Northern Michigan University’s Rylan Yaremko, center, tries to clear the puck away from in front of the Wildcats’ goal while teammate Ben Newhouse, second from right, tries to block Michigan Tech’s Trent Bliss, right, during their WCHA game played at the John MacInnes Student Ice Arena in Houghton on Saturday night. Also converging on the play are, from left, the Huskies’ Tommy Parrottino, NMU’s Mitchel Slattery and MTU’s Brenden Datema. (Photo courtesy Cara Kamps)

“If you want to win on the road you have to bring your team defense.” — Grant Potulny, head coach, NMU hockey

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HOUGHTON — Darien Craighead’s goal scored with just 1:03 left lifted Northern Michigan University to a 3-2 victory at Michigan Tech on the Huskies’ Senior Night, ensuring the Wildcats will host Tech in the first round of the WCHA playoffs this weekend.

It ended the Huskies’ four-game winning streak as they were attempting to tie Northern in the standings and possibly take home ice from them in the league quarterfinals.

It was the Wildcats’ only win over MTU this season, but it was important to have as the full three points for a regulation win clinched the No. 3 playoff seed by one point over Alaska-Fairbanks and Bowling Green State. Fairbanks and BGSU play a series against each other this weekend in Alaska as the Nos. 4 and 5 seeds.

Michigan Tech (19-15-3, 14-11-2 WCHA), which ended up No. 6, played its familiar brand of hockey on Saturday, rallying in the third period of a one-goal game. With the loss, the Huskies are 10-8 in one-goal games this season. The loss also dropped Tech to 5-9-2 at home.

“It was a winner-take-all type of environment,” Huskies head coach Joe Shawhan said. “We were on home ice. We haven’t played great on our home ice for some reason all year.

“I’m not sure. Maybe we have to look a little bit deeper into that. We seem to be a better road team for whatever reason.”

Tech comes to Marquette for a second straight weekend, this time in a best-of-three series. Puck drop is 7:07 p.m. Friday and 6:07 p.m. on Saturday and also Sunday, if that game is necessary.

The Wildcats’ win was only their second victory in the last eight games, as just a month ago NMU was angling for a shot at the league’s No. 2 seed, which would’ve guaranteed home ice for two rounds of the playoffs.

Instead, they hung on for dear life to avoid losing home ice altogether after an 8-4 debacle at home on Friday night against Tech.

“There’s a lot of emotion going into the game,” Northern head coach Grant Potulny said. “We’ve had a tough stretch.

“We talked about it before the game. You work all year at the beginning of the year to put yourself in a position where you have a chance to have home ice. Came down to your biggest rival, on the road to complete that home ice opportunity.

“I thought the effort was outstanding. The small things — shot blocking, faceoffs, advancing pucks — things you have to do to win. If you want to win on the road you have to bring your team defense.”

Craighead scored the winning goal for the Wildcats (18-14-4, 16-11-1-1) on a whirlwind sequence as time was winding down and overtime loomed.

It started with Northern goalie Nolan Kent going far out of his crease to play the puck. Tech freshman center Logan Pietila also chased after the puck, but Kent got to it first and tried to shoot it up the ice. Instead, it deflected to Pietila, who spun around while going toward the net. He didn’t see the puck, which glided at his feet with him into the corner.

“I couldn’t see the puck and I thought the puck was just going to kind of slide right in because of the momentum it was going to take it,” Potulny said. “I was thinking, ‘Boy what a way to lose the game.’ Immediately after it goes the other way.”

Wildcats defenseman Rylan Yaremko got control of the puck, turned it up ice to Craighead, who took it into the Tech zone on a 2-on-1 break. Craighead wristed it high past Huskies senior goalie Matt Jurusik as Yaremko and Kent got assists.

In the celebration of the goal, Craighead skated to center ice and made a flag-planting gesture with his stick at the center ice faceoff dot.

Up to that point, the Huskies carried momentum by rallying to tie the game. Sophomore right wing Tommy Parrottino scored his 10th of the season on a wrist shot just inside the right circle near the slot less than four minutes earlier.

Potulny challenged the goal, saying Parrottino was offside. The puck appeared to fully cross the blue line just a split second before Parrottino’s left skate lifted off the ice. Any sooner and he would have been offside and the goal would’ve been waved off. Potulny’s lengthy discussion after the replay review was about making sure he had his timeout, he said.

“I wasn’t arguing if it was on or off. They told me the video was inconclusive, so I thought they couldn’t see the video, so I wanted my timeout back,” Potulny said. “Then after the game, I said I just wanted to clarify with you I’m right on this.”

Huskies freshman defenseman Brenden Datema scored his first career collegiate goal and the only goal of the first period 2:36 before the first intermission.

Greyson Reitmeier won the draw back to the 6-foot-5 Datema, who stepped into an atomic slap shot that beat Kent stick side.

Datema’s goal seemed to be all the Huskies needed to keep momentum rolling after their dominant win the previous night.

The Wildcats then took the lead in the second period despite throwing away multiple power-play opportunities that could’ve padded their lead.

Tech senior defenseman Keegan Ford’s night ended prematurely with a checking from behind major penalty seven minutes into the second period. The impact was partly muted as NMU’s Griffin Loughran was whistled for a minor for roughing at the same time.

Before that happened, Wildcats senior center Luke Voltin tipped a shot from the point by Brandon Schultz for his eighth goal of the year at 4:08 of the second. The scoring opportunity came off a defensive zone turnover.

Just 58 seconds later, sophomore teammate Garrett Klee pressured MTU sophomore defenseman Colin Swoyer, who lost an edge and fell. Northern freshman Andre Ghantous secured the puck and barely snuck it between Jurusik’s closed pads for a 2-1 lead.

After the Tech major and NMU minors were called, Northern actually got stuck in a 4-on-3 shorthanded situation when Phil Beaulieu was called for tripping 17 seconds after those initial penalties went into effect.

The Wildcats attempted 41 shots in the second period. Of those, 10 were blocked and one hit the post with Jurusik saving 14 then and 26 total.

Once Craighead gave Northern the lead with 63 seconds to go, the Huskies went into desperation mode. Tech pulled Jurusik and sent out skater Trenton Bliss, who scored a hat trick in Friday’s win, but the Huskies couldn’t get the puck past Kent.

He made 22 saves for the win. Potulny said Kent’s ability to bounce back Saturday after enduring the eight goals allowed the night before was key.

“He’s done that the second half of the year quite a bit,” Potulny said. “He’s had an interesting year. To start the year, him and (fellow goalie) John (Hawthorne) were going back and forth to see who was going to get more games.

“We played Mankato before Christmas and (Kent) played a great game (in NMU’s 4-1 home win). So I came back with him at Bowling Green and he played four games, Bowling Green, Bowling Green, Cornell, Cornell — about .967 save percentage hockey.

“At that point, he kind of solidified himself. What that did was I think it affected his mental approach. When he kind of solidified himself as ‘the’ guy, it affected his play because he wasn’t as mentally hungry or whatever you want to say.

“He had a tough stretch there. Tonight, he really played well in a tough building to play in.”

In other WCHA playoff series, Lake Superior State won for the fourth time in its last five games to capture the No. 7 seed and will play at No. 2 Bemidji State, which lost Saturday night 4-1 at Minnesota State-Mankato to be denied a share of the league title, the MacNaughton Cup and No. 1 playoff position. Alaska-Anchorage is No. 8 and visits Mankato.