The Big Ten men’s hockey season’s first half has concluded, with the final series of first-half occurring this past weekend as the Michigan State Spartans took on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. Following the series, Michigan State Head Coach Danton Cole spoke to the media, reflecting on their play against Notre Dame and the preparation for the second half of the season, beginning with their two-game series against Penn State University on January 3rd and 4th in East Lansing.

Cole started with an opening statement. “(It was an) interesting weekend last weekend. One thing we talked about with the team and tried to establish was a work ethic and the battle and the composure, regardless of the type of game it was. I thought our guys did an outstanding job with that. There are certainly some areas where we made the game harder than it needed to be, but the barrier entry is that work ethic and that battle, and we found ourselves in a couple interesting situations late in the third in the second game, being able to tie it up and win it in overtime was a tremendous boost for the guys. Heading into the break, we haven’t played a lot of games, but being at 3-3-2 is kinda where the Big Ten is going to be. We’ve got four overtimes in our eight games, and the other four games, the goalie’s been pulled. We’re gonna see ourselves in those situations, how we handle it, and how we work through it are gonna be important. There are a few areas, out breakout, and I give Notre Dame credit, they came at us pretty hard, but I think it was pretty average, but I think it was better the second night, I thought coming through the neutral zone we were pretty average as well, and that affected the forecheck, the offensive zone, the ease that Notre Dame can come out and get their forecheck and offensive zone established. We’ll tighten those things up, but a lot of things, starting with Drew (DeRidder) on out, and we’ll get a little break now. We’ve been here since July 6th, and mentally, probably as much as I think physically, it’s been a long grind for the guys, so I think it will be good for everyone to get away from each other, recharge their batteries, open some gifts, and then we’ll be back at it. Guys will start coming in and we start testing just after Christmas, and get ready for Penn State on January 3rd and 4th.”

Looking back at the two-game set against Notre Dame, true freshman defenseman Powell Connor was inserted into the lineup both nights and had much more playing time than expected in game two due to the early ejection of Christian Krygier. “I thought he was outstanding. He didn’t get a ton of ice time the first night, but got his feet wet, had good composure. The second night, with the ejection early to Krygier, that opened up a lot of ice for him. I thought he did really well, he moved the puck, he defended well, blocked a lot of shots, things we’ve seen out of him in practice. He’s been in a lot of situations. If you look at the amount of hockey that’s been played in the last ten months, he hasn’t played since last February or March, he’s practiced a lot, but it’s a compliment to him, remaining prepared and ready to jump in. He was outstanding, didn’t miss a beat, and was noticing him doing the right things on the ice, and we needed those minutes from him on Sunday.”

There was one major lineup change ahead of game two, with Kristof Papp getting scratched again. There was one major reason why that occurred. “Play. I say it a lot, and I didn’t reinvent it ate it, but players determine ice time. We looked at it, we had a line of seniors, chomping at the bit, waiting to get in. If the play is not where we want it, he sat out a game before, and got back in, we had other guys we thought would help us win, and they did.”

The Spartans have won a lot of faceoffs this year, and he gave a lot of credit to one player. “We’ve been good over the past few years, and I’ll give Tommy Apap a bunch of the credit because, by the end of the game, he usually takes 25-30% of our draws and he is outstanding. He did a lot of work last year, and this year, we work a lot with him, but Tommy grabs the guys at the end of practice, and that’s one big part of it, his leadership, and the other one is the emphasis of all five guys being a part of the faceoff. It’s not just a centerman stat, it’s a line and defensive pairing stat. Make sure we have that line of scrimmage mentality, jumping in and picking those up. (Assistant) Coach (Chris) Luongo does a nice job, he draws up a lot of our situational plays.”

Cole has been impressed with the play of Bemidji State graduate transfer Charlie Combs. “He attacks the game, and I like that. He’s getting an idea of how we want to do stuff and it fits really well into his game. He forechecks, he backpressures, he gets into transition. He’s aggressive, really good in a “half-court” or a transitional offense, the home plate around the net. He moves well, gets into spots, but one thing we really liked about him is he really looks to shoot the puck. If he gets it around the net, he’s shooting it. He’s done well with all those things.”

With Michigan State taking 12 penalties for 46 minutes this past weekend, the penalty kill had to show up against Notre Dame, and they surely did. “(Assistant) Coach (Joe) Exter does a lot of work with the penalty kill. I thought we did a good job keeping most stuff to the outside, which is what you want to do. There were probably three or four times when they got interior and Drew had to come up big, but overall, I thought our guys did a nice job. We talked to (Powell Connor) a couple weeks ago and said if you want to find some ice time and you do well on the penalty kill, the coaches will get you in. He had a lot of blocks, he was even out on the four-on-three. My biggest complaint was too much time. Both five-minute penalties were avoidable. Those are ones we can’t take and don’t need to take. Obviously, they didn’t score and we spent a lot of time killing and gotta be happy with that.”

Head Coach Danton Cole and the Michigan State Spartans continue their season with their second-half opener against the Penn State Nittany Lions on January 3rd and 4th at Munn Ice Arena, home of Spartan hockey.

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