Less than five minutes into the rematch of the 2006 NCAA Championship game foes, Wisconsin looked poised to pick up right where they left off against Boston College. The Badgers had just benefited from the Eagles' second penalty in 27 seconds and were about to have a 5-on-3 man advantage.
That's when everything got funny. Late in the power play, Boston College's Nathan Gerbe — who would score two goals on the night — managed to find the puck against the boards with open ice ahead of him and proceeded to waltz into the Badger zone and bury a deep wrister to give BC a 1-0 lead.
Mike Eaves couldn't recall another instance of such a goal being scored. Boston College's Jerry York said it had been a "long, long time" since he had seen a 5-on-3 goal, which is saying something coming from a coach in his 35th season.
The Badgers never recovered from there, losing ugly 3-0 Friday and uglier in a 4-1 drubbing Saturday night.
"They were ready to play, plain and simple," Wisconsin captain Andrew Joudrey said. "We've been home for three weeks in a row, and you think we would have learned by now. They have good experience, but so do we. Shame on us for not playing better."
"We just came out flat Friday night," senior defenseman Jeff Likens said.
The losses leave UW scratching its collective head as to where the team is right now, as the team prepares for its longest road trip of the season next weekend when they travel to Alaska-Anchorage.
Roughly one month into the season, the University of Wisconsin men's hockey team is at .500. Coming off of a national championship and bringing back a Hobey Baker Award nominee, the Badgers probably didn't expect to be 3-3-1 (2-1-1), but the slow start doesn't have UW players and coaches rushing for the panic button yet.
"I think the morale is fine," Eaves said. "We're in the middle of a long process right now. We have a lot of young faces on the team."
The quality of UW's opponents thus far has had a definite impact on how UW has started the season, having played top-five teams in two of the last three series in then No. 5 North Dakota and current No. 5 BC.
Wisconsin has also had to deal with a plethora of injuries to key players, and it has shown. In Friday night's contest especially, Wisconsin looked like a team that was playing with lines that weren't gelled yet as passes were consistently off target and offensive chemistry seemed lacking.
"Part of the metamorphosis [for this team] is learning to deal with injured players," Eaves said.
According to Eaves and the players, the adversity of a .500 record is acceptable, especially considering it is early in the season.
"I think it's pretty good," Eaves said of the Badgers' place in the standings. "I think we've grown with a lot of experience for a lot of young people, and you know what, it's kind of hard lessons right now, but at the end of the year those will help us."
"I think the gap is minimal," forward Jake Dowell said when asked to assess how big the gap is between Wisconsin and the nation's top teams. "When we play our game and we force turnovers and we play physical we're a tough team to beat. It's just a matter of playing that way 60 minutes."
Boston College played better on Wisconsin power plays than the Badgers did, scoring the 5-on-3 goal and having a chance to score at least one other shorthanded goal on Saturday. The Badgers only scored on one of their 11 power play opportunities, however, UW players refused to make any concessions about the team getting down on itself, despite being outscored 7-1 on the weekend.
"Seeing a team play like that only makes us better," Likens said.
