Danny Nelson finished skating through the fist-bump line and pumped his arm in the air one more time for good measure.
The junior forward captain had just given his team the high point of their 2025-26 season, scoring to put the Irish ahead of the Minnesota Golden Gophers 3-2 with just 51.9 seconds remaining. When the final minute ran out and the siren sounded in front of an elated sellout crowd of 5,120 at Compton Family Ice Arena on Saturday night, Nelson’s goal stood up as the game-winner.
The big moment had been a long time coming. Nelson’s goal propelled the Irish to only their second Big Ten conference win in 18 tries. With a 2-2 tie and a shootout loss to the Gophers in Friday’s game, Notre Dame also took the majority of the points in a conference series for the first time in over two years, since Jan. 19-20, 2024, against Penn State.
As one might expect in a series between two of the Big 10’s worst teams, the road to victory for Notre Dame (6-20-4, 2-15-1 Big Ten) against Minnesota (10-19-2, 6-13-1 Big Ten) was not particularly pretty. It revealed much about how Notre Dame can make the most of what remains in their regular season.
In Friday’s game, a pair of first-period gaffes set the Irish back 2-0 after one. Brutal Notre Dame turnovers led to goals by Minnesota senior forward John Mittelstadt and sophomore forward Brodie Ziemer just 26 seconds apart, drawing frustration from first-year Irish head coach Brock Sheahan.
“By now, with the way we practice and how clear and concise and consistent I know we are as a [coaching] staff, there is no excuse for us to just completely go off page and play random hockey,” Sheahan said postgame. “We know what we’re supposed to do; every guy on our team knows. But for some reason, we don’t want to do it.”
The Irish recovered from their turnover spasms in the third. They first showed signs of coming back when junior forward Brennan Ali finished off a tic-tac-toe feed from classmates forward Cole Knuble and Nelson. The stars got the Irish back to within one, and their fourth line tied it when senior forward Niko Jovanovic capitalized on a hard-working assist by sophomore forward Michael Schermerhorn.
Notre Dame buzzed in the offensive zone after tying the game with 6:09, but could not ultimately spring ahead. Then, their momentum faded. Irish sophomore netminder Nicholas Kempf kept them in it, making a number of difficult saves in the game’s final three minutes to push the game to overtime. A chance to win in regulation had again slipped through Notre Dame’s fingers.
“Credit to the guys, I thought they got on page, but we’ve had to do that how many times, especially in Big Ten play?” Sheahan asked. “I thought we got really complacent in the last three minutes. We’re not in that situation a lot, and that’s the problem for us.”
No, Notre Dame has not found itself in many close games late this year. But after a scoreless overtime period and Gopher freshman forward Javon Moore’s shootout winner Friday, the Irish found themselves again in a close game late on Saturday.
Again, Notre Dame got off on the wrong foot, conceding the first goal to Gopher senior defenseman Cal Thomas 6:21 into the contest. The game proceeded to the second period with limited chances for both teams, but the Irish still responded quicker than they did Friday night. They used strong penalty-killing to do so, shutting out Minnesota’s top-rated power-play four times between Friday and Saturday before Knuble scored shorthanded to tie the game at one.
“I thought our response to being down was ok, like it took us a little longer than I’d like. And that’s part of a fragile hockey team, a team that’s lost a lot of games,” Sheahan said.
Notre Dame showed their fragility not long after tying the game. With 51 seconds to go in the middle frame, the Irish allowed Moore to walk to the front of the net and tuck the puck around Kempf, giving Minnesota a 2-1 lead.
Down a goal in the third, Notre Dame found Saturday that they’d been there before. And unlike Friday night’s contest, where they eventually broke down after tying the game, the Irish didn’t get complacent after freshman forward Cole Brown tied Saturday’s game at two again on the power-play. The Irish kept going.
And they kept going into the final minute of the game, when sophomore defenseman Jimmy Jurcev sprung Knuble on a three-on-two defensive-zone draw. Crossing the blue line into the slot, Knuble dropped the puck to Nelson, whose low shot beat Minnesota junior goaltender Luca Di Pasquo.
“It was kind of an ice burner,” Nelson said. “Brennan [Ali] had an unbelievable screen, he kind of did all the work there, got in front of the goalie’s eyes and made sure he wasn’t able to see anything, and I think that was ultimately why it went in.”
In a season where Notre Dame has had struggles finishing off chances even when they’ve gotten plenty, the Irish won Saturday without generating much offense. According to College Hockey News, their expected goals value Saturday was just 1.9, their lowest since getting shut out at Minnesota on Nov. 7.
So too, where the Irish let a regulation win slip through their fingers just the night before, Notre Dame did not repeat their mistake Saturday. In their limited experience playing close games late, the Irish so often have failed to win them. That made Nelson’s goal a breakthrough of sorts.
Both of those things should give Notre Dame a boost going forward. With just three weeks left in the regular season, the Irish can now look ahead to the single-elimination Big Ten tournament. Their only remaining path to the NCAA tournament rests on winning the Big Ten.
“No one on this team is giving up,” Knuble said. “Obviously, [it’s] not the season we wanted, but no one is giving up. And every team makes the playoffs, so it’s three wins to win the Big Ten. Our mindset is to get better until then.”
“There’s obviously been a lot of times where that didn’t go our way,” he continued. “For it to go our way, it’s big for the group. I think we always believe, but like when it actually goes your way it kind of clarifies, and like I said, no one is giving up.”
Nelson and Sheahan echoed Knuble’s sentiment. The Irish still have something to play for this season, and something to improve for. Their improvement in finishing off scoring chances and finishing off games this weekend should bolster Notre Dame as they head to Michigan State next week before returning home for senior weekend against Penn State on Feb. 27-28.
“It’s good we’re playing close hockey,” Sheahan said. “We are in the playoffs no matter what our record is, right? We know that. So, what team can we be in seven games from now, a month from now? We’ve made progress, so that’s a positive. I still think there’s just so much more for us.”
