Greenway, East rise to puck peak
There were some dramatic games in the Up North region last week. For one, how about Duluth East reaffirming its focus after a couple of wayward weeks with a rousing 7-1 rout at Cloquet? Or, how about Greenway of Coleraine skating onto the Hippodrome ice and whipping Eveleth-Gilbert 5-0?
Meanwhile, at the DECC, games can’t get much more intense than the 2-2 tie between Marshall and Silver Bay.
The most dramatic moment of the whole season in Section 7 might be the seeding meeting, when representatives of all the teams gather to vote on how to seed the sectional hockey tournament.
It appears Elk River, which shouldn’t be in Section 7AA geographically, will be top seed. The Elks beat Duluth East early, and that’s the only game they’ve had against Section 7 teams. The Elks did, however, knock off Hill-Murray and have reaffirmed their No. 1 station in the Up North state ratings with a 17-1 record.
The question is, who is No. 2 in 7AA? Duluth East, which beat Greenway, but lost to Hibbing; Greenway, which lost to East and split with Hibbing; and Hibbing, which beat East and split with Greenway but faced a major hurdle at Eveleth Tuesday, all had a right to claim the No. 2 slot.
East lost to Hibbing, Hastings and Hermantown in a four-game stretch that could mean the ‘Hounds should avoid schools with names beginning with an “H,” but they came back a little in a 4-3 victory over Grand Rapids, when coach Mike Randolph switched Ross Carlson and Nick Licari to defense. After the shakeup, Randolph put Licari and Carlson back up front, and the ‘Hounds played one of their best games of the season to throttle Cloquet 7-1. It could have been worse; Mike Marshall and Zach Burns scored twice each and East led 7-0 before Cloquet scored during the running-time conclusion.
“Before we lost to Hermantown, our last loss in the Lake Superior Conference had been in the ’94-’95 season to Denfeld,” said Randolph. “I had heard enough glass at practice to realize our guys were shooting for the corners so much they were missing the net. So we concentrated on shooting for the middle of the net.”
A bigger question was who would win the Iron Range Conference. Greenway, by winning an extremely impressive 5-0 game in the jam-packed Hippodrome on Saturday night, improved to 7-1 in the IRC, reaffirmed its grip on No. 1 in the Up North Regional ratings, and climbed to No. 3 in the Up North State ratings. Eveleth dropped to 9-2 in its bid to repeat as IRC champ. Hibbing took an 8-1 record into Tuesday’s showdown at Eveleth, having beaten the Golden Bears by a goal in their previous meeting. Eveleth is 18-3 overall, but slipped to 9-2 in the IRC.
“I really have no clue about what it takes to win the IRC,” said Greenway coach Pat Guyer. “We’ve got this thing with 2-point games and 4-point games, but then somehow we play one less IRC game than Hibbing. We’re told that if Hibbing beats Eveleth (Tuesday), we could still get the most points, but we wouldn’t be IRC champ. I think if we don’t win the IRC, I’ll make up a trophy myself and present it to the team.”
The Raiders outshot Eveleth 29-14, including an 11-2 edge in the second period when Greenway had to kill a couple of power plays. Freshman Gino Guyer scored the first goal, Mike Forconi the second, and Josh Miskovich — a senior with no college offers yet — scored the last three.
The Raiders got Eveleth off-balance at the start, put them away with three second-period goals, and made it appear that playing a tougher schedule against AA teams might have been worthwhile.
In Class A, the Silver Bay-Marshall game had all the intensity of a game with seeding as a reward, but it appears Eveleth-Gilbert will be No. 1 seed in the north of 7A, while Silver Bay will be No. 1 in the south and Marshall No. 2.
“We’re locked in as South 2,” said Marshall coach Brendan Flaherty. “Silver Bay will be South 1, and we’ll be South 2.”
That was because Marshall lost by a goal at Silver Bay, when the Toppers were without ace defenseman Tony Tomaino and forward Eric Mendel. In Thursday’s rematch, Mendell’s opening goal gave Marshall a 1-0 lead, but Silver Bay defenseman John Conboy scored the tying goal on a power play midway through the second period, and assisted on Andy Martinson’s goal in the last minute of the middle session. After each team had had a turn with the lead, Jon Blomqvist tied the game for good with 58 seconds left in regulation time.
For good measure, Marshall also defeated a very good Hayward, Wis., team in a 1-0 battle last week.
UP NORTH BOYS HOCKEY RATINGS
STATE
1. Elk River, 17-1
2. Roseau, 19-1
3. Greenway of Coleraine, 16-4
4. Eagan, 18-1
5. Hastings, 16-4
6. Duluth East, 16-5
7. Hibbing, 16-4
8. Eveleth-Gilbert, 18-3
9. Roseville, 17-3.
10. Hill-Murray, 15-3-1
REGIONAL
1. Greenway of Coleraine, 16-4
2. Duluth East, 16-5
3. Hibbing, 16-4
4. Eveleth-Gilbert 18-3
5. Hermantown, 16-3-1
6. Marshall, 12-5-2
7. Silver Bay, 14-5-2
8. Hayward (Wis.), 15-2-1
9. Proctor, 9-11-2
10. Grand Rapids, 7-13
Roseville 5, Burnsville 0
[Please fix the overall tournament lead to have Duluth playing ROSEVILLE in tonight’s 9:15 semifinal…And use this as a folo.]
ROSEVILLE 5,
BURNSVILLE 0
In the opening day finale, the Curtin sisters put on a show as Roseville avenged the only mark on its otherwise-perfect season by beating Burnsville 5-0.
The Raiders scored three goals in a 1:16 span late in the third period to break open a tight, 2-0 game. Ronda Curtin scored two of those three to complete a hat trick in the game, while sister Renee settled for just one goal, and Jodi Winters made 18 saves for the shutout.
Burnsville had tied the Raiders in the South St. Paul holiday tournament, and, after a scoreless sudden-death period, beat Roseville in a shootout. By high school rules, the game counts as a tie, so the Raiders are now 25-0-1 for the season to Burnsville’s 17-5-4.
Curtin sisters escaped from determined containment attempts by Burnsville to set the tone. Senior Ronda Curtin, the favorite to be named Ms. Hockey on Sunday, scored the only goal of the first period, at 14:12, wnen she faked goaltender Andrea Smith down at the right post, then zipped around behind the net to score on the wraparound at the left post.
Sophomore Renee Curtin made it 2-0 in the first minute of the second period. Stationed 5 feet to the left of the crease, the younger Curtin sister watched the puck come in from Leah Peyer to Erika Mortensen, and the sophomore sent the puck across the goal-mouth. Renee Curtin stepped in and, with a flick of her wrists, snapped a backhander almost straight up, bulging the netting in the roof of the goal at 0:59.
With 4:21 left in the third period, Ronda Curtin moved in on the left side and rifled a power-play shot into the left edge. Forty seconds later, Ronda circled in center ice and broke in on the right, scoring from the circle. And 35 seconds later, Alyson Sundberg completed the scoring.
Bulldogs shut out Seawolves…and tie
The good news was that UMD goaltender Tony Gasparini shut out the Alaska-Anchorage Seawolves on Saturday night.
The bad news is that the Bulldogs, likewise, failed to score.
The result was yet another weird chapter in this season of frustration by the hard-working Bulldogs, who had lost the Friday opener 5-3 under more curious circumstances.
“We got a point without scoring a goal Saturday night,” said UMD coach Mike Sertich, whose team has only 10 points in 22 WCHA games this season. “We played pretty well Saturday night.”
The Bulldogs were outshot 36-31 in the scoreless game, which was the fourth 0-0 tie in WCHA history, with three of those involving Alaska-Anchorage.
“They were pretty aggressive, but we didn’t have the kind of individual breakdowns that killed us Friday night.”
If individual breakdowns in decision-making or defensive coverage hurt the Bulldogs, so did another in a series of strange goal calls that have conspired to foul up the ‘Dogs all season. Twice this season goals that were clearly in the goal were declared nongoals, when UMD had apparently scored. Saturday night, there was a different twist on the scenario, but again it was UMD that paid the price.
After leading 1-0 and 2-1, the Bulldogs were victimized by three goals in a five-minute span that vaulted the Seawolves to a 4-2 lead and an eventual 5-3 victory. But the fourth goal came after a scramble, when bodies piled up near the crease, Gasparini was down, and play stopped.
Referee Buzz Christensen discussed the situation, then talked to the goal judge, then declared a goal for the Seawolves.
“That one still hasn’t gone in,” said Sertich. “So they get a goal that wasn’t in…I guess that’s just another part of this year.”
Often, the weather in Anchorage is milder than in Minnesota, because of ocean wind currents. Last weekend, it was frigid, below zero, in Anchorage. The Bulldogs left at 2 a.m. Sunday morning, after the game, and flew to Seattle, then to Minneapolis, where they boarded a bus for the ride home. The trek finished in Duluth at around 4:30 p.m.
Back home in the DECC this weekend, the Bulldogs will face Michigan Tech Friday and Saturday, in a battle of the WCHA’s eighth and ninth teams. The Bulldogs are 3-15-4 in ninth place, while Tech is 7-15 in eighth.
If UMD has any hope of rising from the cellar, this weekend is pivotal, because the ‘Dogs trail Tech by four points and have only six games remaining. After Tech, UMD has a weekend off, then entertains Minnesota before going to Colorado College to end the regular season.
The Bulldogs claimed their first two WCHA victories by sweeping Tech 5-2 and 6-2 in Houghton back in early December. The Huskies are fresh from being swept by first-place North Dakota, after being swept at Minnesota two weeks ago.
COLLEGE PUCK NOTES/Duluth’s Dave Spehar made the trip to Colorado College with Minnesota last week, but coach Doug Woog didn’t have him dress for the Friday game. Spehar has eight goals, but none at even strength, despite generating several scoring chances for himself each game. Woog said on the game’s broadcast that the staff decided which players to dress to give the Gophers the best chance to win. Apparently, the staff decided it didn’t need goal-scorers. At any rate, after the Gophers offered little resistance in losing 5-1, the coaches decided to dress Spehar for the second game, although they did not decide to bench the 19 players who failed to score Friday. The Gophers lost 2-1 Saturday, and stand in seventh place at 7-10-3 for 17 points.
Harvard’s women’s hockey team is ranked No. 1 in the nation, but had never beaten New Hampshire until Saturday night, when the Crimson beat UNH 4-2 amid a flurry of significant performances. Goaltender Alison Kuusisto, a freshman from Duluth, got her third start and won the game; Angie Francisco of Duluth scored the goal that lifted Harvard into a 2-2 tie; and A. J. Mleczko scored her 18th goal and added her 41st and 42nd assists for 60 points, breaking the school single-season record of 57 points, set last year by Francisco.
Sanya Sandahl
SANYA SANDAHL/ATHLETE OF THE WEEK
School: Duluth Central.
Team: Duluth Dynamite
Sport: Girls hockey
Quick stats: The Dynamite reached the state tournament with their first Section 8 girls hockey championship in a 4-3 victory over Hibbing. While compiling a 20-4-1 season, Duluth was outshot quite often, but the goaltending of Sandahl rendered it meaningless. Hibbing outshot Duluth 31-18 in the section final, but Sandahl’s 28 saves secured the victory.
For the season, the senior — and the only Central participant on the Dynamite team that also includes East and Denfeld girls — has a 1.30 goals-against average and a save percentage of 94. She never played hockey until eighth grade, but now has hopes to study, and play goal, at an eastern college, maybe Princeton or Cornell.
Coach’s quote:
“Sometimes we don’t play our best unless we’re facing a top team, but Sanya is always consistent. It seems like our players get overlooked when it comes to post season awards, so it’s great to see Sanya as a finalist for the top senior goaltender award.”
—Jack Shearer, Dynamite coach.
Exceptional defensemen lead puck powers
Goal-scorers get the glory, and goaltenders become instant heroes, that’s the easy part of watching a hockey game. But both the scorers and the savers depend on their defensemen for their success.
On some teams, defensemen are ordered to stay at home and defend. On others, they may fly up the ice to join the offense. On all of them, it is up to the defensemen to clear the zone with crisp passes, giving their goaltenders a moment of peace and starting the rushes toward the other end all at the same time.
Many times, defensemen can be unsung and overlooked. Not this year. While this has been a season of unexcelled strength in numbers among Up North area high school hockey teams in both Classes AA and A, it also has been dominated by a crop of defensemen that may be unmatched in recent history.
It would be possible to fill an entire roster with all-star selections from Section 7AA and 7A.
Consider the Duluth area. Perennial power Duluth East struggled to a 2-2 start when senior defenseman Anunti was out with a preseason injury. When he came back, he stabilized the defense and the Greyhounds took off on a 10-game winning streak. And even when they struggled late in the season, it wasn’t because of their defense, but their goal-scoring that wavered.
Coach Mike Randolph’s method for getting the offense untracked took a novel twist: He moved top scoring forwards Ross Carlson and Nick Licari back to defense for one game, a 4-3 victory over Grand Rapids, then moved them back up front and the ‘Hounds crushed Cloquet 7-1.
“Now Ross and Nick keep asking me if they can go back to defense,” said Randolph. “They loved it.”
No such movement was necessary for Hermantown, which made a run at the Lake Superior Conference championship by upsetting East 4-3 to climax a superb season. The Hawks top line of Jon Francisco, Andy Corran and Chris Baron does most of the scoring, but the Hawks didn’t really get rolling until senior J.R. Bradley came off a long dose of mono that caused him to miss three weeks of school as well as a month of hockey.
“He had two goals and two assists in our first game, then he went out,” said coach Bruce Plante. “At 6-3 and 220, he’s a great skater, and obviously he makes a difference in our team.”
While Hermantown is the favorite in section 2A, Silver Bay and Marshall are two Lake Superior Conference teams who will challenge defending state champ Eveleth-Gilbert in 7A. And their defense will not rest.
Silver Bay has John Conboy, a strong, forceful senior who has accepted a scholarship to play at UMD in the fall. He rarely leaves the ice, staying out as long as his wind will last, and capable of dominating play at both ends of the rink. When he seems to be spent defending, the puck pops loose and Conboy will race up the rink to generate attacks.
“It’s the fifth year he’s played for us,” said Mariner coach Mike Guzzo. “Sometimes he sits back a little against another team’s top line, but he’s so fast, he really helps our offense.”
At Marshall, the Hilltoppers resurgence under coach Brendan Flaherty was smoldering until Tomaino decided that playing at prep school wasn’t for him, and he transfered home from Faribault Shattuck. After sitting out for two weeks, Tomaino stepped onto the ice and the junior blueliner’s forceful presence both offensively and defensively caused the Toppers to flare into a genuine sectional threat.
On the Iron Range, Eveleth was going for its second straight IRC title behind the scoring of the explosive Andy Sacchetti, but Book’Em Heitzman — he’s really Dan Heitzman, but goes by the name “Book’Em” Heitzman after the “Book ’em, Daniel” line from the old television show Hawaii Five-O — is responsible for getting the puck up to the big line and plays in every pressure situation.
The Golden Bears suffered a stunning 5-0 loss to Greenway last Saturday. Ninth-grade forwards Gino Guyer and Andy Sertich team with senior Josh Miskovich on the first line, which scored four of the five Greenway goals. But the solid Raider defense, led by Geisler’s rushing and puck-moving, is equally impressive.
Hibbing gained a tie with Greenway for the title by beating Eveleth-Gilbert 5-4 Tuesday in an overtime thriller. Hibbing’s strength is three lines that keep coming at foes with unwavering balance. But most of the goals are scored when the tandem of Suihkonen and Fatticci on the ice.
It was Fatticci who broke across the blue line and rifled his second goal of the game into the Eveleth goal at 2:26 of overtime Tuesday. He’s headed for Bemidji State’s new Division 1 program in the fall. Suihkonen, a lanky, stickhandling rusher with a hard shot is heading for Alaska-Anchorage. Hibbing coach Mark DeCenzo points to Erik Maras, an unheralded junior, as a key defensive defenseman.
Unlike Hibbing’s two Division 1 recruited defensemen, Greenway’s seniors have no college offers yet., which puzzles Raider coach Pat Guyer.
“There is not a better senior player that we’ve played against than Josh Miskovich,” said Guyer. “If I was starting a team, he’d be my No. 1 choice.”
OK, coach, but he’s a forward. How about senior defenseman Geisler? “OK, I’d have to have two first choices,” Guyer said, hedging.
And then there’s Andy Johnson, the 6-6 giant who has signed a tender to play football at Minnesota, and Bryan Hanson, yet another senior. Johnson can seemingly poke-check from his goal to the blue line. “And defensively, Hanson might be the best of all,” said Guyer.
With the sectional playoffs starting next week, watch the headlines for the exploits of the forwards and goaltenders. But watch the defensemen to see which teams advance.
About the Author
John Gilbert is a lifetime Minnesotan and career journalist, specializing in cars and sports during and since spending 30 years at the Minneapolis Tribune, now the Star Tribune. More recently, he has continued translating the high-tech world of autos and sharing his passionate insights as a freelance writer/photographer/broadcaster. A member of the prestigious North American Car and Truck of the Year jury since 1993. John can be heard Monday-Friday from 9-11am on 610 KDAL(www.kdal610.com) on the "John Gilbert Show," and writes a column in the Duluth Reader.
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