In Class AA Sectionals, only Sections 2AA, 7AA, and 8AA are easy to forecast.  The #1 ranked Eden Prairie is favored to get the Section 2AA #1 seed (Edina is struggling); Elk River in Section 7AA is the overwhelming favorite for the #1 pick; and Roseau is the strong favorite for Section 8AA’s #1 seed.

The Elks have a lock on Section 7AA’s #1 seed.  Five of their seven Section 5AA foes have records under .500 (Grand Rapids and Forest Lake are above .500).   Section 8AA is all Roseau with Buffalo, River Lakes, St. Cloud, and Sartell/Sauk Rapids trying to catch the Rams.  Seeding in 8AA will be Monday February 2nd with the first game played Thursday and the quarterfinal games played Saturday.  In Section 8AA, only the championship game is played at a TBD neutral site.  All other games are played at the high seed.  With the home advantage at stake, the seeding for #2 becomes important.  Buffalo should win their last three games.  The Bison beat North Wright County last week and appear to have a lock on #2, but watch out if the Bison lose their last game to St. Cloud.  Sartell/Sauk Rapids is making a move.

The Easy Seed 

The top ranked Eden Prairie team plays in Section 2AA.  There is no nightmare here, but one can’t ignore a sectional where an Edina team is not a candidate to be seeded #1.  The Hornets still will be the Eagles’ closest challenger and the two teams play each this Saturday at Eden Prairie.  A win by Edina is not likely to change the seeding.  Though the Hornets remain a tough team, Edina is still last in the Lake Conference. Eden Prairie gets the #1 seed and a first round bye.  The Hornets will likely play #3 seeded Chaska/Chanhassen.  The Storm Hawks will draw an improving #6 seeded Holy Angels team for their sectional opener.  Hawks or Angels, the Hornets face a dangerous team on their side of the bracket and will have to play three sectional games.  Eden Prairie gets an opening round bye playing most likely #4 seeded Jefferson in the semifinals before playing the Hornets.  As they say in tennis, advantage Eden Prairie.

A small nightmare with potential

Section 3AA has become a small nightmare; sort of like a hurricane that everybody knows that it will hit the coast, but where?  Hastings remains on a path to get the #1 seed, but Eagan is threatening.  The problem the Wildcats have in catching the Raiders (who will have a better Section 3AA record than Eagan and have beaten Eagan this season), is that Hastings is favored to win their last three games.  In Section 4AA Cretin/Derham Hall is positioned to overtake Hill/Murray and get the #1 seed in Section 4AA.  The Raiders are favored in their last four games and should end with a Section 4AA record of 7-0-0 providing they beat White Bear Lake this Thursday.  Hill/Murray is struggling through playing nine season ending games in two plus weeks.

Class AA nightmares

Section 6AA has Maple Grove and Minnetonka and three other tough teams in the seven team sectional tourney.  It is a potential seeding nightmare if both Maple Grove and Minnetonka want to become Alphonse and Gaston each wanting the other to take the #1 spot.  The #2 seed will likely play #3 seeded Wayzata.  Both teams have done well beating Wayzata.  The top seed in Section 6AA is likely to play either Benilde-St. Margaret’s or Hopkins in their semifinal game and both teams have struggled this year against Benilde-St. Margaret’s or Hopkins.  The Skippers have beaten Hopkins (and have one more game with the Royals).  They will not play Benilde this season.  The Red Knights are an unknown to Minnetonka.  Maple Grove tied Benilde earlier in the season and will face Hopkins in a regular season game next week.  As a result both teams may be saying “you first” over the next 10 days.  Note that in this section the #1 seed’s quarterfinal bye offers little advantage this year.  With the section having five tough teams.  Section 6AA is just a tough sectional to win and getting the right seed for any of the five top teams teams can mean a trip to the Xcel.

The Lakevilles appear to have clear sailing in Section 1AA.  With 10 days to go, the seedings are a nightmare with all sorts of points for the top teams to argue.  Lakeville South beat Eastview 7-2 Tuesday to win the South Suburban Conference, Lakeville North took second place.  Dodge County, a team that plays an independent schedule, still has an outside shot at getting the #1 seed but need big wins against top teams before the season ends.  Dodge’s seeding problems started with a loss to Rochester John Marshall/Lourdes last week and a tie with Holy Family Catholic.  Rochester John Marshall/Lourdes appeared to be a fourth team in the Section 1AA mix.  Then Marshall lost to Chaska/Chanhassen.  With Lakeville South playing Blake and Lakeville North playing Benilde-St. Margaret’s before the two teams play each other in the last game of the season, things will have to sort themselves out.  Dodge County still remains an outsider playing Centennial, Breck, and Eden Prairie in the last 10 days of their season.  With Centennial making a late season run in Section 5AA, Breck challenging in Section 5A, and Eden Prairie still a top girls hockey in the state, Dodge County still has a shot at #1.

Centennial has strung a five game winning streak together and moved not only to the top of Section 5AA, but is also moving away from Blaine and Mounds View.  The Cougars can solidify their #1 seed chances with a win at Dodge County Thursday.  But a loss to Dodge Thursday and the Cougars fall back into a seeding debate that will include Blaine , Mounds View, Irondale, Spring Lake Park, Champlin Park, and Coon Rapids.  All eight teams are above .500 and have similar section records today.  That similarity could be even closer at seeding time in 10 days.  However, a Centennial win Saturday over Blake could make them the #1 seed even if they lost at Dodge.  The Cougars finish their season against Elk River and Champlin Park.

This Week’s Rankings

1-Eden Prairie (Overall 19-0-3; Section 2AA 5-0-0)-The Eagles beat Jefferson 7-3, Hopkins 4-2, and Wayzata 1-0 last week.  Jefferson is only the second Eden Prairie opponent to score three goals this season.  No opponent has scored four or more goals.  The Eagles defense has held their opponents to 411 shots on goal in their 22 games.  Offensively, they are led by senior forward Charly Dahlquist (29 points/8 goals) and senior forward Angie Heppelmann (29 points/14 goals).  Ninth grade goalie Alexa Dobchuk (13-0-3) has been the mainstay in the Eden Prairie nets.  The Eagles have two Lake Conference games left on their schedule.  They play both those games this week hosting Edina and traveling to Pagel to play Minnetonka.  The Eagles need to win only one game to take the Lake Conference title this year.  The Eagles are basically playing to go unbeaten this season.

2-Thief River Falls (Overall 16-1-3; Section 8A 7-0-0)-To the victors go the spoils.  Some may think that an unkind thought, but it is a competitive world.  The Prowlers won last week (beat Crookston 9-0).  Blake and Maple Grove lost.  That means the last week #4 team jumps to #2.  The Prowlers single loss was to Minnetonka 4-0 in their second game of the season.  They tied Eden Prairie 1-1 a month later.  The Prowlers deserve #2 this week, but will need to work hard this coming week playing three tough games.  The Prowlers will make a trip this weekend to St. Cloud to play two Class AA teams, the St. Cloud Icebreakers and Sartell/Sauk Rapids Storm ‘N’ Sabres Friday and Saturday.  They will be favored in both games, but the Prowlers best beware playing the Storm ‘N’ Sabres Saturday.  Sartell/Sauk Rapids has a 14-3-3 record and are on a 5-game winning streak.  Thief River Falls returns to host East Grand Forks Tuesday night for their third game this week.  The Prowlers are favored to win all three games and are still headed for a 21-1-3 season record, the #1 Section 8A seed and a trip to the Xcel.       

3-Blake (Overall 19-2-0; Section 5A 4-1-0)-It is tough to beat a good team three times in a season.  Blake lost round two to Breck 5-4 last week.  To put the loss in perspective, Breck’s five goals exceeded the four goals scored by Blake’s previous six opponents.  So what happened?  Breck scored the winner with 92 seconds left in the game (Grace Zumwinkle from Gabby Billing).  The Blake defense is young.  They normally skate six defense (one senior, one junior, one sophomore, one ninth grader, and two eighth graders).  The senior missed Tuesday’s game.

4-Maple Grove (Overall 20-1-1; Section 6AA 4-1-1)-Maple Grove, despite losing their first game of the season last week, won their 20th regular season game.  The Crimson are the first team in the state to hit the 20 game mark.  Offensively, Maple Grove has been led by sophomore forward Taylor Wente (36 points/21 goals), junior forward Lauren Kaufaman (33 points/11 goals), and freshman Katie Denecke (28 points/8 goals).  Goalies Breanna Blesi (10-1-1) and Coco Francis (10-0-0) have split the Crimson’s goal tending duties.  After losing to Minnetonka 3-1 last week, the Crimson came back to beat Hill-Murray 3-2 in overtime and beat North Metro 9-0.  Senior forward Abby Larson scored the game winner against the Pioneers with less than a minute left in the game.  Maple Grove should win their last three regular season games.  This week, Maple Grove plays one game.  The Crimson will travel to Armstrong for a Northwest Suburban game.  In the last week of the season, Maple Grove plays Hopkins and Blaine.  Maple Grove is the first team to win 20 games this season.

5-Hill Murray (Overall 15-5-0; Section 4AA 3-0-0)-The Hill has been playing a gauntlet of games in the last weeks of the season playing nine games (40% of their regular season games) in the last two weeks of the season.  As noted here last week, stuck in the middle of those games, were tough games against top ranked teams that would challenge the Hill.  That happened last week with the overtime loss to Maple Grove.  This week is no different.  The Pioneers have three games to play, North St. Paul, at Wayzata, and Mahtomedi.  They are favored to beat the Polars and the Zephyrs, but Wayzata is primed to beat the Hill. 

6-Breck (Overall 15-5-1; Section 5A 4-1-0)-Blake had just scored to take a 2-1 lead halfway through the second period when Breck broke the game open scoring three goals in the last six minutes of play to take a 4-2 lead into the third period.  When Blake came back to tie the game early in the third period 2-2, Grace Zumwinkle and Gabby Billing combined to score the game winner with under two minutes left in the game.  Both Breck and Blake teams are noted for their tough defense, each holding their opponents to 1.5 goals a game.  The previous game played between the two teams ended in a 3-2 Blake win.  The nine goals scored indicate a shift to offense by Breck and that makes for a great Section 5AA championship game.

7-Minnetonka (Overall 17-5-0; Section 6AA 4-1-0)-In the Skippers last three games, they have beaten Edina 2-1, Maple Grove 3-1, and Wayzata 2-0.  Yet they are ranked #7 here.  Minnetonka should be ranked higher?  The Skippers have the potential to be the best team in the state and celebrating a Saturday evening championship win.  Here, every time they had the opportunity to move up, they lost.  Minnetonka will finish their season against Hopkins, Eden Prairie, and Blaine.  Their game next Tuesday against Eden Prairie at Pagel will be a great game.  If the Skippers want to be on the Xcel ice five Saturdays from now, they will need to show they can score on Eden Prairie Thursday.

8-Lakeville South (Overall 17-3-1; Section 1AA 2-0-0)-The Cougars beat Prior Lake 4-1 and Eastview 7-2 last week to clinch the South Suburban Title.  Lakeville North, despite willing their last nine games, will finish second in the South Suburban.  The Panthers are chasing South for the Section 1AA #1 seed.  The #1 seed this year will likely not play Dodge County currently #3 in the race for the top spot in Section 1AA.  Both teams have their hands full Thursday night.  In arenas two miles apart in St. Louis Park, North plays Benilde-St. Margaret’s and South plays Blake.  Both teams will be underdogs while #3 Dodge is a slight favorite hosting Centennial.  Lakeville South will play Shakopee and Farmington in two other games this week.  The Cougars should win those games and set up a year ending battle with Lakeville North.     

9-Roseau (Overall 16-3-2; Section 8AA 6-0-0)-The Rams beat Moorhead 5-3 last week but it was not an impressive win.  The Spuds scored on three of their fourteen shots on goal.  Friday, Roseau heads to St. Cloud for two games.  Friday the Rams play Sartell/Sauk Rapids at Sartell’s Bernick arena; Saturday the Rams play St. Cloud at the MAC.  Still Roseau rolls along and is favored to win both St. Cloud games.  But they better watch out against Sartell.  The Storm ‘N’ Sabres can overtake Buffalo with a win and may overtake Roseau with a weekend sweep if they can be the #4 ranked Thief River Falls Saturday afternoon. 

10-Dodge County (Overall 16-4-1; 2-2-0)-Last week, Dodge County was looking good.  They were favored to beat Rochester/John Marshall and St. Paul United on home ice at the Kasson Arena and beat Holy Family Catholic at Victoria.  The three wins would put the Wildcats in a position to overtake Lakeville North and South by beating either Breck or Eden Prairie in their final regular season games.  They lost to Rochester Marshall 1-0 in an evenly played hard fought game where Marshall took a first period lead and held it.  The Wildcats tied Holy Family Catholic 2-2 and beat St. Paul United 5-2.  This week, they host Centennial Thursday night and play at Owatonna is a Section 1AA game.  They need to win.  A loss will likely have  Dodge playing both Lakeville teams to get to the Xcel. 

Teams to Watch: Red Wing, Edina, Lakeville North, St. Paul United (15-6-1), Chaska/Chanhassen, Hastings, Cretin-Derham Hall, Centennial, Proctor/Hermantown (19-3-0), Wayzata, Elk River, Princeton/Big Lake/Becker