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CL 4, North St. Paul 1

Senior forward Aaron Slagle scored two goals against his former team and senior forward Scott Liebsch had three assists as the Wildcats played their most solid all-around game this year. CL beat North St. Paul 4-1 Saturday, December 9 at Polar Arena.

The Wildcats dominated the first period, and finally got on the board at the 15:33 mark. On a breakout play, senior forward Luke Angrimson made a backhand pass from the red line to Liebsch near the Polar blue line. Liebsch raced down the right side deep into the zone and fired a pass into the crease. Slagle crashed the net and one-timed Liebsch’s pass by the Polar goalie to put the Wildcats up 1-0.

While killing a penalty midway through the second period, senior defenseman Jake Parenteau got the puck deep in his own zone and threaded a pass to senior forward Bob LeVasseur breaking toward the Polar blue line. LeVasseur caught the pass in stride and broke free toward the Polar net. He fired over the goalie’s shoulder and just under the crossbar to give the Wildcats a 2-0 lead. It was LeVasseur’s fourth goal of the season, surpassing his total from last season.

North St. Paul got back in the game with an unassisted goal just 30 seconds into the third period. But, at the 6:45 mark junior forward Tyler Willis scored his first goal of the season, assisted by Liebsch, to extend the Wildcat lead to two goals.

The Wildcats added an insurance goal just over two minutes later. LeVasseur carried the puck into the Polar zone down the right side three-on-one. He passed the puck to Liebsch, who redirected it to Slagle on the doorstep. Slagle put the puck in the net to put the Wildcats up by 3, making the final score Chisago Lakes 4, North. St. Paul 1.

Wildcat senior goalie Tom Fitzer stopped 27 of 28 shots in the victory.

“I thought Aaron handled himself well,” said Wildcat head coach Corey McKinnon. “Sometimes when kids come into a situation like this one they tend to try to do too much. We told Aaron to play his game and play hard and that’s exactly what he did. In fact, Luke, Aaron and Scott were playing well together and making good things happen. It was nice to have Scott back – he really skated hard for the team.”

SCORING SUMMARY

1 2 3 T

Chisago Lakes 1 1 2 4

North St. Paul 0 0 1 1

First Period

CL 1 Aaron Slagle (Liebsch, Angrimson) 15:33

Second Period

CL 2 LeVasseur (Parenteau) (sh) 7:36

Third Period

NS 1 Hinz (unassisted) 0:30; CL 3 Willis (Liebsch) 6:45; CL 4 Aaron Slagle (LeVasseur, Liebsch) 8:57

Saves: CL Fitzer 27, NS Horner 34

Totino Grace 4, CL 0

The Wildcat boys’ hockey team (2-6 overall, 0-2 conference) came out on the short end against a tough opponent Saturday, December 23. The ninth-ranked Totino-Grace Eagles shut Chisago Lakes out 4-0 at Parade Ice Garden in Minneapolis.

Tony McDonald figured in all four Eagle goals, with two goals and two assists for the afternoon. The Eagles, a conference and section opponent of the Wildcats, got on the board just over a minute into the game, then added two more goals to take a 3-0 lead after one period.

The Eagles, who outshot the Wildcats 46-28 for the game, added a power play goal just over a minute into the second period to make the score 4-0. The Wildcats had several decent scoring chances in the game, but some great saves and a couple of pipes prevented them from getting on the board, leaving the final score at Totino Grace 4, Chisago Lakes 0.

“Our kids didn’t give up, even after we got behind early,” said Wildcat head coach Corey McKinnon. “I thought the teams played fairly evenly as the game wore on. Both goalies played well. Tommy Fitzer made some great saves for us and their goalie made some great saves, too. All of our kids played hard and none of them played poorly. But we need to do something to shake things up a little bit, because you can’t keep hitting the same nail with the same hammer and expect the results to change. Any changes we make will be done with the goal of playing to our strengths and correcting our weaknesses.”

SCORING SUMMARY

Chisago Lakes 0 0 0 0

Totino Grace 3 1 0 4

First Period

TG 1 Borer (T. McDonald) 1:11; TG 2 T. McDonald (Craft, N. McDonald) 7:59; TG 3 T. McDonald (unassisted) 12:15

Second Period

TG 4 Borer (Egan, T. McDonald)

Third Period

No scoring

Saves: CL Fitzer 42, TG Drakulic 28

The Wildcats are playing in the Lake Area Holiday Hockey Tournament December 27-29, with varsity games being played at Chisago Lakes Arena. The Wildcats were scheduled to play one game on Wednesday, one today and one on Friday. There will be plenty of high school hockey action starting at 1 p.m. and going late into the evening each day. If you’d like to know the time of the Wildcats’ game Thursday or Friday, please call Chuck Fitzer at 612-419-8006.

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