Both Park Cottage Grove (PCG) and Minnetonka gained the Finals with great teamwork and unselfish play.  Things were no different in Monday's final. Both teams traded goals in the first two periods, knotting the score at 1 after two periods. Midway through the third, Camden Forys scored off of an odd deflection in fron to give the Wolfpack a 2-1 lead. With a little over a minute left in the game, Minnetonka got a whstle in the PCG zone. Having already used their one allotted timeout, the Skipper's coaching staff pulle their goalie and was trying to coach their players on how play with the extra attacker. While doing so, the referees got impatient.  Usually this is a cause for the ref to drop the puck. Meanwhile, the PCG players were just watching and (politely) waiting for the Skippers to line up.  What they didn't realize was Minnetonka's Nathan Andruscavage was ready to take the draw as his teammate frantically skated toward the faceoff circle near the PCG net. As dropped the puck, Andruscavage slapped at it and the puck flew through the air hit a PCG defenseman and found it's way into net to tie it. The overtime was about as exciting as a youth hockey game can get. Bodies were flying everywhere. At one time there were four players laying on the ice, two for each team, aftet each had laid out to make a play. After no one scored in the extra session, and now on the fourth shooter, Cade Conzemius scored for Tonka in the top half of the shootout inning. In the bottom half Noah Diebler stopped the PCG forward to seal the victory for a team that was near shipwrecked ten minutes earlier.

Goalie: Noah Diebel, Minnetonka

Skater: Griffin Kranz, Rosemount

Skater: Tyler Johnson, Bloomington Jefferson

Skater: Alexander Ivey, Eden Prairie

Skater: Lucas Chilton, Park Cottage Grove

Skater: Cade Conzemius, Minnetonka

Tournament MVP:  Garrett Gillespie, Minnetonka

Prior Lake and Edina Gray both won memorable semifinal games early Monday. Edina beat District 6 foe and T10 Eden Prairie 3-2. The Lakers knocked off the Cyclones from Illinois 4-1 in a very physical and emotional game.  In the Final, Prior Lake scored on the first shift of the game when Matt Coyle found the 5 Hole of Edina Goalie Finn Dexheimer for a 1-0 lead for the Lakers. Then, Billy the Kid, Billy Kozlak put on a show for the Hornets. He went on to score al four Edina goals lift the Gray to the title with a nice hard fough tourney win for the Gray.

Goalie: Finn Dexheimer, Edina

Skater: Alexander Drobek, Cyclones

Skater: Wil Schumacher, Prior Lake

Skater: Patrick McGarvey, Edina

Skater: Micah Hutchings, Chaska/Chan

Tournament MVP: Billy Kozlak, Edina

Arguably the two best Squirt teams in Minnesota are White Bear Lake and Osseo Maple Grove. In an unsanctioned Fall 3v3 tournament at Velocity, WBL beat OMG by a goal. Rosters from both teams looked very similar (but smaller) to what YHH saw Monday. That game fortold a lot about what to expect this season. After the top two, there would be a drop off (editors note: there are now a few teams that will give these two a good game). Monday's Final was not a good game, it was a great game. Both rosters filled with top players by birth year: Roed, Sweeney, Kukkonen, Thomas and Faber at the '02 level, too many to count and name at the '03 level and Jack Sweeney at the '04 level. This was about as good of a Squirt hockey matchup you will find in the past 5 years in Minnesota. 

Both teams played great team defense, not allowing a lot of free time with the puck in high percentage scoring errors. The first goal came halfway through the scoreless game when a WBL defender caught an edge and unlikely hero Ryan Reid picked up the loose puck and drove to the net and score past Anton Castro. As the second period wound down, Brock Faber got loose in the slot on and tried fire a shot past Castro. With a fully loaded gun, Faber shot a blank and the puck wobbled on the ice toward Castro, as he went to make the save the puck hit something in front and deflected just enough to get past Castro to make it 2-0 in favor of OMG. 

In the third period, OMG got a little too aggressive drawing four consecutive penalties, once thirty seconds apart to give WBL a two man advantage. The Bears could not convert. With less than two minutes to go, Lleyton Roed got wide on a defenseman for OMG who played the Roed to perfection without getting called for a bodycheck. In doing so, Roed, a player with a great motor charged hard at Jack Wieneke and was able to muscle the puck past him for a goal. Immediately following the goal, coach Mike Smith called a timeout to regroup the Bears. After another string of action in front of OMG's net, Lleyton Roed knocked over an OMG player and got called for Body Checking.

Justin Janicke got a loose puck with under a minute left and just like he did versus Rosemount last year in the '13 Squirtacular he buried it into the empty net to salt away a victory for the Crimson. 

Congratulations to both teams and coaching staffs on a hard fought tournament and Championship game.  Both teams showcased great talent and passion each shift they played Monday.

Goalie: Anton Castro, White Bear Lake

Skater: Jack Smith, St. Cloud

Skater: Chaz Lucius, White Bear Lake

Skater: Cruz Lucius, White Bear Lake

Skater: Charlie Lindberg, Edina

Skater: Kyle Kukkonen, OMG

Tournament MVP:  Justin Janicke, OMG