UMass defeats St. Cloud State at PPG Paints Arena for 1st national title
Apr. 11—Thursday night featured a Mass-ive moment. Saturday, a Mass-terful performance.
The result was a first-time national champion.
In his return after missing the semifinals because of covid protocols, Filip Lindberg stopped all 25 shots he faced, and Massachusetts won the NCAA men's hockey title with a 5-0 win against St. Cloud State on Saturday night at PPG Paints Arena.
The blowout contrasted with the thrilling overtime victory for the Minutemen (20-5-4) in the Frozen Four semifinals Thursday against two-time defending champion Minnesota Duluth.
UMass (20-5-4) won the school's first national title in a men's sport at the highest level (the 1998 football team won the Division I-AA championship). The only other NCAA Division I national championship for the athletic program at large was the women's lacrosse team in 1982.
"The feeling's unbelievable," said team captain Jake Gaudet, part of a senior class that joined a team that had gone 5-29-2 in 2016-17. "To be here four years, the guys that have come through this program and worked really hard, to wear a (captain's) letter and help lead our team to the biggest national stage is one of my proudest achievements and it's something I'll never forget."
Saturday's offense came from varied sources and in varied ways for the Minutemen, who had lost in the most recent national title game in 2019. Five players had goals, six had assists and only Reed Lebster had two points.
The Minutemen had a short-handed goal and power-play goal, and they scored during each period. Two goals came from defensemen, and three from forwards. Two seniors scored, and one goal each came from a junior, sophomore and freshman.
"It shows how deep our team is," senior forward Philip Lagunov said.
A freshman defenseman's first career goal opened the scoring. Aaron Bohlinger finished a two-on-none while taking advantage of two St. Cloud State players colliding at the UMass blue line 7 1/2 minutes, 30 seconds into the game.
Lebster made it 2-0 with 64 seconds left in a first period during which St. Cloud State (20-11-0) managed three shots on goal.
The prettiest goal of the night came during a Huskies power play 5 minutes into the second period. Lagunov made a great move to get around a SCSU defender and alone to the slot, where he deked twice before shoveling a backhand that got through Huskies goalie David Hrenak.
"I thought that was the turning point of the game then when they went up 3-0," St. Cloud State coach Brett Larson said.
When Matthew Kessel added a power-play tally at 13:45 of the second period, the Mass-acre was on. It wasn't until the third period that the Minutemen's leading scorer, junior Bobby Trivigno, got on the scoresheet with a blistering wrist shot from the left circle that beat Hrenak to the far side for Trivigno's 11th goal and 34th point of the season.
One UMass player who didn't have a goal was senior Carson Gicewicz, one of four Minutemen who missed the semifinal win Thursday. Three of them returned for the final: Gicewicz (17 goals in 28 games this season), Lindberg and third-string goalie Henry Graham.
Also not scoring was Garrett Wait, who had the winning goal late in the first overtime Thursday night against Minnesota Duluth.
Lindberg improved on his national-best 1.32 goals-against average and .946 save percentage. He'd spent the previous eight days quarantined in an Amherst, Mass., hotel room before driving to Pittsburgh on Friday.
Just 90 seconds into Saturday's game, a wrist shot from St. Cloud State freshman and fellow Espoo, Finland, native Veeti Miettinen clanged off the crossbar behind Lindberg.
That would be the shot that got past him all night.
"It was a tough eight days," Lindberg said. "Watching the boys play on Thursday, I was so nervous. That was something I'm going to remember for the rest of my life. But thank God we got the chance to play tonight and got the job done."
Chris Adamski is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Chris by email at cadamski@triblive.com or via Twitter .
