HOUGHTON - Every year, North Dakota is really good.
And yet every year, Michigan Tech seems to get a victory or two over the Fighting Sioux.
The Huskies got their first of at least four shots to do it again on Friday. But on this particular night, North Dakota was having none of it.
The Fighting Sioux scored solo goals in the first and third periods and added two in the middle frame to defeat Tech 4-2 in Western Collegiate Hockey Association play.
Tech put itself behind the 8-ball early in the opening period. A penalty on Ricky Doriott with just more than four minutes gone put the Fighting Sioux on the power play.
North Dakota came into the game scoring at a 24.3 percent clip with the man advantage, but goalie Kevin Genoe made a couple of relatively easy saves and the Huskies held North Dakota off the board.
Another Tech penalty late in the period proved to be far more costly.
Just five seconds after Alex MacLeod went off for high-sticking, Jason Gregoire lit the lamp to put the Fighting Sioux up 1-0 after one.
"The bottom line is we have got to stay out of the penalty box," Tech coach Jamie Russell said. "I'm at a loss right now to explain how we do that.
"It's pretty crystal clear. There's nothing confusing about it. We must stay out of the penalty box."
The power-play tally was the first of three on the night for North Dakota. The Fighting Sioux were 3-of-8 with the man advantage for the contest.
"I think we have a lot of guys out there that are starting to gel," North Dakota coach Dave Hakstol said of his power-play units. "I think (assistant head coach) Cary Eades has done a great job building a real simplistic base to our power play.
"It's a shoot-first mentality. I thought at times tonight we got away from that. Even though we got a lot of shots on goal on our power play I still think we got away from it a little bit."
The Huskies got an early power-play chance of their own to begin the second. Tech had a 5-on-4 edge for six seconds and a 4-on-3 advantage for another 1:27.
But the Huskies managed just one shot on goal in the 1:33 span. And that shot, a blast from the point by John Kivisto, was swallowed up by North Dakota netminder Brad Eidsness.
The Fighting Sioux struck again just moments after Tech second power play had expired. Evan Trupp's even-strength goal at the 4:58 mark made it 2-0.
The goal by Trupp proved to be an important one, because John Kivisto's tally with just 5:42 remaining cut the lead to 2-1. The goal by Kivisto was his second of the season.
"He was outstanding tonight," Russell said of Kivisto. "Johnny had a monster hit out there and scored a big power-play goal.
"I thought he had so much poise with the puck. He's just playing fantastic hockey for us right now."
North Dakota, however, was able to push its lead back to two before the period ended on its second goal with the man advantage. Chris VandeVelde's power-play marker at 18:11 made it 3-1 after two.
Tech had a chance to slice the deficit back to one on another power play in the third. But the Huskies failed to score and the Fighting Sioux added another while a man up to make it 4-1.
A goal by Eli Vlaisavljevich with 4:16 left closed out the scoring. It was his first goal of the season.
"It definitely felt good," Vlaisavljevich said of his goal. "I was hoping we could get a couple more.
"It was one of those things where there were two good plays by the wingers and center who were driving up, taking hits and making plays."
The two teams complete their series tonight at 7:37.
K.D. Warvie can be reached at kwarvie@ mininggazette.com.
