Alaska vs. Western Michigan, 1/8/11

Carlson Center - Upper Deck

Instead of trying to create an entry that is somehow different than game 1's, I took a semi busman's holiday for game 2 and focused on the things that didn't make it into my first Fairbanks entry.

First off, the cold here isn't that bad. The internet in my hotel moves a tortoise's pace so I walked about a mile to the nearest Starbucks to write this entry. With the mercury hovering around 3 degrees, I was surprised not to be instantly hit with that pain inducing cold we New Englanders are so accustomed to. Yet after about 15 minutes, I realized I couldn't feel my face and knew it wasn't some miracle that I couldn't beat this arctic weather. A student told me the region is classified a desert and that the reason the cold doesn't bite like back east is because the air is so dry. The snow here doesn't have a layer of ice on top of it like back east either, it stays fluffy and dry. Thanks for the meteorology lesson Steve...

The Nanook

I got to to the Carlson Center a little bit earlier for game 2 and asked the ticket usher for a seat in the student section. He happily found me one and thus began an experience quite different than game 1. Alaska entered the ice under a huge Nanook bear. Similar to Providence's entry, yet I thought because it was the school's mascot, it was acceptable. I mean come on, it looks pretty sweet. 

The student section is r-o-w-d-y. The increase in foul language made up for the decrease in ticket price. This upper deck section was fun to see a game from. The game started with an angry Alaska team trying to up the ante by aggressively forechecking the Broncos. Thus the penalties and the inevitable ref taunting came from the students. Some of the cleaner taunts included, "You suck ref!", "Where you from ref, Michigan?", and my favorite when the PA announcer would say, "Western Michigan is back at full strength" followed by the students chanting, "And they still suck!" Ahhhh, the beauty of college athletics.

Flow of the night - Luke Witkowski '13

Western Michigan opened the scoring at 18:56 on the power play when Chase Balisy '14 set up in Gretzky's office and fed Minnesota native Dane Walters '13 for the goal. At the exact same time of the 2nd frame, Max Cambell ' 11 took a power play pass from Greg Squires '12 and fired it over Alaska goalie Scott Greenham's glove for insurance. 

In between periods the Kiss Cam provided the entertainment. I can't believe this thing still exists...

The Kiss Cam

The 3rd period saw Alaska playing very frustrated. They tried desperately to score, only to have the Broncos' Jerry Kuhn '11 turn away every shot. He earned the shutout, his first of the year. Alaska had one final chance, freshman Cody Kunyk firing a one-timer from the slot that beat Kuhn, just not the net. The shot sailed wide and the final 35 seconds ended with Western Michigan sitting on the puck in their own zone. Western Michigan leaves The Last Frontier with a 2 game sweep of the #16 Nanooks. 

Kuhn was a brick wall in Game 2

CPF