At the Bantam AA regionals, only White Bear Lake (#3 seed from D2) made the state tourney.  The Bears beat St. Cloud 4-3, Rochester 1-0, and Minnetonka 2-1.  STMA beat the Skippers (D6’s #4 seed) 7-4 for the #2 seed from the South.  No allocated teams made the state at the peewee AA regionals.  That means no super tourneys this year at the state.  There will be a lot of blowouts. 

If you believe that you don’t understand youth hockey. 

Prior Lake/Savage and Osseo/Maple Grove Bantam AA teams have a number of first year bantams that played peewee A hockey last year.  Both associations peewee A teams played in the state tourney held in Alexandria last March.  Prior Lake led by Kevin Fellows won the title; OMG led by Sam Huff won the consolation title.  This year, the kids return to a state tourney as bantams.  They will play in the bantam AA tourney held at Braemar Arena in Edina March 15-17.  If Prior Lake and OMG can win their opening game, the two teams will play each other for a berth in the championship game.

Two great teams this year played each other twice at the peewee A East Regional.  Edina beat Sibley 5-4 in a close game on Friday and 5-1 on Sunday.  Sunday, both teams were so gassed in the game for the #2 seed that it was startling to see the puck sitting on the ice at times.  It was not hockey.  In the third period both teams stopped skating in their defensive zone at times.  The Hornets won by gritting it out with bursts of attacks.

It is a shame that the kids who put all the effort all season long to not have a better opportunity to win in that game for the #2 seed.  At the regionals on Sunday, the kids put so much energy into trying to win the first game that a second high stakes game four hours later does not reflect the better team.  There should be at least a longer rest break.

When Sibley’s Nicholas Castro, half way through the final game against Edina, put a move on the Edina defense and broke free at the top of the face off circle he found no Hornets between him and the net.  He was shocked.  He made a weak side pass to no one.  There was not a single Hornet or Warrior on that side of the ice.  A minute later, Castro came back with the same move and broke open again with no Hornet around only this time he charged the net and buried the puck for the Warriors only score.

It turns out that no team had enough silver bullets to stop Park-Cottage Grove at the East Regional Peewee A tourney.  The lowly ranked Wolfpack beat NOW ranked #1 Edina A 2-1 in the championship game to take the #1 seed to the state.  The Wolfpack’s goalie Luke Maul stopped 32 of 33 Edina shots in their 2-1 win.  Only Peter Engelking scored on Maul.  It was an unassisted goal.  Engelking had a great East Regional.  Sam Geiser scored the game winner for Park-Cottage Grove late in the third period.

The Wolfpack were mistakenly announced as the “Wolfmen” at Wakota before one of their games and Park-Cottage Grove has played like Wolfmen since, unbeatable.  They open with Luverne, the #2 seed from the South, in the first game on Friday at Faribault.

Tartan is the high school on the Northeast side of St. Paul.  The school district covers parts of Oakdale, North St. Paul, Lake Elmo and Maplewood which includes 3M’s headquarters (the name 3M came from Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company).  The company was started in Two Harbors, Mn in 1902 as a mining company and moved to Duluth to manufacture sandpaper and moved to St. Paul in 1910.  They have had their corporate headquarters in Maplewood for a number of years.  Their first Scotch product was produced in 1925, masking tape, and with it the Tartan used as part of its packaging.

For the Tartan peewee A’s on the ice at East Regional, they concluded a successful season.  At Wakota this past weekend they beat Apple Valley 3-2 in the opening game, lost to Edina 6-0, came back to beat Shakopee 8-5 before losing to Sibley 7-1.  The Tartans ended their season ranked #12 by NOW out of 76 peewee A teams. 

D3, D5, and D6 each have six entries to the four state tourneys.  Six of the 10 D3 teams playing in the regionals won West seeds to the four state tourneys (BAA, BA, PWAA, and PWA).  Only Detroit Lake (bantam A #2 seed) and Centennial (peewee AA #1 seed) were the non-D3 teams to win.  D15’s Detroit Lakes had to beat D3’s Hopkins 6-2 for the #2 seed and D10’s Centennial had to beat D3’s Wayzata 4-3 for the #1 seed.

District 5 matched D3 with 6 of their 10 teams entered in the regionals making state tourneys.  They dominated the South Regionals.  Only D2’s White Bear Lake Bantam AA’s and D4’s Luverne Peewee A’s won seeds, D5 won the rest.

Technically, Luverne could be considered an adopted D5 team since they played in the joint D4/D5 league and district playoffs this year.  The Cardinals must have felt pressure in the last game of the South Regional on their home ice at Blue Mound arena.  The Luverne fans can get vocal, but their team came through with a 7-2 win over Rochester Black. 

District 6 sort of matched D3 and D5, but D6 had more teams entered in more regionals than either D3 or D5.  They had six regional winners; but D6 had 14 teams entered in six regionals.  Edina has a team in all four state tourneys.  The two largest districts in the state, D8 and D10 managed only one state entry.  To make it worst, both D8 and D10 had 16 teams each entered in six regional tourneys.  D8’s only state tourney entry is Park-Cottage Grove peewee A’s, D10’s only entry is Centennial peewee AA’s.  D15 also has only one entry, Detroit Lakes bantam A’s.  D15 had only 8 teams playing in the four West Regionals.

Three years ago, D5 and D3 were reshuffled.  Essentially, D3 went west and brought in Crow River and Mound/Westonka associations and Minneapolis from the East.  They went from a shrinking 5 team peewee/bantam league to a robust 9 team league.  Like D5, the peewee/bantam teams played 16-18 regular season games and like D5, this year they have 9 teams entered in the six state tourneys.

The same year D3 changed, the St. Cloud association moved from D10 to D5 along with some other D10 associations.  Since then St. Cloud AA/A teams have played a full D5 regular season schedule and the St. Cloud, Sartell, and Sauk Rapids area has become a focal point for youth hockey especially in January.

This year, D5/D4 combined and it resulted in 12-18 league game scheduled for all the bantam and peewee teams.  Including the state peewee B and bantam B state tourneys, D5 has 9 teams from 5 different associations entered.  Throw in Luverne as part of the D4/D5, and D5 has 10 teams from 6 associations entered.

Contrast that with D6 and D9 this year.  D6 has eight teams in the state tourneys, five are from Edina.  And if D6 listens to the parents of teams playing Edina’s well-schooled squirt and mite teams, they will understand that the parents are tired of going to games to watch their kids loose 12-0 games.  That will become more and more of a D6 problem in the future years.

District 9 has no entries in the four state tourneys.  Three years ago, unlike St. Cloud with D5, the Rochester Association opted to not play D9 regular season with their A level teams.  D9 teams like Northfield and Owatonna seemed to do well in regular season, but this years regional playoffs are a disappointment.  YHH hopes it is not a trend.