Gophers Beat Notre Dame 6-3 but Lose Leading Scorer Lamb

South Bend, IN – The good news is that the Minnesota Gopher hockey team beat the Notre Dame Fighting Irish Friday night to remain unbeaten in their first five Big Ten games.

The bad news is that, for the foreseeable future, they’ll be without another important part of their forward corps.

Minnesota (11-2-0 Overall (1-1 OT), 4-0-1-0 B1G) beat Notre Dame (5-8-0 (1-1), 0-5-1-1) 6-3 Friday night, a nice come from behind win after a shaky start in the first. However, the team lost Brody Lamb to a vicious and dirty knee-on-knee hit late in the second period. No further information is available on Lamb at the time of posting this article, other than the fact that he is out for Saturday night’s rubber match between the Gophers and Irish.

As mentioned, it was a bit of a rocky start for the Gophers in the opening period. Nathan Airey, Minnesota’s resident Friday night goaltender, let in an extremely soft goal in the opening minutes, but got bailed out as Notre Dame was ruled barely offsides after coach Bob Motzko challenged the play. Not to be deterred, the Irish scored on their very next shot, which came off a Gopher turnover at the offensive blue line.

Brody Lamb answered back just a few minutes later to tie the game at 1-1. Lamb, driving the middle of the ice, took an August Falloon pass and one-time snapped it past ND goalie Owen Say to get Minnesota on the board. The goal was Lamb’s ninth of the year, good for the team lead in goals.

Notre Dame took an offensive zone penalty very late in the first period, which was really the turning point in the game. Minnesota’s Sam Rinzel scored his fifth of the year on a deflection from a point shot early in the second, and the Gophers controlled the game from there.

Oliver Moore scored on a nice play out in front of the net at 14:36 to give the Gophers a 3-1 lead. Almost three minutes later, Notre Dame’s Jack Larrigan scored his first college goal to get the Irish back within one at 3-2. That’s when the dirty play began.

Notre Dame’s Justin Janicke stuck out his knee in the defensive zone and caught Brody Lamb coming across the middle with a brutal hit. Lamb’s knee appeared to bend the wrong way, and he went down in a heap grabbing at his right knee. Lamb left the game and did not return, and he is not in the lineup for Saturday’s series finale.

Janicke was assessed a five minute major for kneeing and a game misconduct, giving the Gophers a chance to extend their 3-2 lead. Rinzel scored on another deflected point shot with just 24 seconds left in the period to give Minnesota a two-goal lead heading into the third.

The Gophers were still on the power play from the major penalty at the start of the third period, and they struck again on Aaron Huglen’s wrist-shot goal at 1:44 to give Minnesota a big 5-2 cushion.

Notre Dame scored again late in the third to make it interesting, but Connor Kurth’s empty net goal sealed the deal, and at the end Minnesota skated away with a 6-3 victory.

The story of the game, of course, is the severity of Brody Lamb’s injury. Janicke has been suspended by the league for the Saturday series finale, but Lamb has the potential to be out much, much longer. With the Gophers already down one top-six forward in Eric Pahlsson, who was hit on another borderline-dirty open ice hit against Wisconsin, Minnesota is down to their last forwards. Saturday’s Gopher lineup features all three part-timers in Minnesota’s forward corps in John Mittelstadt, August Falloon, and Nick Michel.

Despite the shaky start, Nathan Airey earned the win between the pipes for Minnesota, stopping 25 of 28 Irish shots for his seventh win of the season. ND’s Say took the loss, with 32 stops on 37 shots (not including the empty net goal).

The two teams battle it out again Saturday afternoon, with a 5PM puck drop. Minnesota will look to improve to 5-0-1-0 in Big Ten play in the rubber match.