Peewee Notes 

On the Bloomington Ice Garden’s newly minted Rink 1 (the former Rink 3, for you BIG veterans), I was reminded of what I love about ‘B’ level hockey. 

As a former ‘B’ player myself as a Peewee and a Bantam, I’m familiar with the fact that there are moments when the level is far more entertaining than ‘A’ or ‘AA.’ There’s a wider net of players on the ice, with a more varied skill level. 

Near the end of the second period of Blaine and White Bear Lake’s dramatic 2-2 tie on Friday afternoon, the Bears threw more pucks on the Bengal net than Vinny Testaverde threw interceptions in 1988. Pucks went left, right, up, down, and everywhere in between. Pucks bounced off goalie pads, shin pads, sticks, the boards, and the glass. Parents slapped foreheads over. Players banged their sticks. Coaches hollered. 

The pandemonium was a lovely reminder that hockey can be, above all, fun. It can be spontaneous. It can be a game. In some ways, ‘B’ level hockey is the purest form of the sport, and it’s refreshing to watch it as such. 

Bantam Notes 

To this point (2:52 PM), there have been two hat tricks recorded during tournament play, and both happened to come in the Bantam division. Cottage Grove’s Myles Colbert tallied a trio in the Wolfpack’s 6-2 win over Eden Prairie, and Gunnar Gilbert racked up three for Mahtomedi in Wednesday’s 8-1 win over Blaine.