Down two of their top four scorers, Denver’s lack of offensive depth was exposed for the second game in a row as the Pioneers fell at Providence, 3-1.

The defeat, which came after the Friars scored twice in the third period, was the first in eight road games this season for DU (12-4-4 overall).

As alarming as the score was, the fact DU was outshot 36-22 causes some concern on both sides of that ledger. The shots disadvantage was by far the worst of the season for the Pioneers, who were without Troy Terry and Henrik Borgstrom, who are competing in the World Junior Championships. It came one night after the Friars, who also have two players at the WJC, including leading scorer Erik Foley, outshot them by nine.

Another hallmark of DU’s success thus far this season has been keeping foes largely to the outside and away from goaltender Tanner Jaillet (33 saves). That happened less frequently this weekend. Nowhere was that more evident than on the penalty kill, which gave up two goals to Providence (8-6-4) on five chances.

Scott Conway staked the Friars to a lead 4 minutes into the second, only to see DU captain Will Butcher respond on a power play 5:42 later. But Providence struck again on Josh Wilkins‘ power-play marker 1:16 into the third.

“They executed, they moved the puck tape to tape and they were ready to shoot, they attacked our net,” DU coach Jim Montgomery told AM 1600’s Bill Rogan after the game. “I give them credit, their special teams were better than ours and that’s my fault as the head coach. I didn’t do as good of adjustments and preparations for the special teams game as the Providence coaches did.”

Connor McPhee‘s goal with 5:40 left was the final margin.

Yes, it was the second road game in two nights just after an extended break, but it was the unranked Friars who played like the highly ranked team.

“We talked about us having a better effort, and it wasn’t there,” Montgomery said. “I don’t think the preparation that I did for tonight’s game was the right preparation.”

So now the memory of a 15-game undefeated streak has faded a bit because the Pioneers are winless in their past three games (0-2-1). And DU has scored just four goals in that span.

“We need to become a harder team to play against offensively,” Montgomery added. “There’s only one way to do that, go to hard ice and compete for pucks harder. You’ve got to get to that net front. We don’t have enough people willing to do that right now, and it finally nipped us in the butt here in our last three games, where we have four goals in three games and we haven’t won.”

So the question becomes can DU reverse the trend as quickly as it did at the beginning of the season when it dropped its first two and then had to face then-No. 2 Boston University without an injured Dylan Gambrell.

The good news is the Pioneers will play host to Arizona State next weekend and should have Borgstrom, whose Finnish team became the first defending champion to go winless at the WJC the following year, back for the ASU series. Terry’s availability is in some question after Team USA went undefeated in its pool in the preliminary round at the WJC.