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Peewee A West Regional Summary

By frederick61, 02/18/13, 2:00PM CST

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Mound/Westonka’s John Simon is sprawled on the ice as his shot slides by Mpls Storm netminder Oliver Evenson in the Whitehawks 5-2 loss Sunday

The Peewee A West Regional Tourney, played this year at the St. Louis Park Ice Arena, will consist of two peewee A teams from District 15, three from District 10 and three from District 3.

The number of seeds for each district in  the West Regional and what regional tourney the district was seeded to was determined four years ago by a Minnesota Committee.  At that time the best peewee player in the state was sitting in a second grade classroom in an elementary school and it could be guaranteed by anyone in the state, that the committee did not know what classroom.

Twenty five peewee A teams started playoffs last week.  Fourteen teams are left.  At sunset on next Sunday, eight will be left.  Two will be Detroit Lakes and Alexandria.

District 15 completed their playoffs in Park Rapids last Sunday.  Detroit Lakes beat Fergus Falls 4-2 in the championship game.  The Lakers take the D15′s #1 seed to the West.  Alexandria beat the Otters 4-3 in the game for D15’s #2 seed.

Fergus Falls became the first regular season district champions to “bite the dust”, something that happens often in peewee hockey.  The Otters came into the tourney with a 13-1 record.  They lost their last regular season game to Detroit Lakes 3-2 a week ago.

At the District 10 playoffs in Princeton, upsets were also in the making.  Spring Lake Park, the #1 seed in D10’s peewee A playoffs and the regular season champs, breezed through the tourney’s first two games to assure the Panthers of either D10’s #1 or #2 seed to the West Regional.  They beat Blaine A 7-1 and Chisago Lakes 6-0.

In the lower bracket, Centennial A easily beat Elk River A 6-0 in the opening round game and squeaked out a tough win over Coon Rapids A 4-3 to make it to the Championship game.  D10 Peewee A #1 and #2 seeds will either be Spring Lake Park or Centennial A.

NCBD A came back from their 4-3 overtime loss to Chisago Lakes to beat Blaine A  4-0 in the loser bracket and end the Bengals season.  Andover A, after losing to Coon Rapids in their first game 5-2, beat Elk River A 3-0 in the other loser bracket game.  The Elks go home.

 NCBD A and Coon Rapids A play Saturday at Princeton.  Andover and Chisago Lakes play in the second game.  Both games are loser go home games.  The winners play for the D10′s #3 seed.  The Championship game and the third place games are played Sunday, usually at Anoka.  So check your schedules if you are going.

A previous post discussed D3 Saturday games.  Sunday D3 had a full slate of four games played in Hopkins at the Pavilion Arena.

The opening semifinal Sunday game was a good one.  Orono beat St. Louis Park 1-0 on a last minute goal to move on to the championship game.  St. Louis Park dropped to the loser bracket.

Minneapolis Storm played a solid second game in their semifinal.  The Storm forwards played high in the first period and waited for the Whitehawks to try the breakout pass or carry the puck out of their zone.  It forced the Hawks’ defensemen to fire a more vertical pass when they tried to pass from deep in their zone.

St. Louis Park would pick the passes off and turn to attack the Whitehawk goal.

The Storm beat the Hawks 5-2.  Minneapolis plays Orono in the Championship game Friday evening at the Pavilion.  The Storm will be in the West Regional.  The Championship game will decide who gets the #1 or #2 seed.

Wayzata A beat Hopkins A 3-2 in the first game of the loser bracket.  The NOW ranked #19 Trojans have improved since the start of the season and their opening tourney play at Spring Lake Park in early November.  But Wayzata A will have a tough time beating the #7 ranked Mound/Westonka A in Wednesday’s first game.  It is a loser go home game between two good teams.

Crow River beat OMG A Sunday, 5-0.  The Tigers play #12 ranked St. Louis Park in the second loser goes home game Wednesday night.  Crow River has been a rugged workmanlike team this year.  The Orioles will be in a tough game.

For those looking ahead, the opening round of the Peewee A West Regional is fairly set.  In the quarterfinal game played Friday noon at St. Louis Park, Detroit Lakes (D15 #1) will play D10#3.  The second game of the upper bracket matches Spring Lake Park or Centennial A (D10 #1) against Orono or the Minneapolis Storm (D3 #2).  The lower bracket opening game matches Orono or the Minneapolis Storm (D3 #1) against D15’s #2 seed Alexandria.  The second lower bracket game matches D10 #2 (Spring Lake Park or Centennial A) against D3’s #3 seed.

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