NCAA Roundup: Yale stuns Minnesota in West opener

The top-seeded team in the NCAA West Regional is gone.

Jesse Root scored 9 seconds into overtime to give fourth-seeded Yale a 3-2 victory against Minnesota in the first regional semifinal Friday in Grand Rapids, Mich.

Kenny Agostino -- one of the players traded by the Pittsburgh Penguins to the Calgary Flames in the Jarome Iginla deal -- intercepted Minnesota defenseman Ben Marshall's pass behind the net and fed Root, who beat Adam Wilcox for his 10th goal of the season. It was the fastest overtime goal in NCAA Tournament history.

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"I just feel bad for our guys," Minnesota coach Don Lucia said. "You get down at the end like that and it goes into overtime, it's a one shot deal. I didn't even see what happened in overtime, it happened so quick."

Yale (19-12-3) of the ECAC will play North Dakota in the regional final Saturday for a spot in the Frozen Four in Pittsburgh.

Minnesota, the No. 2 seed in the 16-team tournament, finished its season 26-9-5.

The Bulldogs, the last team to qualify for the tournament, jumped to a 2-0 lead in the second period on goals by Agostino and defenseman Gus Young. But the Gophers got a power-play goal from Nate Schmidt midway through the third period before Zach Budish scored with 6:20 left in regulation to force OT.

Jeff Malcolm made 27 saves for Yale. Wilcox stopped 23 shots for Minnesota, which tied for the regular-season title in the WCHA.

North Dakota 2, Niagara 1

Second-seeded North Dakota scored twice in a 57-second span early in the third period to spoil a tremendous effort by Niagara's Hobey Baker Award finalist, goaltender Carsen Chubak and put his team into Saturday's regional championship game.

Niagara led 1-0 after 40 minutes on a goal by defenseman Jason Beattie at 6:27 of the second period. But Andre MacWilliam tied the game 1:56 into the third period with a point shot through a screen that hit a defender and went past Chubak,

Kristo, a second-round pick by Montreal in 2008 and also a Hobey Baker finalist, tucked in his own rebound at 2:53 to put North Dakota (22-12-7) of the WCHA ahead to stay.

Chubak finished with 41 saves as North Dakota outshot the Purple Eagles 43-29, including 20-7 in the final 20 minutes. Niagara, the first Atlantic Hockey Association team to get an at large bid to the tournament, ended its season 23-10-5.

Northeast

UMass-Lowell 6, Wisconsin 1

The top-seeded River Hawks had no trouble beating the fourth-seeded Badgers in Manchester, N.H., as freshman goaltender Connor Hellebucyk stopped 31 shots and six players scored for Lowell, which will play New Hampshire in an all-Hockey East regional final on Saturday.

Hellebucyk's biggest save was a pad stop on a first-period penalty shot by Wisconsin's Jefferson Dahl.

Lowell, the Hockey East champion, led 3-0 after two periods. Joseph Pendenze beat goaltender Joel Rumpel with a wrister from the left circle 7:11 into the game. Christian Folin finished off a 2-on-1 break with Scott Wilson at 3:12 of the second period to make it 2-0, and Shayne Thompson's breakaway goal at 14:08 put Lowell in command.

Nic Kerdiles got WCHA tournament champion Wisconsin (22-13-7) on the board with 11:41 left in the third period by scoring a power-play goal. It was the first goal allowed by Hellebuyck since Providence scored 8:59 into UMass-Lowell's 2-1 win in their conference semifinal game last Friday, a span of 165:20.

Derek Arnold scored for UMass-Lowell (27-10-2) with 6:04 left to restore the three-goal lead, Adam Chapie added an empty-netter in the final minute and Ryan McGrath finished it off with 3 seconds to play.

New Hampshire 5, Denver 2

Casey Thrush scored twice and New Hampshire overcame a pair of one-goal deficits with four unanswered goals to beat Denver and assure that at least one Hockey East team will make the Frozen Four.

Trevor van Riemsdyk, Dalton Speelman, and John Henrion also scored for New Hampshire (20-11-7), which was outshot 19-14 in the first period but played stifling defense for the next 40 minutes. Casey DeSmith finished with 31 saves for New Hampshire.

Daniel Doremus and Quentin Shore scored for the Pioneers (20-14-5) of the WCHA, who managed only 14 shots in the final two periods.

New Hampshire tied it at 2-2 on van Riemsdyk's power-play goal 5:26 into the second period, then took the lead on Speelman' goal with 22 seconds left in the period.

The Wildcats were unable to capitalize on a five-minute power play after Denver's Nick Shore was ejected for a hot to the head of Kevin Goumas, but went ahead 4-2 on Henrion's goal with 11:11 remaining. Thrush added an empty-netter with 2:20 remaining.

Denver goalie Juho Olkinuora finished with 36 saves. The Wildcats outshot the Pioneers 27-14 after the first period.