Denver, CO
No. 11 Pioneers Win 1-0 in OT to Sweep No. 7 Minnesota Duluth – University of Denver Athletics
DENVER – Forward Rieger Lorenz scored 2:17 into overtime to lead the No. 11 Denver Pioneers hockey team to a 1-0 victory against the No. 7 Minnesota Duluth Bulldogs on Saturday night at Magness Arena.
Neither the Pioneers (16-11-2, 12-6-0 NCHC) nor Bulldogs (17-11-0, 8-10-0 NCHC) could get their first 49 shots into the back of the net before Lorenz’s tap-in tally during 3-on-3 play. Denver won 4-3 on Friday to earn its first weekend sweep of 2026 and fourth overall this season.
“I thought again we played well,” said Richard and Kitzia Goodman Hockey Head Coach David Carle. “We played pretty disciplined, didn’t give them a ton. Really liked our first period, second period I thought was a little slow for us, but I really liked our third.
“We did not give them a ton throughout the night, only 19 shots. Inside the power plays we gave them early, and they didn’t have a lot of shots, the first three were on the power plays. So we did a nice job. We held their top line for zero points on the weekend—I’m not sure that’s been done yet this year. A great accomplishment, and Johnny Hicks was excellent.”
Freshman goaltender Johnny Hicks started his second game for the Pioneers and earned his first career shutout, denying all 19 shots that Duluth shot his way. Hicks made 29 saves on Friday night before leaving in the third period with a lower-body injury, and he now owns a 3-0-0 record, 0.55 goals-against average and .980 save percentage in two starts and seven games this season.
Lorenz registered his first goal in overtime and his third game-winner of his career. Junior defenseman Eric Pohlkamp stood at the faceoff dot and sent a tape-to-tape pass to the far-side of the crease for the senior alternate captain. Junior forward Kieran Cebrian also had an assist on the goal and was strong in the circle by winning 60 percent of his faceoffs (12-of-20).
DU outshot UMD 31-19, including by a 14-4 margin in third period and overtime. Bulldogs netminder Adam Gajan finished by stopping 30 shots. The Pioneers outshot the Bulldogs 13-6 in the first period but UMD finished the edge in the second at 9-4.
Minnesota Duluth’s top-ranked power play didn’t convert on its two chances in the contest, while Denver didn’t capitalize on its lone man advantage as well.
UP NEXT: The Pioneers stay in-state next weekend as they take on the Colorado College Tigers in a home-and-home series. DU plays at Ed Robson Arena on Friday before hosting CC at Magness Arena on Saturday. Both games begin at 7 p.m. MT and will be broadcast on NCHC.tv.
POSTGAME NOTES
- The Pios improved to 7-1-0 in their last eight games against UMD and 11-2-0 in the past 13 matchups. Denver is also now 83-40-5 on home ice in the all-time series vs. Duluth.
- DU wrapped up their four-game homestand by going 3-1-0. DU’s homestay was tied for the longest of the season, and the squad closed out January having played eight-of-10 contests at Magness Arena.
- The Pioneers have won three straight contests on home ice, a season-best streak.
- Denver posted its sixth shutout of the season.
- The Pioneers won their second overtime game of the season (Oct. 31 vs. Alaska Anchorage) and is now 2-3-2 in OT this season.
- Rieger Lorenz scored his first career overtime goal, and his second game-winner of the season (Dec. 5 vs. Mimai).
- Johnny Hicks became the third Denver goaltender to post a shutout this year.
- Denver and Minnesota Duluth were facing off for the first time with both teams ranked since the then-No.3 ranked Pios beat the No. 6 Bulldogs in the 2022 NCAA West Regional Final in Loveland, Colorado.
- Duluth was visiting Magness Arena for the first time since March 15-16, 2024 in the NCHC Playoffs when Denver swept the best-of-three quarterfinal series.
- Cale Ashcroft (1g/2a) and Kyle Chyzowski (2g/1a) both had their three-game point streaks come to an end.
- Eric Pohlkamp leads all NCAA players in shots on goal and surpassed 400 career shots this weekend.
- The teams’ six combined penalty minutes tied a season-low in a game for the Pioneers.
GOAL SUMMARY
1st Period
No Scoring
2nd Period
No Scoring
3rd Period
No Scoring
Overtime
2:17 DU (1-0) – Rieger Lorenz tapped in Eric Pohlkamp’s pass from the right faceoff circle while stationed at the far-side of the crease.
QUOTABLES
Senior forward Rieger Lorenz
On game: “We’ve had a hard time closing out weekends here in the second half, so it was nice to see growth from our group. Obviously a good game yesterday. I thought our start was really good; [we] had a little bit of lapse in our mental game in the second and early third, but I thought we obviously pulled it out. It’s a big win for our group at this time in the season.”
On his overtime goal: “Obviously going against that Plante line you want to have the puck when you’re going against them. So, we got some speed, kicked out to Ceebs (Kieran Cebrian), he kicked it out to PK (Eric Pohlkamp). And I think everyone in the building thought he was going to shoot that, including me—but luckily enough he found me.”
On the excitement in building: “It’s unreal. The last few weekends have been tough for us at home, so it’s nice to give the fans something to cheer about, and hopefully they keep supporting us like they have been all season.”
On facing Colorado College next weekend: “Like I said, we’ve had a hard time stringing weekends together, so I think this will be a big weekend for us to show the strides we’ve taken so far. And the downs we’ve had this season, hopefully we’ve learned from them and can prove that to ourselves this upcoming weekend with the big rivalry.”
Junior Defenseman Eric Pohlkamp
On the game-winning goal he assisted on: “Yeah, I thought myself that I was going to shoot the puck, but I saw him (Rieger Lorenz) kind of get positioned on that guy and move backwards, and we made a hyper-play to tap that in. Really happy for him, and he’s been all over the puck in this game, and I know he had a lot of chances. So nice for him to get that one for sure.”
On this win being a boost: “Yeah, I think so. I don’t know what to say about boost, but I think we just need to be more consistent. We have CC as a big rival coming next weekend, so we are home-and-home, and those are some fun games. We played them early in the year, so I know we’re going to be eager to play them and looking forward to it.”
On changes in defense: “Yeah, we kind of talked about it in there, just punting the ball, like just playing football. You know, we don’t want them to regroup and attack us. I really liked our commitment, and we made plays and offense against a tough line (of UMD), me and Jamo (Eric Jamieson). It was a lot of fun playing against those guys, but obviously really good players and it was an excellent job this weekend.”
TICKETS: Tickets for the remaining games of DU hockey’s 2025-26 campaign are available. Click here for more information.
Rocky Mountain sandhill cranes battle warmer conditions due to drought
Wildlife biologist Jenny Nehring and farmer Rob Jones talk about Sandhill cranes and their impact on the San Luis Valley.
DENVER — Zoos are of necessity big gulpers of water, a fact that has some zookeepers in the drying American West working to rapidly upgrade efficiency and reduce unnecessary irrigation or leaks.
Denver Zoo, formally known as the Denver Zoo Conservation Alliance, has rapidly reduced its demands on threatened and declining water sources, including the Colorado River.
Among the upgrades is a sea lion water filtration system that allows most of the water to be cleaned and reused each time the pool is drained. That’s saving more than 8 million gallons a year, zoo sustainability director Blair Neelands said. “You can get in there, scrub it with a toothbrush and refill it with the same water,” she said.
Similar upgrades to an African penguin showcase reduced its water use by 95% by largely eliminating what’s sent down the drain. (Like a backyard swimming pool, though, these tanks sometimes still need to be drained and refreshed with new water to reduce mineral buildup.)
“The biggest thing for us is swapping from dump-and-fill pools to life-support systems,” Neeland said.
Another biggie is replacement of a 50-year-old water main with funding of about $3 million from the city. There’s no way of knowing how much that pipe had leaked over the years, but Neeland suspected it was more than a million gallons a year. The savings should become apparent as the zoo tracks its water use over the next few years.
Creating hippo-sized water savings
When The Arizona Republic visited in 2025, the zoo was on the cusp of eclipsing a goal to reduce its water use by half of what it had been in 2018. The zoo had used 80 million gallons in 2024, or about 219,000 a day, a 45% reduction in just a handful of years. Much of the savings had come in the form of smarter irrigation practices and use of drought-tolerant native plants where possible. The landscaping also pivoted to recycled “purple pipe” water from the city, which owns the zoo’s land, restricting potable water to areas where animals really need it.
“When people hear ‘recycled water,’ they get worried about cleanliness and hygiene,” zoo spokesman Jake Kubié said. “But it’s safe for the animals, and it’s not their drinking water.”
Getting past the water conservation goal would mean draining the pool where Mahali the hippo spent most hours lurking with just his eyes, ears and snout visible to visitors. Because he spent so much time in the pool, the water needed daily changes. It amounted to 21 million gallons a year, not to mention water heater bills that drove the cost to $200,000 a year, according to zoo officials. They estimated that Mahali used as much water as 350,000 four-person households.
“This facility is outdated,” Kubié said. “Some day this will become a huge saver of water.”
That day came before year’s end, and it indeed brought a tremendous savings. The zoo shipped Mahali to a new home (and a potential mate) at a wildlife preserve in Texas and drained the pool one last time. Ending the daily change-outs shaved more than a quarter of the zoo’s entire water usage from the previous year. It put the zoo significantly beyond its goal.
Denver Zoo’s water savings are part of a broader waste- and pollution-prevention effort aimed at being a good neighbor in uncertain times, Neeland said.
“Water savings and drought is top of mind for anyone who lives in the Western United States,” she said.
In Phoenix, a different mix of animals
That’s true of the Phoenix Zoo, as well, where zookeepers must maintain landscaping and animal exhibits in a city that baked under 100-degree-plus high temperatures for a third of the days last year. The zoo creates a “respite in the desert,” spokeswoman Linda Hardwick said, but has no hippos, penguins, grizzly bears or many of the other species that would require big water investments for outdoor swimming or cooling.
“We really specialize in animals that will thrive in the temperatures here,” Hardwick said.
The Phoenix Zoo uses most of its water on landscaping. After a consultant’s 2023 irrigation assessment, the staff centralized irrigation scheduling under a single trained technician and employed technologies including weather-based controllers and smart meters. Salt River Project awarded $70,000 in grant funds for the upgrades and several thousand more for training.
The zoo uses about 189,000 gallons a day, she said. That represents a 17% reduction from 2023, or 20% when adjusted for the year’s particular weather and evapotranspiration demand.
Brandon Loomis covers environmental and climate issues for The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com. Reach him at brandon.loomis@arizonarepublic.com.
Environmental coverage on azcentral.com and in The Arizona Republic is supported by a grant from the Nina Mason Pulliam Charitable Trust.
Follow The Republic environmental reporting team at environment.azcentral.com and @azcenvironment on Facebook and Instagram.
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