Spartans shut out Ohio State, earn weekend split

East Lansing, Mich. - As satisfied as Danton Cole was with Michigan State’s 2-0 hockey victory over Ohio State on Sunday, he was equally adamant about making a habit of it.

“Everything we talked about that we needed to do last night, we did tonight,” Cole said in reference to Saturday’s 5-1 loss to Ohio State. “It was just different. If you were color blind and you watched the game last night and then watched the game tonight, you wouldn’t know that it was the same team.

“It’s just a process about how hard it is to win hockey games and how hard you have to play.

“The challenge now is to be a team that can build on some success.”

It marked the fourth time in MSU’s last five series that the Spartans won the second game after failing to win the opener.

“We keep proving this to ourselves,” Cole said. “They did a great job bouncing back. You got off the mat. That’s great. But how about we quit getting knocked on the mat and start out the right way.

“That’s the price of admission. Now let’s string some together. Don’t always make it so that we have to have adversity to inspire us. Let’s just have excellence inspire us. Play some games like that and it doesn’t guarantee you a win but it guarantees you a hell of a lot better feeling that we had last night.”

Michigan State improved to 6-8-2 overall and 5-8-1 in the Big Ten. Michigan State is in seventh place in the seven-team Big Ten, one point behind Ohio State and one win out of fourth place.

“We have a tough matchup next week with Wisconsin on the road and we’re going to have to be ready to skate and battle and compete for pucks all over the ice,” Cole said.

Senior captain Tommy Apap (6-1, 206, Sr., Bloomfield Hills, Mich.) opened the scoring at 10:01 of the first period. Brody Stevens (5-10, 193, Sr., Ann Arbor) and Gianluca Esteves (5-9, 172, Sr., Winnipeg, Manitoba) assisted.

It was a strong bounce-back showing from those three. Apap struggled on face-offs on Saturday. Stevens and Esteves each made an error in transition defense in allowing goals on Saturday.

On Sunday, Stevens gave Michigan State a 2-0 lead 8:38 into the third period when scored on a rebound. Freshman defenseman Aiden Gallacher (6-1, 200, Fr., Rochester Hills, Mich.) assisted, his first point of his college career. Apap also assisted.

“Tommy Apap was a horse tonight,” Cole said.

Apap was 13-6 on face-offs after going an uncharacteristic 7-13 on Saturday.

“We went over video this morning and a point of emphasis was that we went from being the best face-off team in the country to the point that we can’t even get to .500 against teams,” Cole said. “And we kind of got worked (Saturday). Tonight they were on it; the secondary guys were helping.

“He (Apap) was under the water on Saturday in terms of face off percentage, which is unusual for him. But we challenged everyone in our meeting this morning, even Tommy on a couple of things. He knew it was coming. But captains and your better players had better be able to take it. If I can get on them, they’ve got to be able to handle it. He’s a good Spartan.”

Michigan State was 23-32 on face-offs Saturday. On Sunday, the Spartans were 35-18 for a dominant 66 percent.

The face-off edge helped translate to a 35-28 edge in shots on goal.

Michigan State had 14 shots in the first period, the most shots the Spartans have had in the opening period of any game all season.

Junior goaltender Drew DeRidder (5-11, 175, Fenton, Mich.) turned away 28 shots to notch his second shutout of the season

“He was outstanding,” Cole said. “You get the feeling that he was just squaring all the pucks. He was just there. Late in the game, they had some one-timers but man he was driving across and he was right there nice and easy.”

Sophomore left wing Jagger Joshua (6-2, 200, Soph., Dearborn, Mich.) was a force all weekend.

With Cole calling for better intensity around the puck, Joshua delivered two big hits on the opening shift of the game and never let up.

“He set the tone,” Cole said. “He’s just learning and figuring out how to take advantage of the things he can do. He’s a big, physical guy. You see him growing up and learning how to use that to his advantage and not losing his cool and taking penalties, but just knocking guys down.

“Hey, occasionally you’re going to smoke somebody and you’re going to get a penalty; that’s all right. He was on a mission this weekend. He has some good leadership in him as well.

“He’s not a dirty player. He finishes his checks. That’s something there’s not a lot of in hockey anymore. He announced his presence with authority.”

“He’s just scratching what he’s going to be able to do before he leaves here.”

Searching for intensity and goal production, and playing without the team’s top goal scorer in Charlie Combs, Cole shuffled the lines a bit this weekend.

On Sunday, Cole went with a line of Nicolas Müller, Joshua and Mitchell Lewandowski as the top line for the first time this season.

That trio served as the No. 3 line on Saturday, as Lewandowski spent more time on a lower line than usual. Lewandowski responded with a few good scoring chances on Saturday. He didn’t finish, but Cole liked the activity.

And he liked Sunday’s performance from that line even more.

“Jagger was a force. Muel was real good, too,” Cole said. “They had a good matchup. They played against Ohio State’s highest scoring line all night and obviously did a real good job with that.”

“Real impressed with them. They played with that pace. Not worrying about being perfect, but chasing perfection and you might catch excellence every once in awhile.”

Combs missed the weekend with an undisclosed injury. His status for next weekend is unknown.