This Monday morning in the Edina Peewee A invitation, seven teams started out with hopes of making the semifinal games of the championship round to be played Monday evening.

Oklahoma Oil Kings and the Edina A team played in the first key game.  The Edina A team struck quickly scoring two goals in the first four minutes of the game to take a 2-0 lead, but a combination of a stubborn Oil King team and penalties keep the Hornets at bay.  The Oil Kings kept the game close before losing 5-3.

It was a surprising result.

The Edina victory knocked the Oil Kings out of the tourney.  In the next door rink, the Arapahoe Warriors gave up a quick goal to Hopkins in a pool game that Hopkins had to win.  The Warriors came back to score four goals in the first period to take a 4-1.  Arapahoe went on to win 8-2 and claim the Pool C crown.  The win eliminated Hopkins and Chaska.  Chaska beat Waconia 6-3 in their final Pool C game but needed a Hopkins win to have a chance to advance.

After two Monday morning games, there were four teams left standing.  The only thing that needed to be decided is who would play who.  Mound West/Tonka settled that beating Mounds View 5-3 to win Pool B.

The championship semifinals Monday evening matched Edina (#1 seed) and Mounds View (Wild Card).  The second semifinal matched Pool C and Pool B winners, Mound West/Tonka and Arapahoe.

In other Monday morning games, Elk River beat Osseo/Maple Grove 4-3 and Spring Lake Park beat Minnetonka 2-1.

The Monday evening semifinals opened with Mound West/Tonka and Arapahoe. Mound West/Tonka and Arapahoe put on a quite a show.  Both teams played to win.

The Whitehawks scored early in the first period to take a 1-0 lead and then dominated the Warriors for the next three minutes.

Then an Arapahoe player broke out of the Warrior zone beating the Whitehawk defense and attacked the goalie.  The Whitehawk goalie made the save and the Warrior drew a penalty crashing into the goalie for goalie interference.

A minute later Mound West/Tonka scored a power play goal off a second rebound from the left side to put the Whitehawks up 2-0.

After that a series of Arapahoe penalties kept them on the penalty kill.  Still the Warriors managed to score a goal to cut the Whitehawk lead to 2-1 as the first period ended.  Mound West/Tonka outshot the Warriors 21-5 in the first period.

The Whitehawks didn’t dominate the game in the second period as they had in the first.  They scored two minutes into the period to take a 3-1 lead.  Arapahoe came back to tie the game with six minutes left in the period.  They scored two goal in thirty seconds.  The Warriors’ Timothy DeBord soloed the length of the ice to score the tying goal.

Penalties continued to plague the Warriors in the second period.  A penalty with 5 minutes to go in the period resulted in a Whitehawk power play goal.  Mound West/Tonka’s Torsten Lee did a wraparound and stuffed the puck between the Arapahoe goalie’s skates to put Mound West/Tonka ahead 4-3.

Both teams played great hockey in the third period, moved the puck well.  Both teams had their chances, but neither could score.  With a little less than 2 minutes left in the period, Arapahoe drew another penalty.  It took the Whitehawks 10 seconds to score the power play goal and take a 5-3 lead.

Arapahoe put DeBord and Zach Purcell out on the ice for the following faceoff.  It took them a minute to score to cut the Whitehawk lead to 5-4.  Thirty seconds later, the pair almost tied it with a neat passing combination, but failed.

Mound West/Tonka won 5-4.  The Whitehawks outshot the Warriors 43-22 for the game.

Last year, these two teams played a December game at Pond Arena in Mound.  It was a good game.  There may not be many of the kids from that game that played in this game, but the two teams really improved.

In the Braemar rink next door Edina A beat Mounds View AA 9-2.  The Hornets continue their domination of the peewee A tourney.  They have won four games by a combined score of 37-7 and are the strong favorite to beat Mound West/Tonka for the title tomorrow.  Arapahoe had a great tourney and will play a surprising and tough Mounds View team for the third place trophy.
And then there were two…..Edina and Mound West/Tonka.