And over the weekend, the Wildcats showed that good trend with a road sweep of No. 17 Bemidji State.

The Wildcats used a four-goal third period surge to win 5-1 Friday in Bemidji, Minnesota, before outlasting the Beavers 3-2 in overtime Saturday with defenseman Ben Newhouse scoring the game winner.

Despite the final score Saturday, that game was a tight one for two periods, much as a majority of games between these two teams go.

The first period was evenly played with neither team registering much offense for the majority of the period, thanks to a number of blocked shots.

Joe Nardi

The only real scoring chance came with NMU trying to kill off an A.J. Vanderbeck penalty as the Beavers’ Brad Johnson sent a shot through traffic that was bobbled by Wildcats goalie Rico DiMatteo, but the puck was cleared out of the crease in time to keep the game scoreless.

The offense picked up in the second period with Northern breaking the deadlock early after an impressive offensive rush. NMU’s Mikey Colella sent a long pass up ice to teammate Andre Ghantous, who backhanded a pass from the slot over to Wildcats captain Joe Nardi, who then one-timed a shot past Beavers goalie Zach Driscoll.

Bemidji answered back shortly after that, but that goal was waved off because of an offside call.

Both teams had scoring chances for the remainder of the second period with Newhouse sending a blast on net that rang off the post with the teams playing 4-on-4 with around 13 minutes remaining, and Ghantous had a shot that also went off both pipes a few moments later.

DiMatteo made two flashy glove saves in the period, one on Tyler Vold with 14:41 left and another on a one-timer by Elias Rosen on a penalty kill with less than seven minutes left.

Still up only 1-0, Northern exploded offensively in the third period. First, Brandon Schultz took a pass from Tim Erkkila by the right post with NMU on the power play and backhanded a shot past Driscoll with 16:47 left. Less than two minutes later on the same power play, Nardi deflected a Vanderbeck shot into the net to make it 3-0 Wildcats.

Later, the Wildcats’ penalty kill created more offense. First, Ghantous got a pass from Nardi on a shorthanded rush and snapped a shot from the slot past Driscoll to pad the advantage to 4-0 at 13:19. Then on that same kill, Connor Marritt took advantage of a Bemidji lapse, raced up the middle and passed the puck to Garrett Klee, who beat Driscoll to make it 5-0 Wildcats. Driscoll was then pulled for backup Gavin Enright.

Bemidji did get one goal back on a tally by Tyler Kirkup at 15:12, but the margin was way too much to overcome.

On Sunday, Nardi got the Wildcats on the board first again, this time just 22 seconds in as he scored five-hole off a pass from Ghantous. NMU almost pushed its lead to two goals twice later in the period, but Ghantous had a pair of shots ring off the crossbar.

Meanwhile at the other end, DiMatteo kept the Beavers at bay, stopping a one-timer from Tyler Jubenvill with less than nine minutes remaining, and later stuffing Alex Ierullo on a breakaway with a little more than two minutes left to maintain the 1-0 margin.

In the second, Bemidji answered back when Sam Solensky beat DiMatteo high-glove on an offensive rush at the 2:07 mark to tie it 1-1. The score remained deadlocked the rest of the period until the Wildcats got a break in the Beavers’ defensive zone as a David Keefer shot was saved by Driscoll, but went right to Klee, who tapped in the rebound. Northern then took a 2-1 advantage into the third.

The Beavers retied it again, though. After DiMatteo stopped a Jubenvill shot from the point with 18 minutes left and deflected out a shot by Brendan Harris shortly after that, Ethan Somoza tapped a rebound just inside the right post at 2:59. Bemidji almost took the lead with just over two minutes left, but Johnson’s shot from the point rang off the post and the game stayed tied 2-2 going to overtime.

NMU dominated the extra period with Nardi almost winning it on a one-timer just a few seconds in. About a minute later, Vanderbeck was stopped twice by Driscoll.

Then with 1:57 left, the Wildcats broke free on another rush with Ghantous sending a pass over to Newhouse in the slot and he snapped the puck past Driscoll to complete the sweep.

Northern hosts Alabama-Huntsville at 4:30 p.m. today and 7 p.m. Wednesday in a makeup series originally scheduled to be played in Alabama, which will be followed by two days off and another home series against Bowling Green State on Saturday evening and Sunday afternoon.

Ryan Stieg can be reached at 906-228-2500, ext. 252. His email address is rstieg@miningjournal.net.