WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 15 A8

SPORTS WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 15 B1Sports Editor / Matt Busch / busc0115@d.umn.edu

SPORTSBRIEFS

Women’s Basketball

Women’s Hockey

Softball

Former Bulldog Suspended

The Bulldogs lost Friday 84-77 to Moorhead after a late 13-0 run led to a disappointing finish. Saturday went much better for the (14-8) Bulldogs with a dominating 72-47 win over Crookston. Katrina New-man led the Bulldogs once again with 16 points and 9 rebounds.

The Bulldogs split a pair of low-scoring games against Bemidji State this weekend. A 1-0 win on Friday was fol-lowed by a disappointing 2-0 loss Saturday. Jennifer Harss picked up her second shutout of the season with 25 saves Friday and Jenna McParland scored the lone Bulldogs goal on the weekend.

The Bulldogs spent three days in Las Vegas playing five games, going 4-1 and outscor-ing their opponents 40-19 including 21-1 in their first two games of the season on Friday, Feb. 10.

Justin Fontaine, one of the stars from the last national champion Bulldog hockey team was suspended for two games from the Minnesota Wild’s developmental team, the Houston Areos, follwoing a Twitter post, which used a gay slur during Sunday night’s Grammy Awards. Fontaine apologized on Twitter Mon-day saying “it’s a word I’ll nev-er use again.”

BY MATT BUSCH busc0115@d.umn.edu

Jack Connolly just looks like a hockey player. His slightly askew set of teeth and his distinct omni-present playoff beard make him instantly recognizable to any northland hockey fan.

His look wouldn’t mean much if he couldn’t back it up, and back it up he has over the last three and a half seasons at UMD. Connolly has slowly climbed to the upper echelon of names in Bulldog his-tory and cemented his legacy last spring with a national champion-ship. He has raised his stellar play this season, being one of the favor-ites to win this year’s Hobey Baker Award.

“It would be awesome,” UMD’s 2004 Hobey Baker winner Junior Lessard said Friday about Connol-ly possibly taking home the award. “We’re leading the country with Hobey Baker winners, and to have a fifth one would be special.”

Connolly is a hometown boy. He helped lead Duluth Marshall High School to three straight appearanc-es in the Minnesota Class-A State Tournament from 2005-2007. The final two seasons they finished runner-up.

“Playing for Marshall was great, it was a lot of fun,” Connolly said. “Great high school memories, lot of great buddies on my team.”

Connolly joined the Bulldogs after a year in the USHL where he led the league with 72 points.

His prolific statistics contin-ued during his years as a Bulldog, with a chance to become UMD’s seventh player to reach 200 career points. This has given him a lot of individual national attention.

The two-time All-American Connolly isn’t too worried about his own accolades, but admits the Hobey Baker Award would mean a lot. His focus remains on get-ting the Bulldogs another national championship.

“Hands down it would be another national championship,” Connolly said. “The Hobey Baker would be cool but winning a national cham-pionship then try to repeat would definitely be one of the most spe-cial things that could ever happen to a guy in college hockey.”

UMD’s 1984 Hobey Baker win-ner Tom Kurvers agrees with Con-

nolly on team success first. “We would enjoy it immensely if

he were to win it, but in our mind, Jack’s already been part of a nation-al championship,” Kurvers said. “We would trade in our awards to be a part of a national champion-ship team. I tell people that the 2011 championship was for every player that ever played here. It’s hard to express that to a guy who’s on the team, because it’s their team and their championship, but we celebrated just along with them.”

Connolly is focused on helping the Bulldogs for the remainder of the season despite his potentially bright future beyond the friendly confines of UMD and AMSOIL Arena.

“Right now just keep doing what I’m doing,” Connolly said. “Try to perform for UMD. Try to get this program another national champi-onship this year. After that I guess we will just have to wait and see what happens. I would like to try and play hockey somewhere, wher-ever that may be.”

BY KARA HILLEhille212@d.umn.edu

Top contenders from all over the United States will gather in Tampa Bay, Fla., this April for the Frozen Four and also to see who will win the prestigious Hobey Baker Memorial Award. While the first phase of fan voting for this award will not end until March 1, three players have pulled ahead as clear leaders, including UMD’s own Jack Connolly.

Most recently with two goals and three assists in Saturday’s game against North Dako-ta, UMD captain Jack Connolly has been profiled as a favorite to win Hobey. Coming from a program that has produced more Hobey Baker winners than any other program in the nation, Connolly’s five-point night was a career-high as well as just a point short of UMD’s single-game record. The two-time All-American is also working toward reaching an impressive 200-point collegiate career. Connolly’s run for Hobey has launched the website www.webackjack.net where fans can stay on top of his advancement toward the award.

Ranked third for the NCAA’s scoring leaders, Colgate senior Austin Smith is also in third place for fan voting. The senior forward is now sitting at 150 career points with an even 75 goals and 75 assists. Smith is only the fourth player in Colgate’s history to reach 30 goals in one season, and also the first to reach that benchmark for his program since 1988. Smith also currently leads college hockey in goals scored with 32. Registering four goals in a game against RPI earlier this month, Smith was the first to do so in nearly a decade.

Leading fan voting with 18 percent, Maine senior Spencer Abbott also leads college hockey overall scoring with 33 assists and 16 goals for a combined 49 points in 29 games played. As Hockey East’s player of the month for December, Abbott has also been named the Hockey East player of the week three times this season as well as the National Col-legiate Hockey Player of the month for the month of December. The Black Bears forward was also named a Maine scholar-athlete award winner for the 2010-11 season. Abbott, an Ontario native, has been most heavily scouted by the Toronto Maple Leafs but has not been drafted, much like Jack Connolly.

The top 10 players to advance to phase II of voting will be announced March 15. Phase II voting will then begin March 16.

Jack Connolly: Alpha dog

Scan this with your smartphone to watch the video

interview with Connolly

Jack Connolly is having a historic season for the Bulldogs. Connolly currently has the second most fan votes for the Hobey Baker Award.

RACHEL KRAFT/STATESMAN

Breaking down the Hobey Baker favorites

Jack Connolly - UMD

Austin Smith - Colgate

Spencer Abbott - Maine