Oct. 18—GRAND FORKS — UND beat Bentley 5-0 on Saturday night to complete a two-game sweep
behind Caleb Heil's second straight shutout.
Here are five other things you might have missed from Saturday's series finale.
Minot product Brasen Boser is off to a terrific start to his UND career.
The Arizona State transfer has already established himself as one of UND's best defensive defensemen.
Bentley had a 5-on-3 power play for 1:56 on Saturday night. Two of UND's penalty-killing defensemen were in the box — Carson Carels and E.J. Emery.
Boser started as the lone defenseman on the kill. Bentley called a timeout after a shift to rest their top players. So, UND threw Boser right back out there after the timeout.
He played all but about 10-15 seconds of the kill.
"He's just a really reliable, accountable, solid, good, dependable defenseman," Jackson said. "He's just a really good player. He led the Fargo Force in minutes when he played there. He led ASU in minutes when he played there. I can see why. He is a guy you can count on."
Boser also made an impact on offense, hammering a one-timer past Bentley goalie Easton Rye for his first UND goal.
"It was pretty special," Boser said. "Going to games growing up, I always wanted to be here and do that."
UND made several lineup changes for the series finale.
Forward Brock Schultz of East Grand Forks and defenseman Bauer Dumanski made their NCAA debuts.
"It was super cool," Dumanski said. "It's a really storied organization. It's an honor to be a part of it and to come out and help win."
Schultz tallied an assist in his debut.
Dumanski posted two assists, a plus-3 rating and drew a power play in just 5:52 of ice time, prompting the question: Is Dumanski actually UND's high-end offensive defenseman from the Prince George Cougars?
"Might have been a one-off," Dumanski said.
The other Prince George Cougars defenseman is Carels, the No. 6 overall pick in the NHL Draft.
Jackson said the lineup decisions were less about Garrett Lindberg, Cooper Simpson and Ashton Schultz's play — he said Lindberg has played "extremely well" — and more about giving other players a chance.
"We have a lot of real tough games coming up and we wanted to get everybody in there," Jackson said. "It was tough. But guys were really mature and selfless."
Will Zellers and Cole Reschny carried UND offensively during a Week 1 sweep of Bemidji State.
Zellers was in on six of UND's seven goals. Jack Kernan scored the seventh.
One of the best signs from Saturday's series finale was that UND scored five times without Zellers or Reschny getting on the scoresheet.
Anthony Menghini scored a pair at 5-on-5. Cody Croal and Boser also scored 5-on-5 goals. Hudson Malinoski got one on the power play.
Former UND captain Mark Taylor skated "One More Shift" before Saturday night's game.
UND's
No. 2 all-time leading scorer
(1976-80) made a couple of laps in UND's zone to a big ovation.
Taylor and some of his old teammates from the 1980 NCAA national championship team spoke to the current team earlier on Saturday.
"They were in here talking about how you don't remember the wins as much as the people you battle with," Jackson said.
UND is now 10-1 in "One More Shift" games.
Jim Archibald, Brandon Bochenski, Dave Christian, Ed Belfour, Matt Greene, Tony Hrkac, Ryan Duncan, Dixon Ward, Dennis Hextall and Zach Parise are the others who have skated "One More Shift."
Former UND great T.J. Oshie is next up. Oshie will skate his shift on Jan. 15 before a game against St. Thomas.
Tyler Liffrig, a Williston, N.D., native who developed into one of the best linesmen in college hockey,
called his last game
Saturday night.
UND showed its respect for Liffrig in several ways.
After the game, UND captain Cole Reschny grabbed the game puck. As they went through the handshake line, Reschny stopped, gave it to Liffrig, and said a few words.
After the game, UND presented a poster to Liffrig. Jackson and UND stood on the blue line to watch the presentation and gave some hearty stick taps.
"These guys are part of the machine that make the whole thing run," Jackson said. "It's his last game and you want to acknowledge that you respect and appreciate what he gave to our league."
UND equipment manager Dan Johansson also custom-designed two skate blades for Liffrig to recognize his career.
One side has his name, dates of his final series and says: "Thank you for your commitment to college hockey."
The other side has logos of the Frozen Fours he's called.
* Sophomore defenseman Keaton Verhoeff leads UND in blocked shots (seven).
* Ethan MacKenzie (19:46) and Verhoeff (19:29) led UND in time on ice.
* Ollie Josephson went 12-6 in the faceoff dot to lead UND.