ASU completes epic OT comeback, sweeps Minnesota Duluth in NCHC quarterfinals

No. 12 Arizona State is moving on! The Sun Devils completed an epic comeback victory on Saturday night, capped with an overtime winner by Ryan Kirwan to win Game 2 over Minnesota Duluth and sweep the NCHC quarterfinals.

ASU, a two-seed in the conference, struggled with the seventh-seeded Bulldogs from the jump, however. Duluth took a quick 3-0 lead in the first period, with ASU struggling to find any kind of offensive rhythm.

But it was a three goal explosion over the course of 3:57 of game time that revived the Sun Devils, tying things up in the second period. Artem Shlaine, Dylan Jackson and Noah Beck combined for the comeback effort.

Ryan Kirwan's OT winner sends ASU to Frozen Faceoff

The Sun Devils made an incredible effort to claw back not one, not two but three separate deficits throughout Game 2 of the quarterfinal. Kirwan's overtime winner was the first lead ASU had taken in the entire contest.

The team is now 3-6-2 in overtime this season. It'll fly to St. Paul, Minnesota to participate in its first-ever Frozen Faceoff.

ASU will await the winner of the Denver-Colorado College quarterfinal series, which heads to a winner-take-all Game 3 on Sunday. Once their opponent is set, the Sun Devils will attempt to win the single-elimination semifinal game on March 21 at Xcel Energy Center, home of the NHL's Minnesota Wild.

The program is considered to be a bubble team for the NCAA Tournament, ranked 15th in the all-important PairWise Rankings and given little to no chance of qualifying for the 16-team field as an at-large team. That means ASU will have to win the NCHC Tournament outright in order to clinch the conference's single auto-bid.

That'll be easier said than done considering Duluth gave the team a lot to handle in the first round. ASU went 3-1 against Denver compared to just 1-3 against Colorado College in its respective four-game series this season.