Frozen Four semifinal victory<\/a> over North Dakota on Thursday. With Wisconsin up 2-0 and trying to kill off nearly two minutes of a five-on-three early in the second period, Dexheimer went down and blocked a shot with the inside of his leg where there wasn\u2019t any padding. He came back to the game a few minutes later, and the Badgers won 2-1.<\/p>\n\u201cJust had to walk it off behind the bench and put a little pad on it, and it was all good,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Dexheimer is one of the intriguing undrafted free agents left in the championship game. Whether the Wild are among those in the mix remains to be seen. But it\u2019s a credit to Dexheimer that the Badgers have gone from a coaching change three years ago and a 13-win season to a chance for their first national title in 20 years.<\/p>\n
There was his game-winning overtime goal to complete the comeback over Michigan State in the regional final, and sparking the penalty kill to go 5-for-5 against North Dakota on Thursday. But he\u2019s made so many under-the-hood contributions that have helped reset the culture for the Badgers under coach Mike Hastings, who took over three years ago.<\/p>\n
\u201cMost leaders that are really good at leading usually carry a confidence throughout themselves, whether they\u2019re playing the game or how they command a room,\u201d Hastings said. \u201cBen has done it in a lot of different ways. He\u2019s got an incredible amount of humility in how he carries himself. He\u2019s not that hard and boisterous guy that\u2019s barking in the locker room. He\u2019s the guy that has a really good feel about when to put an arm around a guy. He\u2019s really endeared himself to our group as a leader, because he\u2019s really aware of what\u2019s going on through each other\u2019s journey.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dexheimer\u2019s journey is an interesting one. Born in Edina, Dexheimer played for the Blake School and led the Bears to a third-place finish in the 2020 Minnesota State High School Class AA tournament. His favorite player growing up was David Backes, as he was a Blues fan. Dexheimer\u2019s dad grew up in St. Louis, and his grandmother still lives there, so the family tried to go to every home opener.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was unbelievable,\u201d Dexheimer said.<\/p>\n
Dexheimer went the USHL route initially, playing for the Austin (Minnesota) Bruins and then the Madison (Wisconsin) Capitals.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was a very late bloomer,\u201d Dexheimer said. \u201cI just went through puberty and everything really late, so I think junior hockey was always going to be the path, because it gave me a couple years to develop more. Just physically was the biggest thing. And then, coming in, the mental maturity as a 20-year-old was big for me as well. It allowed my body to catch up with the other guys.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dexheimer had been committed to Miami (Ohio) since he was 15, but as it got closer to signing day, he had second thoughts. When the Badgers staff, led by Tony Granato, reached out, it was a no-brainer, especially considering his familiarity with Madison.<\/p>\n
Wisconsin won 13 games in Dexheimer\u2019s freshman year, and they made a coaching change. So Dexheimer and the rest of the group had a big decision to make. Stay or go? Wisconsin brought in Mike Hastings, the former Minnesota State coach. Dexheimer said the thought of leaving never crossed his mind. \u201cThere\u2019s no place I\u2019d rather be than Madison for my four years,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
But a couple of others in his freshman class, including Wild prospect Charlie Stramel, transferred to Michigan State. Jack Horbach stayed. Tyson Jugnauth went back to junior. Boston Buckberger will be on the other side Saturday, playing for the University of Denver.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s going to get kind of crazy the next few years in college hockey,\u201d Dexheimer said. \u201cIn the next couple years, they\u2019re really going to have to hold onto their friendships because it\u2019s going to be a little nuts.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dexheimer admits the program was in a \u201crough spot\u201d three years ago. After a 13-win improvement in Hastings\u2019 first year as coach, they dropped back down last year, fueling a summer of self-examination. But after Wisconsin rallied to narrowly make it into the NCAA Tournament as the No. 12 seed, needing Dartmouth to win its conference tournament to seal the deal, the Badgers are right back in the final.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is the goal, no matter how the season went,\u201d Dexheimer said. \u201cIt\u2019s been an amazing journey, and we expect to be here. This is what Wisconsin should be doing year in and year out. We\u2019re just super grateful to be here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Where Dexheimer ends up after the Frozen Four isn\u2019t set in stone yet. He\u2019s letting his agent sort out all of those details. But the Badgers captain would be up for returning to his hometown Wild.\u00a0Stramel, who was his roommate at Wisconsin and one of his good friends, recently signed with Minnesota after being a first-round pick.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf they reached out, it\u2019d be amazing to play for them,\u201d Dexheimer said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LAS VEGAS \u2014 Ben Dexheimer grew up in the Twin Cities and attended Minnesota Wild games from time…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":863906,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[339,7,31382,49,48,4475,2785],"class_list":{"0":"post-863905","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-college-sports","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-minnesota-wild","11":"tag-ncaa","12":"tag-ncaa-football","13":"tag-nhl","14":"tag-wisconsin-badgers"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116385840164903108","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/863905","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=863905"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/863905\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/863906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=863905"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=863905"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=863905"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}