The No. 7 University of Minnesota Duluth men's hockey team swiped three of a possible four monthly National Collegiate Hockey Conference awards on Wednesday – the most the Bulldogs have earned in a single month since the 2018-19 season. For the month of October, Max Plante was named the NCHC Forward of the Month, Ty Hanson the NCHC Defenseman of the Month and Adam Gajan the Goaltender of the Month – all first time monthly award honorees for the trio.
Plante offensively exploded out of the gate last month, posting 18 points in 10 games online goals and nine assists. His 2.00 points per game average led the NCAA, as well as his +14 plus/minus rating. The Hermantown, Minn. native also had a league-high two shorthanded goals, two power play goals and a game-winning goal on his scoresheet for the month. Plante was the only player in the NCHC besides his brother Zam to log two, four point games (his career high), and he six times recorded two or more points and three times recorded three or more. Plante is currently the NCAA's leading scorer with 19 points total points.
Hanson's game-winning goal in overtime last Friday night against North Dakota capped off an impressive month for the defenseman in which he had three goals and seven assists for 10 points total in 10 skates (just four shy from his entire rookie output of 14 points). The Hermantown, Minn. product posted a 1.11 points per game average, which included two game-winning goals, a +12 plus/minus rating and 12 blocks (a 1.20 a game average). Hanson led all league defenseman in points, assists, plus/minus and game-winning goals, and posted three multiple point games, including a career-best three assists against Bemidji State University on Oct. 18. He was also part of a penalty kill unit that turned in a 90% kill rate and a power play that was 32.4 in October.
Gajan was arguably the nation's best goal last month, winning a NCAA-high eight games and recording a 1.45 goals against average. The native of Poprad, Slovakia had a .931 saves percentage, and made 176 saves in an NCAA-high 538:46 minutes, and also added one shutout. Gajan led the NCHC in wins, minutes played, goals against average and saves percentage and helped back stop UMD 90% penalty kill. He also allowed the second fewest goals against in the NCHC (13) last month.
The Bulldogs earned three monthly awards for the first time in program history, and earned multiple honors for the first time in the same month since defenseman Mikey Anderson and goaltender Hunter Shepard were winners for March of 2019. UMD had multiple monthly award winners twice over the 2018-19 season. For perspective, the Bulldogs have had just five total NCHC monthly award winners before today's trio were named since the 2019-20 season.
