The No. 9 Pioneers travel to Grand Forks, N.D., to play No. 4 North Dakota in a key NCHC series Friday (6:30 p.m. face-off) and Saturday (6 p.m.).

Radio: 104.3 FM

Web: NCHC.TV and UND live stats

Records: Denver 7-3-2 (3-0-1 NCHC – third), North Dakota 12-2-2 (5-1-0 NCHC – first). DU is 3-2-2 on the road while UND is 4-1 at home.

Series: North Dakota leads 140-120-10 all-time. Last season the teams were 2-2-1.

Three keys for DU

Bring ear plugs: “Don’t be intimidated,” sophomore defenseman Adam Plant told me this week. “It seems like the whole stadium is a student section some games. We’ve been talking to the freshman (DU likely will play five or six), letting them know what it is like. … We have to focus not on what they’re doing but on what we can do.”

Help out: It will be particularly important for the Pioneers, especially their centers to back check hard. North Dakota has a dangerous offense – including an active defense – and its top line of Brock Boeser, Drake Caggiula and Nick Schmaltz has combined for 58 points in 16 games. Compounding this will be not having junior defenseman Will Butcher in the lineup Friday. He is sitting out the game as a result of his DQ late in the second game at Wisconsin. The good news is junior defenseman Matt Van Voorhis (concussion) is healthy, and redshirt sophomore Brad Hawkinson also should be available. The rest of the D core, led by the pair of senior Nolan Zajac and sophomore Tariq Hammond and supplemented by Plant, is rounding into form. Also helping is the fact DU has received excellent play from its veteran centers, led by seniors Quentin Shore and Gabe Levin, and juniors Matt Marcinew and Evan Janssen. Shore, in particular, has played outstanding of late.

Get the power play revved up: North Dakota’s aggressiveness leads to a lot of goals but it also can cause it to take a lot of penalties. With Trevor Moore (illness) close to full strength, some combination of him, Shore, Danton Heinan and freshmen Dylan Gambrell and Troy Terry should have plenty of power-play chances. The Pioneers are going to need to cash in on some of those.

@MagnessMayhem