Summary of Peewee A West Regional Sunday games

[frederick61]

It was not a difficult decision when I woke Sunday morning. The results showed that it was déjà vu. Move the clock back a week and you have a repeat of the district playoffs. Only this time the winners advance to state and the losers go home.

The East Region had D8(Woodbury/Eagan) and D3(Wayzata/Maple). Teams that I had seen play each other a number of times. The South had one potential jewel, D6 Eden Prairie playing D1 Mpls Park and one repeat D6 (Edina/Chaska). That game was a déjà vu of a déjà vu with the teams meeting for a third time on the playoff trail.

The North had home cooking going for it, but no company to eat it, only the homefolks. Hermantown and Cloquet would tangle in one game in a repeat of a D11 playoff game and Duluth East would take on a surprising Grand Rapids team.

That left the West Region. The West Region in Brainerd had a repeat of the D16 championship between East Grand Forks and Roseau and a repeat of the D15 championship between Little Falls and Moorhead. But to me, it was a “no brainer”. I had seen all the teams in the other regions play and in most cases the play the team they needed to beat to get to state. The West Region maybe a “rerun”, but I never saw the “first run”. Besides Brainerd was only a hundred miles or so drive, only a little farther then Chaska.

I had never been to the Brainerd Area Civic Center, but it was easy to find. North on 371 to 210, turn right and go five blocks, turn left and go two blocks and park. The two Arena entries confused me and the lack of people a half hour before the 12:00 start surprised me. The second sheet was busy with mites and there were kids everywhere. They all had to carry their sticks where ever they went.

I found a comfortable seat and settled in noting the crowd had gotten bigger. The arena had good sight lines partly because the stands on one side were close to the ice surface. On the opposite side, there was an overhead platform that fans could stand on and look down on the ice. That gave an excellent view.

The East Grand Forks team had to really want to win after losing by a goal in the D16 championship game and Roseau in their dark blue jerseys (with ties) had to feel some pressure. In hockey, it is hard to beat a good team a fourth time in a year, especially in a "winner goes to state" game.

And the game started that way, with EGF tense. Roseau took advantage of that and found the net in the first 90 seconds on a tip-in. Then, before the dust had settled, added a second goal 30 seconds later on shot from the wing to go up 2-0. The Green Wave began to bottle the Roseau forward up in their own zone and pressed the attack. Then at the seven minute mark, a Roseau defenseman broke out and on a rush slammed the puck past the EGF goalie to take a 3-0 lead. Thoughts of another sound beating must have been running through everybody’s mind.

But it ran for only 30 seconds. That’s how long it took for an EGF forward to retaliate rapping a shot by a surprised Ram goalie that caught the upper corner. Suddenly, it was a game again.

A pattern began to emerge. EGF would gain the offensive zone and pressure the net until Roseau would breakout, usually led by the defense and attack on a breakaway. But unlike the opening minutes, the EGF defense had settled and was only giving up the initial shot, not rebounds that they had given up in the first few minutes. This game play held until the EGF pressure finally worked. They scored on another high hard shot to the right corner to narrow the score to 3-2 at the one minute mark. The Rams seemed to sag with that goal.

Roseau opened the second period tired. The Green Wave took advantage of that and kept the pressure on. At the 13 minute mark, they caught a break when a hard shot on the Roseau net bounced high. The goalie lost sight of the puck and it came down on his back, bounced on the ice behind him and trickled in to tie the score 3-3.

The Wave pressed even harder in the next few minutes and the Rams scrambled. A EGF forward banged a lose puck through the Ram defense along the boards and fired from just inside the blue line. The puck climbed the Ram goalie’s catcher and bounced over into the net and the Green Wave led 4-3 at the ten minute mark.

The pace of the game slowed as both teams tired. With a little more then five minutes left, the Rams got a break when the EGF drew a penalty.

Then in a key sequence, the Rams lined up with one of their best defensemen wide, won the face and suddenly had a four man rush across the offensive blue line. But EGF defense turned the puck a started a breakaway with only a single Ram defenseman back. He took the EGF forward out of scoring, but drew a penalty negating the Ram advantage.

The Ram scoring opportunity was lost and the game flow returned to one that favored EGF. They struck again at the one minute mark scoring another hard shot to the catcher that climbed the glove and dropped in. The period ended with the Green Wave leading 5-3. It was time to clean ice and regroup.

The third period opened with the Green Wave playing cautiously, not attacking deep in the offensive zone, but looking to defend their goal. It worked for the first 3 minutes until they drew a penalty. Then Roseau, for the first time since the first period, really applied pressure holding the Green Wave in their defensive zone until the puck found the net by sliding through the goalie’s five hole. At the ten minute mark, the Wave led 5-4.

It now became apparent that a key Ram defenseman would never leave the ice. I have seen coaches debating this before. They have a good player and they know if they leave him out there, he would tire and play at 70%. But the argument is at 70% he is better then any other player the coach could put out there. The counter argument is that you need that player at 100% to score and at 70% he loses some of his scoring ability.

What was happening on the ice over the last 10 minutes is exactly that. EGF would push the attack, and Roseau would counter with the defenseman leading the rush but failing to find the net. It culminated when at the 5 minute mark, the EGF drew another penalty. But unlike the first penalty of the period, Roseau could not mount the intensity needed to score. They contained EGF in their zone for most of the penalty period, but could not put the puck in. Most of the scoring opportunities came from the one defenseman who by now had been on the ice 10 to 12 minutes.

With the penalty over, EGF finally got their defense set and started to take the puck away from the Rams in the neutral zone and fire back into the Rams zone. The Rams could mount no real pressure in those finals minutes and the game ended. But I was totally unprepared for the eruption from the Green Wave bench when the horn went off ending the game. It was loud, totally genuine and a joy to see. That made my day. Final score, EGF 5, Rams 4.

The second game was a repeat of the D15 playoff game, pitting Little Falls against Moorhead. The Spuds had turned a corner and had been playing well in the last few weeks, but Little Falls had been strong all year.

The game started with a Moorhead penalty in the first two minutes. The Flyers took advantage of the power play and scored on a shot to the catcher glove with the puck climbing the glove and into the net at the 12 minute mark.

The game then became physical. For the next five minutes, every Moorhead forward that touched the puck, was hit by a Flyer finishing their check. And it worked when a puck was coughed up to a Flyer forward in the slot and he rapped it in to take a 2-0 lead at the seven minute mark. The game then settled into an up and down affair at a fast pace.

As the period ended, the Flyer first line was starting to assert itself. Every shift they had pushed the Spuds into their defensive zone and had close shots. The Spuds could pressure the second line somewhat, but not enough to sustain pressure. The first period ended with the Flyers up 2-0.

Between the periods, I saw another first in the stands when a fan showed up with a brown retriever. The dog sat in the stand and watch the owner and the game. Just as I wondered if he would wag his tail on a Flyer or Spud goal, I heard a yipe on the other side of me. There was a small black pug that was obviously a Flyer fan. I have never seen dogs at a hockey game before.

The second period opened with the Flyers looking tired. And it showed. The game slowed and the Flyer forwards started to tie up the game along the boards. There was only two penalties called. But they didn’t matter in the game flow. Nothing mattered until with about a minute left a Flyer forward flattened a Spud behind the Spud net separating him from the puck that was promptly picked up by another Flyer forward and passed to a Flyer five feet in front of the net. He lifted the puck over the goalie’s shoulder to take a 3-0 lead at the end of the second period.

The third period was anticlimactic as the Flyers added a fourth goal. The Spuds could never mount and sustain an attack and there were some brief spurts of hard hits that the refs had to quell. The game ended 4-0. One note, one of the more effective Flyer line combinations has two girls as wings. That line combination contributed to the Flyer scoring and sustained pressure on the Spuds at various times during the game.

[Air Force 1]

Thank you Frederick, as always a joy to read.