach Don Lucia said.
After the game, Lofquist said he idolized Kessel while growing up. When asked if it was worth getting admonished by his coach, Lofquist simply grinned and said, ""No comment.""
Neither team could score after that, and the game ended in a tie.
Eaves emphasized the lack of flow during the game, pointing to 12 second-period penalties. He also described senior goaltender Shane Connelly's night as ""rock solid,"" as Minnesota took 36 shots on goal.
""We really seemed to struggle with the puck tonight. We didn't connect dots very well, we didn't handle it very well,"" Eaves said.
Puck-handling was again an issue early in Saturday's game. Wisconsin won the opening faceoff, but a burst of Gopher pressure forced a turnover, and Stoa scored an unassisted goal six seconds into the game. Stoa scored later in the period when he came from behind the net and got around Connelly.
Wisconsin could not score in the first two periods, despite a frenzied series of rushes and scoring chances early in the second. The Gophers lit the lamp again, putting the score at 3-1 entering the final 20 minutes.
The game then settled into a pattern where Wisconsin would close the gap and the Gophers would score right back. Freshman forward Matt Thurber got the Badgers on the board with a goal from in close.
Minnesota answered when junior wing Tony Lucia got the puck past Connelly just before slamming into him and knocking the net off its moorings. Turnbull hit a long shot from the blue line, but would get no closer.
""Every time I thought we were going to break through tonight, we gave up another goal, and that was disappointing,"" Eaves said, adding he felt the team left it all out on the ice.
Things got rough near the end of the game when a check by Wisconsin defenseman Ryan Little incited several scuffles that resulted in 16 of the 39 penalties assessed in the game. Junior wing Ben Grotting was disqualified from the game and will not play in next Friday's game.
The Badgers scored on only one of their 14 power-play chances in the two games. Saturday marked the fifth time in six games that Wisconsin gave up five or more goals.
