KALAMAZOO, MI – Mike Leone said he was simply trying to create some action in front of the net when he fired in a shot during a third-period power play, but the Western Michigan University senior ended up doing much more than that.

Leone’s shot came from a tough angle on the stick side of Ferris State University goalie C.J. Motte, but instead of bouncing off the goal post or Motte, the puck flew into the back of the net with 2:14 remaining in regulation to serve as the Broncos’ winning goal in their 2-1 comeback win over the Bulldogs Saturday at Lawson Ice Arena in the Central Collegiate Hockey Association.

"Garrett (Haar) made a great play, a little chip in the middle, and we've been talking about all week taking pucks wide and getting pucks on the net and I just wanted to shoot it on goal and get one of our guys coming in a rebound, but it took a good bounce and went in," said Leone, who scored WMU's first goal in Friday's 4-2 win. "I was actually just trying to get it on net and for a rebound for a guy coming in the slot, and it happened to go in. I was pretty excited."

The Broncos (10-3-1, 7-2-1 CCHA) jumped from fifth place to third place in the CCHA standings with 23 standings points. Notre Dame is in second place with 24 points and Miami sits on top with 25.

WMU is now on a five-game winning streak. Western Michigan last won five regular season games in a row in the 2006-07 season, from Feb. 9 through Feb. 23. WMU won five CCHA Tournament games in a row last season en route to winning the tournament championship.

Special teams were Western Michigan’s saving grace Saturday as Chase Balisy tied the game with a power play goal less than two minutes before Leone’s score.

Balisy took a great feed from Dane Walters and threw a shot over Motte’s shoulder and into the back of the net with 4:08 remaining in the third.

“Just an exciting way to win, obviously,” WMU coach Andy Murray said. “We played a really good team this weekend. They made some adjustments, came at us hard to night, which we would expect they would do, and we found a way to win the hockey game. It was a battle back and forth. Certainly, Ferris had their opportunities. Frank (Slubowski) was solid in net, and we had a key power play goal from a guy that does that for us.”

Western Michigan, which is now 3-3 this season when trailing after two periods, killed all three Ferris State (7-6-3, 6-4-1 CCHA) power plays. The Bulldogs left with weekend 1-for-8 on the power play.

Through two-and-a-half periods, Western Michigan had roughly 30 shots on goal to no avail as Motte was stopping and gloving everything in sight.

“You face good goaltenders in this league all the time and we seem to be making them look pretty good this year, too,” said Murray, referring to the nearly 31 shots WMU is averaging per-game. “We were hitting them with shots, but he played very well. We had our problems putting the puck in the net and one of the reasons is the opposing goaltenders have been good and we haven’t been efficient enough. So he played very well for them. He’s a good goalie.”

Motte made 33 saves for FSU, while Slubowski stopped 25 shots for WMU.

In front of Motte, the Bulldogs were skating with much more authority than they were in Friday’s game and it created headaches for the Broncos, as their shots from the point and overall offensive flow wasn’t as smooth as it was in Friday’s game.

FSU forward Garrett Thompson found himself in the right place at the right time when he stepped out of the penalty box and found the puck at his feet following a WMU turnover. He charge in with the puck and shot it past Slubowski to put the Bulldogs ahead 1-0 with 11:39 remaining in the second period.

Balisy said there was a little frustration mounting on the bench when WMU failed to score on several strong chances, but Leone said the team never lost its composure, even when play became extremely physical late in the game.

“We talked about it all week that it was going to be a battle, especially the second night, second game,” Leone said. “They were going to give us anything they had and we knew it was going to be a 60-minute battle and we had to stay in the fight. We talked about it, even if we got down, we had to keep it going. We knew at 10 minutes left, we had a lot of energy on the bench, and we just said, ‘Keep plugging away. Let’s get one and let’s get another one.’ It was a huge weekend for us.”

WMU converted on 2-of-5 power plays and left the weekend 4-for-9 on the power play, which is the best in CCHA action at 27.7 percent.

Murray sounded pleased with the way his team withstood the physical series to come away with two wins.

“Well, we knew that Ferris would play very hard and physical against us,” he said. “I mean, they’re not a program that’s gonna allow you to win two games on them. We knew they’d put up a battle here tonight. They did some grinding drills this morning in their practice, so you knew they were coming in with some intent and were going to play us really hard. That’s the sign of a great team, which Ferris is. They came in here on a roll, and we found a way to beat them twice, but it got everything out of our team, it demanded the most of our team.”

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Email David Drew at ddrew1@mlive.com and follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/Drew_on_WMU