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Chisago Lakes 5, River Lakes 1

Lauren Schmidt notched her second hat trick of the season to lead the Wildcat girls’ hockey team to a 5-1 win over the River Lakes Stars Tuesday, January 28 at Chisago Lakes Arena.  The Wildcats jumped out to an early lead, scoring three goals in a two-minute stretch in the first period, and never looked back.  The Wildcats outshot the Stars 30-27 for the game.  Wildcat goalie Evi Reedy came up big in this one, stopping 26 of the 27 shots she faced.

Allie Smothers scored at 6:11 of the first period, assisted by Aven Lyckholm and Brynn Secor, to give the Wildcats a 1-0 lead.  Just 21 seconds later, Nora DeVries scored, with the assist going to Secor, to double the Wildcat lead to 2-0.  And Schmidt got the first goal of her hat trick at 8:11, assisted by Lexi Smothers and Nora DeVries, to make it 3-0  Schmidt added a second goal with two minutes to go in the first period to bump the score up to 4-0, with Lexi Smothers and DeVries again getting the assists.  The Stars put on some pressure in the second period, but Reedy and the Wildcat defense stood tall, shutting down River Lakes despite being outshot 10-5 for the period.  Schmidt completed her hat trick at 5:41 of the third period, this time assisted by Kali Hanson and Joee Westland, to make it 5-0.  The Stars scored with just over three minutes left in the game to spoil what would have been Reedy’s third shutout of the season.  And this was likely the cleanest game of the season for both teams, as there was jut one minor penalty assessed for the game.

Pine City 4, Chisago Lakes 1

Rhiannon Ashworth, the third-leading scorer in the state, scored twice and had an assist to lead the Pine City Dragons to a 4-1 win over the Wildcats last Thursday, January 30 at Pine City Civic Center.  Allie Smothers scored the only goal for the Wildcats with three minutes left in the second period, assisted by Camryn Hinsch.  The Dragons outshot the Wildcats 29-20 for the game.

Chisago Lakes 2, Hutchinson 1

Sophomore Lexi Smothers scored with 16 seconds left in the game to give the Wildcats a 2-1 win over the Hutchinson Tigers in the Wildcats’ final regular season game last Saturday, February 1 at Burich Arena in Hutchinson.  The Tigers scored in the first period to take a 1-0 lead.  The score stayed that way until the third period, when senior captain Lauren Schmidt sniped a top shelf goal on a power play to tie the game at 1-1.  Junior Allie Smothers and seventh-grader Aven Lyckholm got the assists.  And then, with time running out, Lexi Smothers took the puck out of traffic in the corner and fired a wrist shot past the Hutchinson goalie to give the Wildcats an exciting 2-1 win as they head into the playoffs.

Playoff Preview

The fifth-seeded Wildcats are matched up against the fourth-seeded Minneapolis Novas in the quarterfinals of the Section 4A playoffs.  The teams will clash Saturday at the Parade Ice Garden in Minneapolis.  The game will get underway at 7 p.m.

The Wildcats (9-15-1) and the Novas (9-16-0) had virtually identical records this season.  The Wildcats, due to their tougher schedule, are ranked 22nd in the final QRF rankings, ahead of the Novas, who are ranked 25th.  But, as most sections do, Section 4A uses section coach voting to seed teams for the playoffs instead of the QRF rankings.  While the QRF rankings aren’t perfect, they are generally pretty good when it comes to seeding teams.  Unfortunately, there is often bias when coaches vote. There is no way to know if there was any bias in the seeding process for Section 4A.  But the result is that the Novas get home ice advantage out of it.

For the Wildcats to win their quarterfinal game, they will need their leading scorers – seniors Lauren Schmidt and Nora DeVries, and sophomore Lexi Smothers – to provide scoring and leadership.  Even more importantly, senior goalie Evi Reedy needs to play her best hockey of the season to give the Wildcats a chance to advance to the semifinals.

Whichever team wins the game, they will – unfortunately – have to face the top-seeded Holy Angels Stars in the semifinals at Richfield Ice Arena on Tuesday, February 11  at 7 p.m.  Holy Angels is ranked fourth in the state, and it would be a major upset for either Chisago Lakes or Minneapolis to beat the Stars.

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