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ASU hockey drops thriller against No. 17 Michigan

The Sun Devils fell 4-1 to No. 17 Michigan in a game filled with twists and turns Friday

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Sun Devils Joey Raats (left) and Jakob Stridsberg (right) work together to block a play by Michigan at Gila River Arena on Nov. 4, 2016.

ASU hockey head coach Greg Powers said earlier in the season that if his team wants to get a benchmark win, they must put forth a benchmark effort.

In Friday night’s 4-1 loss to No. 17 Michigan at Gila River Arena, the Sun Devils (1-8-0) gave a benchmark effort.

“I thought we played really well,” Powers said. “5-on-5 we’ve been really good, pretty much all year. So there’s silver lining in tonight, but at the end of the day we’ve got to get over that hump. It’s disappointing it didn’t happen tonight, but we’ll figure it out.”

Michigan (4-3-1) entered the game coming off back-to-back losses and tabbed Zach Nagelvoort to do the goaltending. The senior and Edmonton Oilers prospect became a big part of the Wolverines’ game, stopping31 of 32 shots.

Meanwhile, ASU freshman goaltender Joey Daccord stopped 34 of 38 shots.

“We didn’t get the result tonight, but I thought we competed well,” Daccord said. “We worked really hard tonight. I thought we gave ourselves a chance to win. A couple chances, couple bounces – we were right in it.”

Though the Sun Devils had numerous scoring chances, they had mixed results on special teams. They held Michigan to just 1-for-4 on its power play, but they went 0-for-7 themselves on power plays – a troubling trend for ASU so far this year.

The teams were knotted after the first 20 minutes, as Michigan senior blue-liner Nolan De Jong and ASU sophomore forward Joe Lappin each scored their first tallies of the year.

In 2015-16, Lappin had the second-most NCAA goals on the team, behind then-freshman forward Jordan Masters.

Though the Sun Devils got on the board early, they failed to convert on a 5-on-3 power play in that first period.

The second period saw a strange Michigan breakaway goal from freshman forward Will Lockwood, a Vancouver Canucks prospect. The shorthanded goal ricocheted off the left-wing side crossbar and bounced almost precisely parallel with the goal line, and appeared to have not completely crossed the line. The referees went to review the play, but because ASU is an independent school, no video replay is available. The initial call stands.

That made it 2-1 Michigan.

“It’s unfortunate. It is what it is,” Powers said. “At the end of the day, it didn’t end up mattering. We had one goal and they had four. It certainly stung and changed momentum and all that good stuff, but you’ve got to be mentally tough and get through that.”

“I guess the referees didn’t have access to that overhead view where you could see it didn’t look like it went in,” Daccord added. “But it’s hockey, stuff’s going to happen. Bounces are going to go your way, they might not go your way. That one didn’t go our way but I thought we battled back hard after that.”

The Wolverines then made it 3-1 when Adam Winborg scored on the power play.

Later in the second period, ASU had a tremendous 2-on-0 breakaway chance with sophomore forward Anthony Croston and freshman defenseman Brinson Pasichnuk. Croston gave a feed to Pasichnuk, but the result of the play was a shot wide of the goal.

Pasichnuk found himself in trouble in the third period when Lockwood was on a shorthanded rush. Lockwood made a toe-drag deke move to get around Pasichnuk and score on Daccord, making it 4-1 Michigan.

That’s where the score would remain.

“Our D are backing in too far to our goalie and, to be honest, that’s a save we’ve got to have,” Powers said. “So it’s a back-breaker when they score off the rush shorthanded. It’s a back-breaker and it’s happened three times against us in three games.”

The loss ends a stretch of nine games to open the season in which ASU hockey has played a Top 20 ranked opponent.

“I don’t care what anybody says,” Powers added. “That young team will be so much better at the end of this year, they’ll be better in a month, they’ll be better when they’re juniors and seniors because of the schedule that we’re playing. I’m proud of their effort. They want more wins. They’ll come, but it’s just minor details that we’ve got to shore up.”


Reach the reporter at matthew.layman@asu.edu or follow @Mattjlayman on Twitter.

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