The Wisconsin women’s hockey team (11-2-1, 9-2-1 WCHA) is focusing on the minor things as they look to continue their success, taking to the road for a weekend series against St. Cloud State (5-6-1, 2-3-1 WCHA).

After outscoring North Dakota 16-2 in two games last weekend, the Badgers are playing at a high level, while St. Cloud State has dropped their past two games.

Wisconsin dominated the shots last weekend with more than 100 total shots on target, so they will just keep trying to open up opportunities, as the goals will keep coming.

“We just have to keep working on the little things and not necessarily just focusing on goals, but just focusing on getting pucks to the net. If they go in, they go in,” Wisconsin senior Katy Josephs said.

The coaches will not let the players lose focus on the small things, as they try to make sure all the athletes get some practice at it every day in practice.

“It’s about creating habits and the more solid your habits are, the better chance you have of carrying it on into the game,” Wisconsin head coach Mark Johnson said. “So try to emulate within the game how you practice and obviously, the past couple of weekends, you focus on getting pucks to the net and in the net and getting rebounds and bouncing on that. This week, it’ll be the same.”

The Badgers’ work in practice should pay off this weekend, as they will have to come out with increased intensity because of how St. Cloud State played last weekend. The Huskies got swept at home by Minnesota-Duluth, meaning they will not want that to happen again when the Badgers come to town.

“I’m sure they’ll practice hard this week and come out Friday afternoon with the attitude that they don’t want to lose again,” Johnson said.

If the Badgers are not ready for a strong surge from the Huskies at the beginning of the series, they may fall behind.

“They’re going to come out fast and physical, so we have to be ready for that,” freshman forward Emily Clark said.

This attitude, combined with their style of play, could put the Badgers on their heels. St. Cloud State also always plays hard against the Badgers, despite UW usually being ranked higher.

“I know every time we play them, they always put forward their best game, so it should be good competition,” Josephs said.

The Huskies are also a physical team that has given up the most power play chances on the season, so the Badgers can expect at least a few power play opportunities throughout the series.

The Badgers were two for six in power play chances in their last game, but three of those opportunities came when Wisconsin was already winning by eight goals. Johnson tried mixing up new power play lines to get more players opportunities to score.

This experience should be beneficial this weekend, as more players can be comfortable if they are thrown into that situation, but also the starters were successful when given the chance, so their confidence is high.

If the Badgers can convert on their power play chances, they should have relative success against this physical St. Cloud State team.

The road series will begin Friday at 3 p.m., with the second game coming Saturday at 3 p.m. as well.