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FELDY: A link to live blogs for all of today's Section 1A and 1AA semifinal games can be found on our home page, www.postbulletin.com
Today's schedule
11:30 a.m. -- Red Wing vs. Faribault (Section 1A)
2 p.m. -- Lakeville South vs. Winona (Section 1AA)
5:30 p.m. -- Lourdes vs. New Prague (Section 1A)
8 p.m. -- Century vs. Lakeville North (Section 1AA)
Note: The scoring summary will stay at the top of the blog; game notes & lines below
FIRST PERIOD
1. RC, Nick Jacobs 7 (Brandon Kautz 8) 14:20 (pp). Kautz fires a wrist shot from the left faceoff dot; Jacobs, standing in front of JM goalie Bryan King, re-directs it in. 2. RC, Drew Anderson 19 (Jordan Martini 18) 16:15 (pp). Anderson and Martini work a nice give-and-go on a power play. Martini feeds Anderson from below the goal line; Anderson one-times it high from the doorstep.
Shots on Goal: Century 23, JM 3.
SECOND PERIOD
3. RC, Nick Raehsler 11 (Martini 19) :12 (pp). Raehsler put a shot through traffic from the point. 4. RC, Raehsler 12 (Connor Faupel 25) 5:06 (pp). Raehsler puts a rebound into a wide open net, making Century 4-for-4 on the power play. 5. RC, Matt Mills 3 (Luke Klugherz 3) 11:52. Mills notches his third goal of the season as Century scores its first even-strength goal of the game. 6. JM, Eric Mackey (unassisted) 16:34 (4x4). Mackey intercepted a Century pass in the Panthers zone, skated in 2-on-1 crossed across the slot and lifted a wrist shot top shelf that hit the bottom of the crossbar and went in.
Shots on Goal: Century 46, JM 7.
THIRD PERIOD | 1:53
no scoring.
Final shots on goal: Century 53, JM 14.
LINES (I'll post JM's as the first period goes on)
CENTURY (17-7-0, No. 2 seed)
Forwards
10 Drew Anderson - 14 Cory Kautz - 9 Jordan Martini
6 Blake Heroff - 7 Dominick Jacobs - 20 Tyler Iverson
11 Matt Mills - 13 Luke Klugherz - 18 Brett Applegath
4 Justin Powers - 17 Ryan Iverson - 24 Cal Bjerke
Defense
15 Nick Raehsler - 12 Brandon Kautz
19 Connor Faupel - 21 Brandon Sauter
8 Wyatt Travis - 22 Joey Canakes
Goalies
1 Brock Kautz
30 Cam Sellnow
JM (10-14-1, No. 7 seed)
Forwards
6 Zach Johnson - 7 Jason Macken - 16 Eric Mackey
4 Ryan Yetzer - 24 Jared Kristo - 20 Matt Cyr
8 Nate Armstrong - 12 Zach Ewing - 21 Alex Antolak
Defense
2 Tom Foley - 5 Anthony Johnson
10 Matt Broman - 3 Reed Miller
Goalies
35 Bryan King
30 Matt Potoracke
NOTES
6:59 -- Teams taking the ice for intros now. Not sure if this is a playoff game between two Rochester teams or a pre-season JV scrimmage. Crowd is not good.
6:46 -- Warmups just wrapping up; captains are meeting with officials at center ice. Should be on time for the 7 p.m. puck drop.
6:36 -- Other Section 1 playoff games tonight: Section 1AA -- No. 9 Dodge County at No. 1 Lakeville South; No. 7 JM at No. 2 Century; No. 6 Farmington at No. 3 Lakeville North; No. 5 Owatonna at No. 4 Winona. Section 1A -- No. 8 Mankato East at No. 1 Faribault; No. 7 Northfield at No. 2 Lourdes; No. 6 Mankato West at No. 3 New Prague; No. 5 Red Wing at No. 4 Albert Lea.
6:33 -- Teams just taking the ice now for their 12-minute warmup period. Quick glances to both ends tells me none of the top players are out for either team.6:15 -- Our main Web guru at the P-B is under the weather today, so I decided to put a live blog from tonight's JM-Century Section 1AA quarterfinal game up on Faceoff. Not expecting much traffic on here tonight as I didn't put anything in the paper about me doing this (intentionally, I wasn't sure if I would be feeling up to it tonight after fighting the Mother Of All Coughs for the past week and a half), but on Saturday, I'll have our usual interactive live blog up and running from the Section 1 Semifinal Saturday at The Rec. Four games, 11 hours of hockey. What a day that should be, but we have to get there first. So, here's the deal for tonight: I'll update the score in the title and the body of this post as the game goes on, but there won't be much play-by-play on here. Saturday, you'll get more of that.
Feel free to comment or post questions; I'll try to keep an eye out for them. I'll also post lines for each team if I can track down the coaches and verify them. Speaking of which, I'm off to the locker room area to see if I can get those line charts.
PHERSY: Your Rochester Ice Hawks can wrap up another Minnesota Junior Hockey League title tonight in Little Falls when they take on the Minnesota Flying Aces.
The Ice Hawks have four games remaining, and as long as they win one of those games, they will be the regular-season champs in the MnJHL. Not a bad run for a team that started out so poorly, with those two ugly losses to the Lakers.
It seems likely the Ice Hawks will come home late tonight with that league title, even though it means very little. In case you haven't been paying attention, the league decided this year that the regular-season champions will NOT be awarded an automatic bid to nationals. Instead, the two teams advancing to the postseason league finals will be headed to nationals. So that means, theoretically, the Minnesota Wildcats and their 4-39-0-2 record could be headed to Marlborough, Mass., for the national tournament. It's unfortunate, but a hot goalie could carry a team into those finals, and a team like the Ice Hawks who proved themselves the best team in the league over a 50-game schedule, could be left home.
But, the bottom line is, that's how this thing is going to work, so the Ice Hawks need to be the team to keep playing well and make it through these first two rounds and claim a spot at nationals.
The other frustrating thing is that the league had decided to make these first two rounds best-three-out-of-five, but now it will remain best two-of-three, like it was last year.
Again, it's the way it is ... so we move on.
Tonight, the Ice Hawks are exected to have all but one player available -- Zack King is out with strep throat and he's not on the bus with the team.
Matt Rucinski could return to action, and it will be interesting to see if he can go at full speed and hit people with that injury. Fatis said it's about 60/40 in favor of Rucinski playing tonight. My guess is Fatis will put Rucinski out for warmups and see how he looks and make a decision after that.
Fatis has informed me Jordan Yaggy will get the nod in goal tonight. It's a little surprising, since I expected to see Simon Eriksson lifting the trophy tonight! But Fatis said that's not what it's about at this time of year.
"No, we've tried that before. This time of year you need to make sure everyone is sharp and work on getting all of your rotations ready," Fatis said. "We need to see where Jordan is at."
New defenseman Matt Hannibal will be in the lineup tonight, though Fatis said he won't be used often because he's still recovering from an injury. But Fatis said he does like the combo of Hannibal alongside Rick Weber.
Fatis thinks his team is ready for this game, and that they played very well Wednesday night in the win over the Mustangs.
"We did things reasonably well against them," Fatis said. "I may be a little hard on the guys, but generally we played well and it was a good game. We can still do things a little sharper, though."
Fatis said the fact that a trip to nationals isn't on the line tonight doesn't take away from what this team has done.
"Everybody talks about that, but what we did is prove that for seven months we could get the job done," Fatis said. "Yes, the playoffs proves it in a pressure situation, and that's important. But I judge a hockey team by their body of work as a whole, over the long haul. At the end of the day, I'm very proud of what we've done."
That's all for now. Bring home that trophy boys!
FELDY: First off, who's loving the Olympic curling coverage on TV? I watch curling once every four years (probably because that's the only time it's on TV). I mean, the drama of watching the skip curl the rock around the high guard to try to knock the opponents' rock out of the house while landing his own on the button is pretty intense.
I have no idea what that means. I heard an announcer say it yesterday and it sounded good, so I'm going with it. Seriously, I have no idea why, but I can't stop watching the curling coverage.
On to hockey ...
I'm only about three days late on this, but for those of you who packed into the Rec Center on Jan. 22 to watch the U.S. Women's Olympic hockey team beat the Century boys, 2-1, how cool has it been to watch the women's team on TV so far in these Games?
That U.S.-Century game is probably my favorite game I've covered this year because, playing with a no-checking rule allowed both of those teams to show off their speed. Century is at its best when it has room to skate and move the puck. It was a 2-1 game but only because both goalies played very well. It was entertaining, up-and-down hockey, and I imagine we'll see something similar if/when the U.S. and Canada meet in the medal round.
To no one's surprise, Team USA is off to a tremendous start at the Vancouver Games and appears to be on the much-anticipated course to meet Team Canada for gold. The U.S. has outscored its first two opponents -- China and Russia -- by a combined 25-1.
And former Gopher Jocelyne Lamoureux has provided the highlight goal of the tournament so far, men's or women's.
I won't attempt to describe it. Just watch it. Here is a link to the video.
FELDY: So, last week I was pretty certain that the seedings in Section 1AA are cut-and-dried. I was partially right on that. The top three seeds should be locked in as: 1. Lakeville South, 2. Century, 3. Lakeville North, in that order. South has beaten both of those teams, while Century beat North. There's no reason for any of the section's coaches to deviate from those teams in that order at the seeding vote.
As for the other six teams, the seeding isn't quite as clear as I thought, though the remaining six essentially break down into two groups of three: Winona, Farmington and John Marshall will receive the Nos. 4-6 seeds, in some order.
Mayo, Owatonna and Dodge County will receive the Nos. 7-9 seeds, likely in that order. Mayo earned the seventh seed -- and avoided next Tuesday's play-in game -- with a 6-3 win against Owatonna last night. Owatonna and Mayo each have just six wins, while Dodge County has nine, but the quality wins are slightly better for Mayo and Owatonna. Of course, we've seen Dodge County as the No. 9 seed the past two years come to Rochester and knock off JM, so it wouldn't at all surprise me to see the Wildcats take down Owatonna next Tuesday.
If you follow how the section quarterfinal matchups would set up, this would mean Mayo would play at Century in the quarterfinals next Thursday, the 25th. It's certainly not an easy matchup for Mayo, but there are some positives for the Spartans if that's how things shake out. First, they wouldn't have to take a bus trip to Lakeville and wouldn't have to leave town. Second, the Spartans are playing with a fully-healthy lineup for one of the few times this season and they're coming off essentially a two-goal loss to Century on Saturday (ended 4-1 with an empty-net goal by the Panthers). Mayo gained a lot of confidence in that game.
(EDIT, 5:40 p.m. Tuesday: Just thought of this: In what's been kind of a weird season in the Big 9, Mayo could actually help Century -- a team it has had two heated, emotional games against -- capture the conference title outright. If Century beats Mankato East on Thursday and Mayo wins at Faribault, Century wins the conference all alone. If both Century and Faribault win, they share the conference title; there's no distinction for the Falcsons' head-to-head win against Century.)
As for the Nos. 4-6 seeds, Winona has the strongest case for the No. 4 seed at the moment. The Winhawks are 14-7-1 overall, but just 2-2-1 against section opponents. They have two section games remaining -- tonight against Dodge County and Thursday at JM. If Winona wins both of those games, it deserves the No. 4 seed.
A JM win on Thursday makes the 4-6 seed decisions much more difficult. The Rockets would then hold a win and a tie against Winona, but a loss against Farmington. Winona would hold a win over Farmington, but a loss and a tie against JM. Farmington would hold a win over JM, but a loss against Winona.
The strength of schedules for JM, Winona and Farmington are all pretty much even, as are the quality of their victories. That means Winona would likely get the nod as the No. 4 seed, because it has the best overall record.
The argument I would make for JM in this case is this: Which team is playing the best right now? Certainly not Farmington; the Tigers are 1-9-0 in their past 10 games and 1-12-0 in 2010. Winona is 4-5-1 in its past 10, but just 1-5-0 in its past six games. JM is just slightly better than Winona in its past 10 (5-4-1), but the Rockets are 5-2-1 in their past eight. Those two losses -- to Century and Albert Lea -- were by just one goal.
Bottom line? If JM can beat both Owatonna and Winona in the next three days, the Rockets will finish the regular season with a 12-12-1 record and a 5-4-1 record against section opponents. They'd deserve the No. 4 seed. If Winona wins at The Rec on Thursday, it deserves the No. 4 seed.
FELDY: The 10 finalists for Minnesota's Mr. Hockey Award were announced today. Nine of them are committed to WCHA teams, five of those committed to Minnesota. A defenseman has won this award the past five years; perhaps this will be the year a forward breaks through? Eight of the 10 finalists are forwards.
Among the finalists are Nick Bjugstad of Blaine, who was the best player on the ice in a state tournament quarterfinal game against Rochester Century last year, when Bjugstad was just a sophomore. He's a Gophers recruit, and he's the complete package -- size, strength, speed, and a rocket of a shot.
Gophers recruit Christian Isakson is also a finalist; he's a forward from No. 2-ranked St. Thomas Academy, which knocked off Rochester Lourdes last night, 5-3.
Forward Adam Krause of Hermantown is another of the finalists. He's a Minnesota-Duluth recruit; you may have seen him play if you watched FSN North's Hockey Day Minnesota coverage last month.
The 10 finalists, with their college commitments in parentheses:
*Mark Alt, D, Cretin-Derham Hall (Minnesota)
*Joey Benik, F, St. Francis (St. Cloud State)
*Nick Bjugstad, F, Blaine (Minnesota)
*Cal Decowski, F, Andover (uncommitted)
*Max Gardiner, F, Minnetonka (Minnesota)
*Caleb Herbert, F, Bloomington Jefferson (Minnesota-Duluth)
*Justin Holl, D, Minnetonka (Minnesota)
*Christian Isakson, F, St. Thomas Academy (Minnesota)
*Adam Krause, F, Hermantown (Minn.-Duluth)
*Brock Nelson, F, Warroad (North Dakota)
Recent Mr. Hockey winners include D Nick Leddy (Eden Prairie, 2009, Minnesota Wild 1st round draft pick); D Aaron Ness (Roseau, 2008); D Ryan McDonagh (Cretin, 2007); D David Fischer (Apple Valley, 2006); D Brian Lee (Moorhead, 2005).
TOP GOALIE: Thief River Falls goalie Zane Gothberg has been named the winner of the 2010 Frank Brimsek Award, given to the state's top high school goaltender. Gothberg is a North Dakota recruit who will play for the Fargo Force of the USHL.
PHERSY: Your Rochester Ice Hawks will welcome the Wisconsin Mustangs to the Rec Center on Friday night fo a 7:05 p.m. faceoff.
At this time of the season, every game is big, so I don't even need to point out that this will be another big weekend for the Hawks. After Friday, they'll hit the road for a game against the Flying Aces.
Well, the trade deadline has come and gone. And the Ice Hawks did make one move.
The Ice Hawks have added defenseman Matt Hannibal.
Hannibal was playing with Albert Lea of the NAHL. He injured his shoulder at the beginning of the season and only plyed 10 games with Albert Lea. He had one point and was a minus-4. Prior to Albert Lea, Hannibal, who is a Bloomington native, played for Russell Stovers AAA midget team.
Hannibal is 6-foot, 200 pounds and has a 1991 birth year.
He arrived in town Tuesday and he's been practicing with the team for the last few days.
"He looks like a kid who can help us in some way," Fatis said. "He's only been here for a few days, and there are kids who have been here all year and are still trying to pick things up. So it's going to be a process, but he has the right attitude, he's excited to be here, and that's half the battle right there. Hopefully he can come in and help us get to that national championship."
To make room for Hannibal, the Ice Hawks moved Nik Tamanko off the active roster. "We just didn't see him getting legitimate ice time," Fatis said. "He's really good, tons of talent. He's just young. He needs more time. I think he's going to be a huge part of the program next season. Nik knew this was a possibility, at the same time I know he wishes he could be in there helping out. He's a great kid and he'll do anything he can to help the team."As far as injury news, the Ice Hawks received a bad update on Matt Rucinski. He will be out at least another week and possibly longer because of his shoulder injury. "I wish we had known earlier, but that's how these injuries go," Fatis said. "It turned out to be a lot worse than we thought. But we're hoping he gets back soon, and we're excited to get him back. He's obviously a very talented offensive player."
Morgan Sanchez also missed practice all week due to an undisclosed injury. He's seeing a doctor today, though Fatis said he doesn't expect Sanchez to be back this weekend.
The Ice Hawks also will be without Shaun Walters this weekend. His grandmother passed away, so he flew hope for the funeral. "Shaun was very close with his grandmother, so it's tough. He tried to get a flight that would make it so he wouldn't miss games, but it just didn't work out," Fatis said.
Fatis said everyone else should be available for this weekend.
"Everybody else is healthy, but some guys are still dinged up," Fatis said. "We're not 100 percent, but like I've said before, I don't want us at 100 percent because that would mean we're not going hard enough."
The Ice Hawks have seven games remaining in the regular season. The have a six-point advantage on the Granite City Lumberjacks in the MnJHL standings. The magic number for the Ice Hawks to clinch the league title is now down to 4 1/2.
As of now, there's nothing to really report about the playoffs, other than that each round will be a best-two-out-of-three series. Game dates and times have not been determined.
"Very few teams in the league are the main tenants in their building, so it's tough to set dates on these things," Fatis said. "I know, it's a pain in the butt for media, and it stinks for the parents to not know, but it's kind of the nature of the beast."
Fatis did say the team plans to ride Simon Eriksson as long as he stays hot. "There's no point in taking him out of there now while he's playing this well," Fatis said. "Sammy and Yaggy are on the roster, and they're both working very hard. But at this point, there's no reason straying from Simon. He's been effective. That's the way it is right now."
The team has had a rough week of practice, Fatis said. He just hopes his guys don't think they have the league wrapped up.
"This isn't over, and I hope nobody thinks it is. We still have a lot of work to do, and if we relax, we're not going to win," Fatis said.
So, that's it for now. 7:05 p.m. Friday at the Rec ... be there!
FELDY: I've spent several hours yesterday and this morning attempting to figure out just which team deserves the No. 1 seed in the Section 1A hockey tournament, which begins in 13 days. The answer: Clear as mud. (I'll get into the Section 1AA seeding tomorrow; that's a section that appears pretty cut-and-dried).
The bottom line for all teams in Section 1A is that they should do whatever they can in their remaining four or five games to avoid being the No. 4 or No. 5 seed. In other words, there are five teams in the section that could cause problems for one another. If you earn a top-three seed, you'll only have to beat two of those other teams to get to state.
The Big Five in 1A: Lourdes, Faribault, New Prague, Albert Lea and Red Wing.
We've eliminated Mankato West and Northfield from the equation, even though West is 4-3-0 in the section and Northfield holds a win over Lourdes. That win (which came way back on Dec. 17, by the way) is the Raiders' lone win against a section opponent. Both teams are four games under .500 overall, as well, which isn't good enough in this section for a top-five seed.
The problem with the remaining five teams is that they've all beaten up on each other. So, let's first take a look at how they've fared against section opponents:
ALBERT LEA (10-9-1 overall, 5-2-0 vs. section). Section wins (score): Faribault (6-4), West (3-2), Northfield (5-2), Red Wing (5-2), Waseca (4-3). Section losses (score): New Prague (5-4), Lourdes (4-3). Remaining section opponents: Austin, Mankato East, Mankato West.
FARIBAULT (15-6-0, 5-2-0). Wins: Austin (9-0), Mankato East (9-2), Mankato West (5-1), Northfield (5-4), New Prague (5-1). Losses: Albert Lea (6-4), Lourdes (6-3). Remaining section opponents: LeSueur-Henderson/St. Peter.
NEW PRAGUE (13-6-2, 4-3-2). Wins: Albert Lea (5-4), Mankato East (6-4), Mankato West (3-2), Red Wing (6-2). Losses: Faribault (5-1), Red Wing (4-2), Lourdes (2-1). Ties: Lourdes (1-1), Northfield (2-2). Remaining section opponents: Northfield.
RED WING (10-10-0, 4-2-0). Wins: New Prague (4-2), Lourdes (4-2), Northfield twice (5-1, 4-0). Losses: Albert Lea (5-2), New Prague (6-2). Remaining section opponents: None.
ROCHESTER LOURDES (12-6-3, 4-2-1). Wins: Albert Lea (4-3), Faribault (6-3), Mankato East (7-1), New Prague (2-1). Losses: Northfield (3-0), Red Wing (4-2). Tie: New Prague (1-1). Remaining section opponents: Mankato West.
All of the top five are done playing one another in the regular season, so let's assume for the sake of this blog entry that they'll all win their remaining games against section opponents. In that scenario it would seem to come down to Faribault, New Prague and Lourdes for the top seed. Albert Lea and Red Wing are out because they each hold just one victory against the top three teams (so does Faribault, but the Falcons' strong overall record gives them the edge).
Albert Lea, then, earns the No. 4 seed because of its head-to-head win over Red Wing, so Red Wing would travel to Albert Lea for a section quarterfinal game (assuming the Wingers would win their play-in game at home against the No. 12 seed).
Looking, then, at head-to-head matchups among the three remaining teams, New Prague would receive the No. 3 seed because it lost to Faribault and has a loss and a tie against Lourdes.
That leaves Faribault and Lourdes, which would make Lourdes the top seed via its 6-3 win over the Falcons on Jan. 30. That would mean a pretty entertaining Semifinal Saturday at the Rec Center on Feb. 27, with potential matchups of Albert Lea/Red Wing against Lourdes and New Prague against Faribault.
PHERSY: The Rochester Ice Hawks are on the road right now, on their way to St. Cloud for a huge Minnesota Junior Hockey League game against the Granite City Lumberjacks.
This will be the last regular-season meeting between the two top teams in the MnJHL. The Ice Hawks currently hold a four-point lead over the Lumberjacks in the standings; the Ice Hawks have 69 points and are 34-7-0-1, while the Lumberjacks have 65 points and are 32-9-0-1.
The Lumberjacks lead the season series 4-2 (one of those wins came in OT).
I just spoke to coach Fatis, and he said Simon Eriksson will start in net tonight. "Simon's playing well, so he's earned it," Fatis said.
The Ice Hawks will be without Alex Whitney (cleared, but still working to get back to game shape), Nik Tamanko (about a week or two away) and Matt Rucinski (a week away, at least). Fatis said Jordan Yaggy suffered a hip injury in practice this week and also will be out.
"Pretty much everybody who's healthy will be in there," he said.
Fatis said physical play is the key to victory tonight.
"Last time we got physical with them, they wanted to fight us, so some kids stepped up," Fatis said. "We need to take it to them. What I like about this Thursday game is that we can empty the tank, and then we get three days off to rest."
So, how important is this game? Fatis downplayed it a bit.
"It's just another game to us," Fatis said. "The only difference is that every other time we've played them this year we were playing a team that was ahead of us in the standings. Would two points be nice? Yes, but we've given ourselves a little wiggle room now. Our magic number is at 6 1/2, and it would be nice to cut it down to 4 1/2 after tonight."
Fatis said he has been in talks with a player who has recently been cut from the NAHL. The trade deadline has now been pushed back to Feb. 10, so he has a little time to make some last-minute additions. With a thinning roster, I wouldn't be surprised if Fatis added at least one player for the stretch run.
That's all for now ... go hawks!!!
FELDY: Rochester hockey fans packed the Rec Center two weeks ago to see the U.S. Women's Olympic Team. I wouldn't expect Graham Arena to be packed on Super Bowl Sunday, but more of the best women's hockey players in the world will be in Rochester for a youth clinic and a game.
The Minnesota Whitecaps, a pro team in the Western Women's Hockey League, will be in Rochester to face the Strathmore (Alberta) Rockies. Several of the players on the U.S. women's Olympic team -- Julie Chu, Angela Ruggiero, Jenny Potter -- play for the Whitecaps. Of course, this season they are not competing with the Whitecaps prior to the Olympics.
The game is scheduled for a 12:30 p.m. start on Sunday, with all proceeds going to the Dodge County and Rochester Youth Hockey Associations.
Tickets are $5 for adults and $3 for children (18 & under).
From 11-11:40 a.m., Whitecaps players and coaches will put on an instructional clinic for players of all ages (Termites through High School).
For clinic and ticket information contact Karen Mathias at dcgirlshockey@gmail.com, or Dodge County head coach Jeremy Gunderson at gunderson325@hotmail.com.
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