At South Bend, Ind., the Minnesota Gophers' men's hockey squad endured a 4-3 defeat at the hands of No. 18 Notre Dame on Friday night, at Compton Family Ice Arena.
The Gophers made a furious, two-goal rally late, but it wasn't enough to overtake the host Fighting Irish.
Hudson Fasching and Leon Bristedt both had two points for the second straight game for Minnesota, including a pair of power-play tallies late in the third period to briefly knot the score. Additionally, netminder Eric Schierhorn made a career-high 34 saves for Minnesota (2-4-0 overall).
After a scoreless first period, the Irish (4-1-2 overall) broke the scoring drought 4:34 into the second period on a goal from Anders Bjork. The goal sparked a four-goal second period with Jack Sadek and Fasching feeding Bristedt to tie the game at 7:29, only for the Irish to answer back with two more goals from Dylan Malmquist and Jordan Gross at 12:46 and 19:17, respectively.
Minnesota bounced back during a huge power-play opportunity in the middle of the third period, however. Malmquist took a five-minute major and game misconduct for contact to the head followed by a cross checking penalty to Luke Ripley to set up a five-on-three for the Gophers.
Bristedt scored his second of the night at 14:51 on the two-man advantage after being set up by Tyler Sheehy and Jake Bischoff to make it a one-goal game, and then Michael Brodzinski and Tommy Novak fed Fasching for the power-play equalizer at 16:38 as Minnesota closed out the night 2 for 4 on the power play and 2 for 2 on the penalty kill.
The tie wouldn't last, though, as Gross tallied his second of the night soon after for the game winner.
The Gophers and the Irish close out this weekend's series on Saturday at 5:35 p.m.
