Special teams lead the way as Bemidji State sweeps Northern Michigan

BEMIDJI It had been a while since the Bemidji State men’s hockey team recorded a six-point sweep. Some would argue too long, Oliver Peer being one of them. The Beavers didn’t have a regulation league sweep last season. It’s a streak that went back to March 1-2, 2024, when BSU won the MacNaughton Cup for the second time in program history against Minnesota State at the Sanford Center. Despite heading into its weekend series without a CCHA regulation loss, a six-point weekend eluded Bemidji State. However, behind five special-teams goals, the Beavers beat Northern Michigan 6-2 on Saturday after a 7-3 win on Friday. “It’s just nice not to go to overtime for once,” Peer quipped, referring to the eight-game stretch BSU played six OT games. “We’ve been going to overtime a lot. And it does make a big difference in this league with the three-point system. It was great to get six points, all of the points on the table.” On Friday night, Connor McClennon recorded the first BSU hat trick since Feb. 25, 2022, in a four-goal performance. Peer, a junior forward, decided to make history on Saturday. For the first time in the Beavers’ Division-I history, they had hat tricks in back-to-back games. Peer scored a goal in each period and now has a team-high 10 in 16 games. His first came three minutes and 14 seconds into the game. He cleaned up a loose puck early in the second period on the power play to put BSU ahead 3-1. Peer completed the hat trick with an empty-net goal with 5: 30 left in the third. The last time Bemidji State had back-to-back hat tricks was Feb. 2-3, 1991. “It was kind of three different goals,” Peer said. “Two were net front and the third was open net. I have good teammates. Just kind of hang around in front of the net.” Peer’s linemate, Kasper Magnussen, nearly had a hat trick himself. Magnussen scored a pair of the Beavers’ three power-play goals and assisted on the empty-netter. BSU’s top line of Peer, Magnussen and Adam Flammang combined for five goals and five assists on Saturday. Flammang, Peer and Magnussen have combined for 55 points this season. “I played with Flammer at the beginning of the year,” Peer said. “I’ve always been with Flammer. I don’t know the exact time it was when Kasper was put on the left side, but we all clicked right away together. We have a little bit of everything. (Magnussen) blows somebody up every game, I can skate and Flammer can shoot it. Our game’s complement each other. We work well as a unit.” Bemidji State went 3-for-6 on the power play. Along with their 6-on-5 goal, the Beavers also got a shorthanded tally from Max Namestnikov in the third period. Namestnikov scored an unassisted breakaway goal to give BSU a 5-2 lead. He leads all BSU freshmen with 11 points in 16 games. “I like everything about him,” head coach Tom Serratore said of Namestnikov. “He’s got juice. He’s tough as nails. He can skate. He’s good in the corners. He’s got a good stick. He’s got offensive instincts. He’s a great net front player on the power play. He’s killing more penalties right now. He’s emerging, really emerging, and he’s having a heck of a year. He’s a heck of a player who’s got good depth to his game.” Similar to Friday’s win, BSU took a 1-0 lead into the first intermission. On Saturday, though, the Wildcats showed more fight. Twelve seconds into the middle frame, Matthew Argentina scored a power-play goal to level the score. After the Beavers tallied a pair of man-advantage goals, Jakub Altrichter scored on a penalty shot. Altrichter was on a shorthanded breakaway before he was tripped by Ben Vigneault. The Wildcats opted to take the penalty shot instead of playing 4-on-4 and getting a brief power play. Altrichter danced around junior goalie Raythan Robbins to pull NMU within one. “It was an interesting game, and it was a game I could predict,” Serratore, the 25-year bench boss, said. “All the years of doing this stuff, when you have a win like last night, it’s always the total opposite the next day. Everything that happened, you could kind of sense it. Nothing surprised me. It was a nailbiter. “Special teams got us through, if you really want to analyze the game through all 60 minutes. (NMU) was as good, if not better than us 5-on-5 tonight. Our power play bailed us out. They got a power-play goal, but that shorty was a big shorty in the third period as well.” Northern Michigan outscored Bemidji State 2-1 in 5-on-5 play, but the Beavers outscored the Wildcats 3-0 in the third period. All three third-period goals came in special-teams situations. “In the third period, we kind of started playing like we did last night,” Serratore said. “We were more patient with our game, we kept the puck low. We had no ground game for two periods. I thought our ground game for 60 minutes last night was the difference. We had to defend; they had a lot of scoring chances. They were shorthanded tonight, and we didn’t take advantage of that.” Northern Michigan dressed only 10 forwards, seven defensemen and two goalies. Medrick Bolduc and Kyle Bettens didn’t dress after playing in Friday’s series opener. Forwards Peter Cisar, Girts Silkalns and Tobias Pitka were also out of the lineup, as was standout freshman goaltender Oliver Auyeung-Ashton. “Northern is always hard to play against,” Magnussen said. “They chip a lot of pucks out. It’s just hard to play against, and we managed to play our game.” BSU raised its power-play percentage to 23. 3%, which ranks 20th in the nation. The Beavers have scored 14 times on the man-advantage this season. Flammang, Peer and Magnussen have nine of them. “Kasper said it, we have so many options and can just do so many different things,” Peer said. “It’s hard to defend. We scored three goals, and they were all completely different. It’s tough to defend when you’re doing that. It gives me confidence, and the rest of the guys, too, just to be creative, make plays and stay loose.” Magnussen added: “I believe in the group we have on the power play so much. We have a lot of shot threats up top and we have heavy sticks in front. We have threats all over the unit. I think we can all score and make plays.” Bemidji State 6, Northern Michigan 2 NMU 0 2 0 2 BSU 1 2 3 3 First period BSU GOAL: Peer (Wolfe, Magnussen) 3: 14. Second period NMU GOAL: Argentina (Altrichter, Schiller) PPG, 0: 12; BSU GOAL: Magnussen (Peer, Thornton) PPG, 1: 40; BSU GOAL: Peer (Funk, McClennon) PPG, 6: 30; NMU GOAL: Altrichter (penalty shot) 7: 26. Third period BSU GOAL: Magnussen (Flammang, Thornton) PPG, 0: 54; BSU GOAL: Namestnikov (unassisted) 7: 48; BSU GOAL: Peer (Flammang, Magnussen) ENG, 14: 30. Saves Robbins (BSU) 19; Gramme (NMU) 22.
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