To be fair, Miami is probably the best team the Spartans will face all season and are hitting on all cylinders at this point. The Spartans can take solace in the fact both games were one-goal affairs before an empty-netter in each contest.

“That’s a national championship-caliber team and they played like it all weekend,” Comley said following Friday’s game. “They just don’t give you anything. We never really got to their net until the end.”

And that was the main problem. The Spartans got locked down by Miami for 53 minutes Friday and couldn’t mount any pressure until the final seven minutes. Munn Ice Arena’s near-sell-out crowd, having sat on its hands for much of the contest, was ready to blow the roof off the place had the Spartans scored.

It didn’t happen.

“We haven’t been tested even close to that,” Comley said. “As far as confined areas and corners, strength, contact. Our kids are beat up and have welts all over their bodies, but they were in two very tough games this weekend.”

The power play, which had been MSU’s calling card, was rendered completely and totally useless by the RedHawks — the Spartans went 1-for-15 with the man advantage. Miami relentlessly applied pressure from the opening second to the final buzzer, something MSU was unable to fully handle.

The pressure forced MSU out of its offensive game plan, which played right into Miami’s hands. The RedHawks continually dominated the puck, including an incredible effort in the final minutes Thursday when the Spartans couldn’t gain control.

“We’ve got to generate more offense,” senior captain Bryan Lerg said. “We didn’t cycle down low like we normally can, we just went up and down the ice, back and forth hockey like Michigan, roaring up and down the ice and that’s not our style.”

But it’s not quite time to push the panic button. As we’ve learned from previous seasons, Comley’s teams have always performed better in the second half of the season, so it would be unfair to pass judgment after one weekend of inferior performance.

“We saw where we matched up with the best team in the nation,” Lerg said. “That’s probably their best, that’s probably what their peak is right now and obviously we’re not at our best, and it’s going to take time for us.”

Miami did a bang-up job of shutting down MSU’s go-to line of juniors Tim Kennedy, Justin Abdelkader and Tim Crowder. The trio, which can usually be seen having a profound impact on the game, was, like many things on the weekend, ineffective.

“They’re a really good defensive team and they shut us down,” Abdelkader said. “I think our problem was we didn’t get any low play in their zone and we didn’t cycle the puck. We were kind of one shot and they got the rebound and they got the puck right out.”

The one bright spot of the weekend was junior goaltender Jeff Lerg, who stopped 59 shots and stoned Miami cold several times in the second period Friday.

“We told him to shut the door and we’ll score for you,” Bryan Lerg said. “He did his part, but we had trouble doing ours. I give him a lot of credit. He stands on his head and every day you can always expect you’re going to get the best out of him. There’s not much more he could’ve done this series.”

The Spartans did their job through October and early November, winning all the games they were supposed to win. Now, things are a little tougher with Minnesota and Wisconsin coming to town for the College Hockey Showcase and then a road series at Lake Superior on the horizon.

“We knew this two-week stretch was going to be the toughest two-week stretch of the year,” Comley said. “Hopefully we’ll learn from it and make some corrections, work-wise, in the area that we need to.”

Matt Bishop is the State News hockey reporter. He can be reached at bishop20@msu.edu.