If Tuesday night was any indication, the combination of longtime youth teammates Jackson Blake and Drew Holt could cause headaches for many an opposing team this coming season. 

The Eden Prairie duo had a hand in four of Twin Cities Orthopedics's 4-2 win over MAP South in Upper Midwest High School Elite league play, with Blake scoring the team's second goal and Holt dishing out three assists. 

"It's super easy to play with a guy like Jackson that just finds open areas," Holt said after the game. "I just give it to him, and he puts it in the net."

Blake says the feeling is mutual. 

"I just try to find Holty (on the ice)," Blake said, adding that Holt's lethal shot makes him an obvious target in the offensive zone. "He has a ripper, so whenever he shoots it, it's most likely going in the net."

Holt, a junior, potted 14 goals and totaled 31 points as a sophomore for the Class 2A state runner-up Eagles. Last year, Blake starred for the Eden Prairie Bantam AA team after starting the season at Shattuck-St. Mary's. As a sophomore, Blake leads TCO (6-6-1) with 13 goals in 13 games.

Will Svenddal kicked off the scoring for TCO, launching a shot from the point that cleanly beat MAP South goaltender Brandon Shantz. Jackson Hallum tied the game with 4:27 to play in the first and then scoring less than two minutes into the second period to give MAP South (5-7-1) a short-lived 2-1 lead. 

Blake admitted that the intensity might have been slightly lacking, given that it was a weeknight matchup as opposed to a power-packed weekend tilt. 

"I had to run a mile today, so the legs kinda weren't there at the start," Blake said. "But when the boys score, you kinda get going."

Blake's goal tied the game in the second, while Jonah Mortenson's even-strength tally in the third turned out to be the winner. Kyle Kukkonen put a bow on a solid performance with an empty-net insurance goal.

MAP South goaltender Shantz finished with 37 saves in the loss, with TCO counterpart Will Pinney stopping 31 of 33 shots. 

TDS Transportation picked up a 5-2 win over Sit Mutual Funds in the second game on Tuesday, with five of the games seven goals coming in the first period. 

Andrew Boemer, Ben Steeves, and Jack Reimann all chipped in first period goals for TDS Transportation, with Sit Mutual Funds' scores coming from Shane Donovan and Luke Delzer. 

Steeves and Owen Neuharth added goals in the second period before a scoreless third to cement the win. The two goals scored by Steeves were his eighth and ninth of the Elite League season, good for third in the league tied with MAP South's Nick Pierre. 

With the win, TDS Transportation inches closer to a .500 winning percentage at 5-6-2 and drops Sit Mutual Funds to 5-7-1.