With four games remaining in the regular season, Bulldog hockey aims to finish strong, starting with a weekend slate against the Michigan Tech Huskies.
Ferris (11-17-2, 10-12 in CCHA) will head to the Upper Peninsula to play the Huskies (15-12-3, 11-8-3 in CCHA). Earlier this season, Michigan Tech swept the Bulldogs in two different games.
Ferris is coming off a series split against the Lake Superior State Lakers at home. Michigan Tech is coming off a one-point weekend at Augustana where they lost the first game and won the second in a shootout, registering a tie in the standings.
The Bulldogs suffered their loss to Lake Superior in the second half of the series, following the theme for a majority of their matchups this season. Ferris is 3-10-1 on Saturday games compared to a 7-6-1 ledger in the Friday opening games.
However, the Bulldogs have won five of their last seven games, making a push for home-ice advantage in the upcoming CCHA playoffs. While the opportunity of taking a top-four seed is unlikely, Ferris is still rising in the standings as the season concludes.
Redshirt sophomore forward Cole Burtch highlighted the forwards and how they’ve been playing the last seven games.
“It starts up and down the lineup,” Burtch said. “It starts from [Noah] West to the defense to the forwards. Our forward core has been doing a lot more up and down and we’ve been checking well which has created for our offense lately.”
The Bulldogs are led in scoring by Burtch (7-15–22), with junior forward and Hobey Baker nominee Caiden Gault (11-7–18) right behind him. Senior forward Kaleb Ergang (5-11–16) rounds out the top three in scoring and games played, with 30 for Burtch and Gault and 29 for Ergang.
in March. Photo by: Abe Kraus|Torch Photographer
Graduate goaltender Noah West continues to anchor the Bulldog defense in the crease. The Pittsboro, Ind. native and Michigan transfer has started 28 of the 29 games he’s played. West has logged almost 1,700 minutes played, bringing a 3.12 goals-against average and a .906 save percentage into the contest.
West credited the defense in front of him for the play he’s had.
“They’ve been good the last three weeks,” West said. “They’ve been solid, so we just got to keep putting 60-minute games together and keep this rolling. We’ve been playing hard the last month, and that’s awesome to see as a goalie because it makes life easy when guys are in front of you.”
The Huskies are led in scoring by junior forward Stiven Sardarian (10-22–32), with sophomore forwards Isaac Gordon (5-17–22) and Max Koskipirtti (6-15–21) rounding out the Huskies’ top three in points. Tech will likely have senior goaltender Derek Mullahy between the pipes. Mullahy started 17 of the 19 games he’s played and has just under 1,000 minutes played. He brings a 2.59 goals-against average and a .904 save percentage into the game.
Head coach Bob Daniels is confident that his team will be able to bounce back following the loss and have a good week of practice going into the Michigan Tech series.
“I don’t think it’ll be hard to come back and work really hard,” Daniels said. “Just given the fact that the guys know we’re playing good hockey right now, and we feel it. So we’ve got momentum. We can move upward in the standings so I don’t think there’s gonna be any issue.”
Ferris State will play Michigan Tech on Friday, Feb. 21 at 7:07 p.m. and again on Saturday, Feb. 22 at 6:07 p.m. in Daniels’ last road series in the regular season before returning home on Feb. 28 and March 1 for his final home series, as the Bulldogs take on Northern Michigan.