It was clear to everyone inside of Yost Ice Arena who the better team was Friday night. Luckily for the Michigan hockey team, looks can be deceiving.

The Wolverines survived a disastrous second period and held on to a 3-2 victory over Northern Michigan in Game 1 of a first-round CCHA playoffs series.

“You don’t go forward unless you get by your first weekend series, and you don’t get by unless you survive games like that,” said Michigan coach Red Berenson. “Whether we’re getting lucky, or we’re getting momentum, I think we learned something. A lot of our players learned how hard you have to play and how good that team was. They’re a tenth-place team, but right now they’re not playing like a tenth-place team.”

On paper and after 20 minutes of play, it looked like the Wolverines were going to cruise to an easy playoff victory.

Michigan jumped out to a big lead, starting with a fluke power-play goal from defenseman Jon Merrill. NMU goalie Jared Coreau made the initial save, but as the puck trickled past him and appeared to be going wide of the net, a NMU defender swatted at the puck, knocking it into his own net and giving Michigan a 1-0 lead.

Nearly 9 minutes later, Kevin Lynch scored his first goal of the game, corralling a rebound off of an A.J. Treais shot and burying it in the net for a two-goal lead and Michigan's second power-play goal of the period.

Three minutes later, while on the penalty kill, Lynch capitalized on a lazy line change by NMU and stole the puck from defenseman C.J. Ludwig, who had his back turned to Lynch and was watching his teammates change lines.

Lynch picked Ludwig’s pocket and darted up the left wing before stickhandling across the crease, faking out Coreau and firing the puck into an open net.

“I usually black out when I get a breakaway,” Lynch joked. “I thought if I made a quick move, that maybe he would bite enough and he bit too hard."

Things continued to go in the Wolverines favor early in the second period as the Wildcats were called for roughing just 24 seconds into the stanza, but Michigan only managed one shot on goal on the power play. It would be nearly nine minutes before they would get another shot on goal and finished the second period with just six shots on net.

The Wildcats scored two even-strength goals in the frame. First Kory Kaunisto redirected a shot from the blue line past goalie Steve Racine just five minutes into the second period. The stick appeared to be high, but officials reviewed the play and ruled it a goal.

With four minutes to play in the period, Darren Nowick poked the puck past Racine who gave up a big rebound on a seemingly harmless shot, to cut the lead to one.

“We found out tonight that no matter how big of a lead you have early, you’re not safe,” Lynch said.

Berenson said his team was more composed entering the third period after getting out of the second with the lead intact.

“We had to refocus on the things that we came to do. We were losing every footrace, every battle on the puck. They thought they were playing hard, but they weren’t playing desperate and there’s a difference,” Berenson said. “I thought we played our best in the third period. We didn’t give up much, but we were playing with the lead.”

The Wildcats outshot Michigan 28-25 in the game and 23-13 in the final two periods. The Wolverines didn’t manage a shot on net over the final nine minutes of the game.

Despite giving up two goals, Racine was solid in net making 26 saves on the night and more importantly, provided some relief for his teammates in front of him.

“We've been kind of unsure all year about goal tending and now it's good to have somebody back there who’s got some confidence in him and he’s stepping up and playing pretty well,” Merrill said about his goalie’s recent play.

The win gives the Wolverines a 1-0 lead in the best-of-three series. Game 2 is at 7:35 p.m. Saturday at Yost Ice Arena.

So while Lynch and his team are happy to get the win on a night when they didn’t play their best, he knows things could be different in the future.

“We got a lot of things to clean up for tomorrow and get ready for tomorrow night,” Lynch said.

Matt Durr is a freelance reporter.