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Fourth seeded Wisconsin opened up the WCHA playoffs Friday night in fine fashion, knocking off ninth seeded Minnesota-Duluth, 3-1. The win was key for a Badgers club that is still in contention for a potential at-large birth in the NCAA tournament.
While the 1-0 lead in the best-of-three series is nice, Wisconsin knows they must seal the deal. The past two seasons the Badgers have gotten out to 1-0 leads only to drop the final two games and see their seasons end before the WCHA Final Five.
Wisconsin will use the exact same lineup that they used in game number one, with Joel Rumpel back between the pipes for the Badgers.
As for injuries, once again Wisconsin will be without the services of senior center Derek Lee who will miss his sixth straight game with a knee injury suffered in the Penn State series. Also, Duluth will be without sixth-year senior captain Cody Danberg who was injured after taking a hit from Sean Little on Friday night.
Little's hit was egregiously called a two minute penalty for boarding. Replays showed that the hit was clean from every angle. Regardless, the injury drops Danberg out of UMD's lineup tonight.
What you need to know:
Who: 9th seeded UMD (14-18-5, 10-13-5 WCHA) at 4th seeded Wisconsin (18-12-7, 13-8-7 WCHA)
What: WCHA Playoffs First Round
Where: Kohl Center (Madison, Wis.)
Capacity: 15,237
Game Time: 7:07 PM CT
Television: Wisconsin Channel
Web-Stream: LINK (Free)
Radio: Badger Sports Network
WISCONSIN LINES
Nic Kerdiles - Mark Zengerle - Tyler Barnes
Joseph LaBate - Brendan Woods - Michael Mersch
Ryan Little - Jefferson Dahl - Sean Little
Brad Navin - Keegan Meuer - Matt Paape
Jake McCabe - Frankie Simonelli
Kevin Schulze - John Ramage
Eddie Wittchow - Joe Faust
Joel Rumpel
Landon Peterson
Adam Miller
MINNESOTA-DULUTH LINES
Mike Seidel - Caleb Herbert - Justin Crandall
Autin Farley - Tony Cameranesi - Joe Basaraba
Dan DeLisle - Cal Decowski - Adam Krause
Charlie Sampair - Jake Hendrickson - Keegan Flaherty
Drew Olson - Andy Welinski
Tim Smith - Chris Casto
Wade Bergman - Derik Johnson
Aaron Crandall
Matt McNeely
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You can also reach Andy via e-mail (AndyJohnsonB5Q@gmail.com)