Patrick Wyers clinches it for Tonka
Patrick Wyers scored in double overtime to lift Minnetonka to the state championship 3-2 over Moorhead Sunday at the St. Croix Rec Center in Stillwater.
A year ago, many had felt Minnetonka had a great chance to repeat as Bantam AA champs. They expected return some pretty big guns from their team that won in Duluth - a team that beat Edina for the first time ever in their careers. At the beginning of the season they picked up one of the top incoming PeeWees Bobby Brink who moved from Chaska.
Many of the projected suitors for the title were Blaine (Consolation Champs, State), Edina, Cloquet (third place) and Eden Prairie (sixth place, state). One team that went well under the Top 5 radar all season was Moorhead. Without a great finish to the season, they were a bubble team to make it to state. They bursted the bubble beating Roseau in Cloquet two weeks ago and then beating Rochester and Wayzata to punch a ticket to the state final.
Fitting that the state final would go to overtime. Both teams went to OT on Saturday. Tonka went to three and beat Cloquet and Moorhead needed four to finish off Wayzata.
The Spuds gave Minnetonka everything they could handle. Answering every punch thrown by the number one team in Minnesota and throwing a few of their own.
In the end, it was Wyers who was in the right place at the right time. Scoring his first goal of the state tournament on rebound to end it. After the game, Wyers was still in shock at what had just happened. Asked how he scored, Wyers said, "it was a rebound." Asked what was going through his mind after it went in he nervously said, "we won state."