Sports

Jacks close season on ice with losses to rivals

By Tyler Ohmann

02/21/2012

The season came to a close this past weekend for the Lumberjacks of Dakota College at Bottineau. It did so with losses to rivals Williston State and Minot State.

First on Wednesday the Jacks fell to the Tetons for the fourth straight time this season in a 4-0 loss.

“I thought we had a great effort by everyone tonight and we just needed to stay out of the box,” stated DCB Head Coach Travis Rybchinski. “Our scoring drought continues but I thought we got a lot of pucks to the net tonight and made their goalie work for the shutout.”

Italian native Cesare Dall’Ara got the start in net for the Jacks.

The Jacks closed out their season in Minot against the rival MSU Beavers.

Despite one of their best efforts of the season the Jacks were dispatched by the Beavers for the fourth time this season, 6-3.

“Tonight we played hard and came up short against Minot State. In my 11 years here I think that may be the most balanced and quickest team the Beavers have had,” Rybchinski stated. “This was the last game of the season for us but we left it all out on the ice tonight.”

The Jacks struck first as Cole Reisenauer took a pass from Will Kinsman home past Beavers goaltender Riley Hengen at 2:39 of the first period.

However, the rest of the period belonged to the Beavers who would take a 2-1 lead after one.
In the second the Beavers went up 3-1 on a Josh Dueck goal.

“The problems that have plagued us all year were the same tonight, special teams,” Rybchinski stated. “We were 0-for-5 on the power play and gave up a shorthanded goal, as well as two or three power play goals. We could just not break through their penalty kill and were very frustrated and became individualistic on the man advantage.”

DCB’s Chad Miller scored at 9:46 to bring the Jacks back to within a goal. Seth Serhienko assisted on the play.

The Beavers scored two more goals to go up 5-2, until Serhineko scored a goal of his own. Jonny Heidbrink and Wade Haight assisted on the goal that shrunk the MSU lead to two.

However the Beavers put the game away with their sixth goal late in the third.

The Jacks were out shot 62-32 in the game as Troy Chandler stopped 56 of 62 Beaver shots.

“On a positive note we did a good job of going to the net and getting rebounds and scoring three goals on a team that has a very stingy defense,” Rybchinski stated. “As a coach I am disappointed with our win and loss record and that we will not be challenging for a National Title number nine, but I am proud of the fact that we were a better hockey team in February than October.”

The Jacks finished with an 8-19-1 record on the season, and finished the season on a seven game losing streak.

The Jacks will lose the nine sophomores that were on this year’s squad.