The North Dakota women’s hockey team seems to be turning its season around after a dry spell in late October and early November.

UND earned a sweep over WCHA conference rival St. Cloud State last weekend when it hosted the Huskies at Ralph Engelstad Arena. The series win marked the team’s second sweep of the season, and first since Oct. 11.

“It all starts in practice,” sophomore forward Amy Menke after said UND completed the sweep last Sunday. “Better, upbeat practices where we’re battling a lot harder — I think that carriers over into games.”

UND changed something in its game as the team rolled over St. Cloud, winning 6-1 on Saturday and 3-1 on Sunday.  The nine goals scored by UND are the most the team has accumulated in a weekend series this season.

North Dakota scored five straight goals in Saturday’s game before St. Cloud managed to get on the scoresheet late in the final period. Josefine Jakobsen and Gracen Hirschy both found the back of the net twice, leading UND past the Huskies.

Jakobson was able to break an 11-game scoreless streak in Saturday’s game. North Dakota found a more efficient way of getting pucks to the net over St. Cloud, outshooting the Huskies 40-20.

Sunday’s game was won with production from the North Dakota line of Menke, Dufualt, and Kohler in which each player scored a goal in UND’s 3-1 win. North Dakota secured the series and improved to a winning record after Sunday’s game, but Idalski still sees changes the team needs to make in its game.

“If we play like we did today we’re going to be in trouble.” Idalski after Sunday’s game. “I think we understand that, and we’ll be a lot better.”

North Dakota found itself in the penalty box nine times this weekend. Lazy penalties are an aspect of the team’s game that Idalski wants fixed moving forward. North Dakota has been killing penalties with a strong 88.9 percent this season.

The next four games before the break were deemed  “very important,” by Amy Menke after Sunday’s win.

UND, after a two-week home stand, goes on the road to take on the current WCHA leader Wisconsin. Wisconsin will prove to be a big test for the team being that the conference leader has only lost two of its 14 conference games this season, outscoring WCHA opponents 56-20.

“We need a good week of practice,” Idalski said. “We’re playing Friday and Sunday. There are a lot of dynamics that are different for us, then RIT on the road again to close out the first half. It’s a big four games for us.”

North Dakota will play Wisconsin on Friday afternoon and again on Sunday this weekend.  UND has been gaining momentum slowly moving up in the WCHA standings as the team was tied for fifth last week, before improving to third place to trail only Minnesota and Wisconsin after the sweep over St. Cloud.

After the series at Wisconsin, North Dakota will close out the first half of the season in a non-conference matchup against RIT on the road.

Ben Novak is a staff writer for The Dakota Student. He can be reached at [email protected].