Mark Sinclair stood on his head for two periods to keep Northern Michigan from routing the Chargers. However, when UAH got energized in the third period, they couldn’t tie the game.

Such was the case in the Chargers’ 3-1 loss to the Wildcats on Saturday. After UAH finally got its first win on Friday, NMU snapped a four-game losing streak to split the series.

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The Chargers (1-12-1 overall, 1-8-1 WCHA) were fortunate to only being down 2-1 through two periods, as the Wildcats (8-6-2, 6-4-0) dominated to the tune of a 29-8 shots advantage.

Sinclair stopped 32 of 34 NMU shots on goal.

“Mark Sinclair was fantastic and he was able to keep us in the game,” UAH head coach Mike Corbett said. “He made more than the saves he needed to make tonight. I feel bad for him, because I think his teammates led him down tonight.”

Lategan’s line and Connor Wood and Brandon Salerno, those guys played their butts off but the rest of the guys, we were very average. Very vanilla.

From the start, Northern Michigan wasn’t messing around like Friday’s first period, when the Wildcats sloppily allowed three goals.

NMU got on the board first with a shorthanded goal. Garrett Klee drove almost the length of the ice, got around a UAH defender in front of the Charger net and beat Sinclair to put NMU up 1-0 at the 5:03 mark.

Despite having two power plays, UAH was outshot 5-3 in the first half of the opening period. NMU had a 14-5 shots on goal advantage at the first intermission.

The Wildcats continued the put Sinclair to work early in the second period, but the Chargers tied the game at the 7:22 mark. Brandon Salerno ripped a one-timer from the left circle on a pass from Daneel Lategan at the halfwall for his second goal of the season.

Lategan and Connor Wood, with his third point of the series, got the assists. Corbett said that fourth line of Salerno, Lategan, and Wood had the best energy.

“Lategan’s line and Connor Wood and Brandon Salerno, those guys played their butts off but the rest of the guys, we were very average,” Corbett said. “Very vanilla.”

NMU got the lead right back at 2-1 less than a minute later. Jarrett Lee’s drive from the slot was stopped by Sinclair and deflected off the crossbar, and Luke Voltin put in the rebound.

The Chargers played much better in the third period, holding the Wildcats shotless through the first 10 minutes. UAH outshot NMU 9-6 in the third period.

However, NMU goaltender Nolan Kent (16 saves), who got the start after coming into Friday’s game in relief, would not allow the equalizer.

UAH had a golden chance late with a power play after Darien Craighead was called for a cross-checking penalty, but the Chargers would finish 0-for-6 with the advantage for the game and 0-for-9 for the series.

“We’ve got to move the puck quicker,” Corbett said of the power play. “We play too slow, and they’re able to get in the lanes and block shots. Our decision making on it isn’t very good.”

Vincent de Mey finished the NMU victory with an empty-net goal with 15 seconds to go. All three of NMU’s wins over UAH this season were by two goals, each with an empty-netter at the end. (The Chargers won Friday the same way.)

UAH heads to Bowling Green next weekend. The Chargers won’t be home again until January 9 and 10 against Bemidji State.

Finally, the Chargers are in the win column.

Powered by three first-period goals, UAH defeated Northern Michigan 4-2 at the Von Braun Center on Friday night to earn its first victory of the season. The Chargers snapped a 15-game winless streak going back to last season.

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The Chargers (1-11-1 overall, 1-7-1 WCHA) also got a strong performance in net by Mark Sinclair, who made 27 saves and kept the Wildcats at bay while they tried to rally.

“Mark Sinclair was good,” UAH head coach Mike Corbett said. “Our goaltending’s been average, and we talked with those guys this week about really stepping up and Mark did.”

UAH will go for two in a row Saturday night at Propst Arena. Game time is at 7:07 p.m.

Meanwhile, NMU (7-6-2 overall, 5-4-0 WCHA) has lost four straight games, all in conference play.

“Don’t relax. Don’t be satisfied,” Corbett said about the message to his team for Saturday. “You’ve got to win one before you can win two. You can think about a sweep because you won Friday night, but we also know that their backs are against the wall and they’re going to come out fighting, and we have to come out better than we were tonight.”

Seemingly out of nowhere, the Chargers busted out to a 3-0 lead, scoring the three goals in a span of 4:09.

The first goal came at 11:26, when Daneel Lategan, just out of the penalty box following a charging penalty, scored on a two-on-none with Brandon Salerno.

At 13:59, Connor Merkley found Tyr Thompson in the slot, who made it 2-0 with his third goal of the season.

“That’s the forecheck we want,” Corbett said. “(Merkley) came in hard on the forecheck, took the body, happened to get the puck, and made a nice play to Tyr right in front. That’s the one you work on in practice all the time. It usually doesn’t work but it worked tonight.”

Then at 15:35, Christian Rajic in the right circle found Josh Latta in the slot. Latta fired his second goal past NMU goaltender John Hawthorne, whose night was done early after allowing three goals on five shots.

Northern Michigan cut UAH’s lead to 3-1 at the 6:22 mark of the second period. Griffin Loughran’s deflection of a blast from the point on the power play resulted in his WCHA-leading 12th goal of the season.

The Wildcats would make a push throughout much of the third period. Replacement goaltender Nolan Kent stopped all 15 shots he faced the rest of the way.

UAH would seal the deal with a minute to go after Kent was pulled for the extra attacker. Connor Wood, who also assisted on Lategan’s goal, fought off a defender and found the open net to put the Chargers up 4-1.

Grant Loven scored for NMU with 32 seconds remaining for the final 4-2 score, but it was too little, too late.

“We had to earn it,” Corbett said. “We earned it tonight. We knew they were coming off a long trip, and we started out fast.

“I’m just happy for (the team). It’s not about me. These guys were beat up after last Saturday’s game against Bemidji (a 7-0 loss) and it’s nice to see them come back. It’s nice to see them earn a victory and they deserved it.”

Three stars of the game:
1. Tyr Thompson, UAH (goal)
2. Mark Sinclair, UAH (27 saves)
3. Daneel Lategan, UAH (goal)

File photo of Connor Wood by Todd Thompson/RiverCat Photography.

The Chargers scored on their first shot of the game, but a sequence of misplays in the second period was the difference in Friday’s 5-3 loss to Bemidji State in northern Minnesota.

UAH remains winless at 0-10-1 overall and 0-6-1 in WCHA play. Bemidji State improved to 5-4-2 and 5-2-0. Game two of the series is Saturday at 6:07 p.m.

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UAH took the lead at the 2:50 mark when Connor Merkley, back in the lineup after missing five games due to injury, fired a one-timer from the right slot to beat BSU goaltender Zach Driscoll.

Ben Allen, making his season debut, made the cross-ice pass for the primary assist. Max Coyle got the other assist for his first collegiate point.

Bemidji State tied the game on the power play after UAH was caught having too many men on the ice. Tommy Muck scored from the high slot as UAH goalie Mark Sinclair had a Beaver on top of him. Video review determined a Charger pushed the Beaver into the crease, and the goal was confirmed with 13:40 left in the first.

The Beavers scored their second power play goal in two opportunities with 5:48 left in the period. After four quick consecutive Charger blocks, an Adam Brady shot was deflected by a skate and in.

Bad mistakes allowed BSU to up its lead to 4-1. First was a misplay right in front of Sinclair, allowing Alex Adams to pounce with a backhander with 15:22 left in the second.

Adams scored again just 24 seconds later on another turnover and another backhander in the slot.

Sinclair, who couldn’t have done much to stop the onslaught, was pulled at that point for David Fessenden. Sinclair had made 15 saves on 19 shots.

UAH cut Bemidji’s lead to 4-2 when Austin Beaulieu redirected a Tanner Hickey shot from the left point over Driscoll with 2:26 remaining in the second. It was the senior captain’s first goal of the season.

The second intermission came early with 1:52 left on the clock. Ice issues around the UAH net forced the teams to the locker room early.

The last 1:52 was played followed immediately by the start of the third period.

Tyler Kirkup scored with 6:56 to go to put BSU up 5-2.

UAH answered right back with 6:00 left as Liam Izyk scored his first college goal, a point-blank rebound after another Hickey shot. Hickey and Christian Rajic with the assists.

After BSU outshot UAH 27-7 in the first two periods, the Chargers had a 10-6 shots advantage in the third as they tried to mount a comeback.

Fessenden finished with 14 saves on 15 shots faced.

The search for a win incredibly continues.

Alaska Anchorage scored with 3:05 remaining in the third period, then added an empty-netter to defeat UAH 3-1 at the Von Braun Center on Saturday.

Alaska Anchorage (2-4-2 overall, 2-1-1 WCHA) came to Huntsville and took five of six points in the WCHA series, which seemed to be the best chance so far for the Chargers to finally taste victory. The teams tied 4-4 on Friday with the Seawolves taking the shootout.

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This loss will fester for a bit. UAH (0-9-1, 0-5-1) is off next week before heading to Bemidji State on November 22-23.

“We’ve got to get our game crisper,” UAH head coach Mike Corbett said. “We’ve got to get more consistent. We’ve got to be able to move pucks and let pucks do the work, especially on nights like tonight when maybe we don’t have our best legs.”

The Chargers almost started the game with a bang just like Friday night when Peyton Francis had a breakaway in the first 17 seconds, but he was stopped by UAA goaltender Kristian Stead.

There wasn’t that much action after that until Tanner Schachle committed a major boarding penalty with a game misconduct, ending his night 12:34 in. UAH then had a short two-man advantage after an Alex Frye slashing penalty.

UAH failed to score with the over six minutes of power play time, but not without peppering Stead with pucks. The Chargers finished the first period with a 16-2 shots on goal advantage, but the game remained scoreless.

The first half of the second period saw the Seawolves get the first nine shots on goal, but it was the Chargers who got the first goal.

On a power play, Brandon Salerno backhanded a rebound at the Stead’s doorstep to put UAH up 1-0 with 6:12 remaining in the second. Tanner Hickey and Connor James had the assists.

However, the Chargers did not pick up Trey DeGraaf, who 86 seconds later tied the game at 1-1, also on a rebound in the slot.

The Seawolves continued to dominate the share of scoring opportunities into the third period. From the second period on, UAA outshot the Chargers 26-10.

“We had to get a spark,” Corbett said. “We had to get something going, and we didn’t have the energy to get it going.

“They pressured us a lot. We knew what they were going to do. We just have to be able to handle that pressure. You’ve got to be in shape and you’ve got to be able to play 60-plus minutes to be able to handle that pressure consistently.”

Anchorage’s game-winning goal came off the stick of DeGraaf, who deflected Carmine Buono’s blast from the left point. The puck somehow found its way past UAH goalie David Fessenden to make it 2-1.

Fessenden, who was making his third start, finished with 25 saves.

“I thought he was solid,” Corbett said of Fessenden’s effort. “All you want your goalie to do is give you a chance to win and I think he gave us a chance to win. He played hard and competed in his first home start.”

With Fessenden pulled for the extra attacker, Alex Frye sealed the Chargers’ fate with 8.8 second remaining with an empty-net goal.