Marody leads Wolverines to win over Spartans in third-place GLi game

 

By @StefanKubus –

DETROIT – There was technically nothing on the line in Tuesday’s Great Lakes Invitational consolation game, but when Michigan and Michigan State meet, bragging rights are always up for grabs.

The Spartans and Wolverines battled it out for pride in their first contest at Little Caesars Arena in Detroit as part of the 53rd annual holiday tournament. Despite an early lead for MSU, the Wolverines clawed back in the second and third periods to take a 6-4 decision. Cooper Marody led the way with a hat trick for the Wolverines, and three other players scored their first goals of the season.

“I thought we had some of the secondary scoring from guys we need it to come from. Mike Pastujov got a big goal, his first career goal, James Sanchez scores his first goal, those two goals were important, it was tied. And then Cutler (Martin) scores a goal after being out since November… We expect the kind of performance we got from Cooper and Tony and that line every night.

“It’s a huge win for us, a big win. Any time you play a rival, it’s important.”

Despite the fourth-place showing in his first tournament appearance with the Spartans, head coach Danton Cole said his group will certainly rebound from the weekend.

“I’d like to see us move forward, and I thought we did a good job of going into the break – we did some good things, we weren’t completely horrible here,” Cole said. “I’ve been through worse weekends than this with teams. We’ll find some positives to build on, but we’re not getting away from what I’ve been saying… about trying to get better every day.”

Taro Hirose opened the scoring for MSU, as he corralled a Mitchell Lewandowski (Clarkston) aerial cross-zone pass and snapped a backhand shot top shelf past Wolverines netminder Hayden Lavigne.

Not long after, Carson Gatt’s (South Lyon) point shot was tipped home by sophomore Logan Lambdin (Newport) to put the Spartans up by a pair, a lead MSU took to the dressing room through the first 20 minutes. Despite the loss, Gatt – a Detroit Catholic Central alum – said he cherished the opportunity to play in the first GLi at Little Caesars Arena.

“It’s a pretty electric atmosphere,” Gatt said. “Always fun to play Michigan on a big stage and it was a big prep for when we play Feb. 10 down here and it was good for everyone to get their feet wet in the new arena, and it was pretty cool to play here.

“It was really cool to kind of think on New Year’s Eve Sidney Crosby and (Evgeni) Malkin, those guys were walking the same walk with us and playing on the same surface, same arena as the best players in the world.”

For Michigan, it wasn’t the start head coach Mel Pearson and his team wanted, but they took the intermission as a chance to regroup.

“Obviously, it’s not the start we wanted, 20 seconds into the game you get behind,” Pearson said. “Again, 2-0 after the first. I thought we got the break after the first period, I thought that was huge for us just to regroup a little bit and have a chat.”

James Sanchez got the Wolverines on the board at 3:12 of the second period, as he walked out from the corner toward the goal at the left circle before he fired a wrister past Spartans sophomore goalie John Lethemon (Northville).

Sophomore forward Patrick Khodorenko found the back of the net for his eighth of the season, as he took a slightly-deflected cross ice pass in the offensive zone and snapped it past Lavigne at the right face-off dot.

Mike Pastujov potted his first of the season to pull Michigan to within one late in the period, as he banked a shot off a sprawling Lethemon and in. Just a minute later, Marody (Brighton) tied up the game, tipping home a brilliant cross-ice feed from Tony Calderone (Trenton).

Early in the third period, Michigan found the back of the net on a fortuitous bounce, as Cutler Martin’s shot hit a MSU defenseman in front and went in. It was Martin’s first of the season and Michigan’s first lead of the afternoon.

Shortly after, Khodorenko took a five-minute major for cross checking Michigan’s Griffin Luce up high. That gave the Wolverines the chance to pull away.

Marody added his second of the game and sizth of the season with a quick wrister from just outside the right circle in the high slot.

But Khodorenko made up for his untimely penalty by scoring his second of the game, as he finished off a pretty tic-tac-toe passing play in the slot to cut the Spartans’ deficit to one.

Marody capped off his hat trick before it was all said and done to put MSU away.

“It felt good to see the puck go in the net, but felt even better beating Michigan State,” Marody said. “We’re all very excited for Friday. We’ve got a great opportunity with Notre Dame coming on, so we’re very excited about that.”