Spartans look to put losses to rival Michigan behind them as they head to Minnesota

By Alyssa Girardi –

EAST LANSING — With the fiery emotions stripped away from last Friday’s painful loss to Michigan, MSU head coach Tom Anastos is able to put the anger following the game in perspective.

After the 5-2 loss, Anastos displayed emotions seldom revealed outside of closed doors. He said his team lacked discipline, repeatedly using the word “unacceptable” to describe the Spartans’ behavior.

“What I talked to our team about and what probably wasn’t conveyed necessarily was my dissatisfaction was less about the score of the game — although it’s safe to say I’m not comfortable with the score of the game — and more so how we handled ourselves,” Anastos said Tuesday. “That’s part of a process of developing a certain mentality and team chemistry and championship mentality, in my mind, and it’s an attitude.”

Anastos’ displeasure with the team’s attitude began well before the last minutes of the loss. Following the game, he said he sensed he didn’t like the team’s approach at the team meal earlier in the day, and his gut feeling proved to be right.

Each team showed bouts of roughness throughout the night, but MSU received 29 penalty minutes in the final 45 seconds of the game, including a game misconduct on redshirt freshman Rhett Holland and a 10-minute misconduct on senior Jake Chelios (Bloomfield Hills).

“We’re better than that,” sophomore John Draeger said. “You lose, you lose. You have to be a good loser. It’s a tough one to swallow, especially against those guys. They’re a chippy team, so they can get under your skin a little bit. We just gotta learn to lose and swallow our pride. We got humbled.”

Sophomore Jake Hildebrand is looking back at the weekend with his typical goaltender trait: a short memory. The team likely is eager to move past the negatives of being swept by an in-state rival, but Anastos isn’t as ready to forget the games.

Losing games is unavoidable, and he said the experience will be a teaching tool for navigating failure and developing a more stable mental toughness moving forward.

“In the end, I think it will make our team and our program better, I really do,” he said. “Nothing worthwhile comes easy, and certainly nothing’s coming easy to us. But it allows us the opportunity to learn from pushing through and getting better and the mental toughness it takes to fight through the highs and lows of a season.”

The next test for MSU is Big Ten opponent No. 1 Minnesota at Mariucci Ice Arena this Friday (9 p.m.) and Saturday (8 p.m.).  Minnesota is the only undefeated team in the conference (18-2-4, 7-0-1-0 B1G), with its shootout loss coming at the hands of MSU.

The two teams met Dec. 6-7 for a weekend series at Munn Ice Arena. The Spartans tied the Golden Gophers and won in a shootout the first night, then lost 3-2 the following night despite being down 3-0 at the halfway point.