Three players who played their high school hockey in the state of Minnesota, and one from neighboring Superior, Wis., earned the WCHA weekly awards this week.

Junior Alex Stalock, the flashy goalie from South St. Paul, was named the WCHA’s Defensive Player of the Week. He did not allow an even-strength goal and stopped 66 of 70 shots as UMD swept Minnesota State Mankato 4-0 and 7-4. He had 39 stops that first game.

His goals-against average is 2.24 overall, best among WCHA netminders. The Gophers will see Stalock and UMD at Mariucci later this season.

The Rookie POWs are two freshmen centers, Brett Olson of Superior for Michigan Tech and Jack Connolly of Duluth for UMD. Olson had three goals and one assist as Tech tied Alaska Anchorage twice, both by 3-3 scores, on the road. Connolly had three goals and two assists against the Mavericks.

Freshman forward Drew LeBlanc of Hermantown was named the Offensive POW. He helped St. Cloud State tie Colorado College 4-4 on Friday with an assist on the tying goal and then had a hat tirck and an assist as the Huskies beat CC 6-1 the next game in Colorado Springs.

No Gophers were nominated for any of the awards because, of course, Minnesota was idle last weekend. That was their last break, though. They play the next seven weekends, then move right in to the WCHA playoffs.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 27th, 2009 at 12:16 pm and is filed under Gophers men's hockey. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.