SWANSON’S HAT TRICK LEADS PIRATE GIRLS HOCKEY TO A WIN OVER DETROIT LAKES

Crookston freshman, Reese Swanson, scored the first three goals of the game to lead the Pirate girl’s hockey team to a 4-2 win over visiting Detroit Lakes at the Crookston Sports Center.

FIRST PERIOD
Crookston came out flying in the game, taking advantage of their speed and ability to roll three lines out one after another using quality 45-second shifts for the most part. Crookston got on the board first with the first of Swanson’s goals as she took a crisp Addie Fee pass from the near boards right on Swanson’s stick in the high slot area, and she one-timed it past the Lakers goalie, Leah Honer, to give Crookston the 1-0 lead. “I was in their zone, and Addie put a perfect pass on my stick, and I was able to one-time it,” said Swanson, “It’s great playing with Addie and Aleah (Bienek) as we all seem to know where the other is on the ice. It makes it fun.” Crookston head coach always says that the best defense is a great offense, and that proved out the rest of the period even though the Pirates didn’t add any more tallies in the period. “We held them to two shots on goal in the period,” said Moe, “I really liked the way we played in the period, and we kept rolling the lines through, and they all had opportunities.” Detroit Lakes would take the only penalty of the period with 43 seconds left in the period, which would benefit Crookston to start the second period.

SECOND PERIOD
With the man advantage to start the period, Crookston did score on a power play when Aleah Bienek put a shot on the Lakers goalie, and Swanson, standing at the right side of the goal, was able to backhand it past Honer to give Crookston a 2-0 lead just 53 seconds into the second stanza. ”  The third Swanson goal of the game came just after Detroit Lakes regained full strength after another penalty. Mckenzie Epema kept a Laker clearing pass in the Laker zone to Fee, who put it toward the net, and Swanson was able to jam the puck past for a 3-0 lead and the hat trick for the freshman, who was a defenseman to start the season and moved upfront to get some more goal production, which looks like a great coaching move. “We’ve to watch Reese coming up through the system,” said coach Moe, “she’s played a lot of hockey, and whether she’s on defense or playing up front, she is dynamic as you saw tonight.” It appeared Crookston was going to take a 3-0 lead into the locker room, but Detroit Lakes had other ideas! Madi Olson skated deep into the Crookston zone with under 10 seconds left. She was near the goal line, 13 feet to the left of the Crookston goal, and just sent a bad-angle shot that found its way past Pirate goalie Kailee Magsam to make it a 3-1 game with 4.5 seconds to go in the period. “Kailee would like to have that one back,” said Moe, “she just misplayed it, and she is a sponge. She’ll learn from this. When I walked into the locker room, she said, I know what I did, and it won’t happen again.”

THIRD PERIOD
If Detroit Lakes was going to have a little extra hop in their step to start the third period because of the late second-period goal, that was taken care of by Catherine Tiedemann as she was standing to the right side of the Laker goal when the puck came to her and Tiedemann tapped it in to give the Pirates a 4-1 lead with just under 14 minutes to go in the game. “It’s good to see Cat starting to get some goals for us,” said Moe. “She’s picking them up in big games and big plays!”
After the goal, Crookston, who didn’t have a penalty in the game, took four in a row. “We played two very good periods and then settled into taking penalties and completely throwing off our rhythm,” said Moe, “especially since we were going to give some of the girls that don’t get a lot of ice time some more time in the period, but we really couldn’t do that with all the penalties, which hurt us.” It was on the fourth penalty that Detroit Lakes scored a power-play goal when Haley Stattelman lifted a shot from the blue line, and Crookston goalie, Magsam was screened until the last second, but it was already past her, and Detroit Lakes cut Crookston’s lead to 4-2 with just under three minutes to go. A minute and a half later, the Lakers used their time out, pulled their goalie with a minute to go, but had no luck penetrating the Crookston zone, and the Pirates rode out a 4-2 win. “It was a great win for us and a great week,” said Swanson, “we just want to continue to play well and keep this going. I really like this team, and its a great group.”
It was Crookston’s third win in a row, improving to 4-4 on the season. The Pirates will have two newly added games next week when they host the Grand Forks Knightriders on Tuesday and then travel to the Ralph in Thief River Falls to play the Prowlers in a Section 8A game. “They will be very competitive games,” said Moe, “that is what we want. We want them competitive, not blow out games. We played pretty good hockey this week and want to carry it on to next week and the rest of the season.”

Detroit Lakes’ four-game winning streak was halted as they fall to 4-2, and they will host East Grand Forks on Tuesday night.
JV –  Crookston won 13-0

1st Period
11:01 – Crox – Reese Swanson (3) (Addie Fee)

2nd Period
16:07 – Crox – Reese Swanson (4) (Aleah Bienek)
4:15 – Crox – Reese Swanson (5) (Addie Fee, MacKenzie Epema)   (PP)
0:04 – DL – Madi Olson (Haley Staltelman)

3rd Period
13:55 – Crox – Catherine Tiedemann (2) (Nora Peterson)
2:56 – DL – Haley Staltelman (Emma Coley)     (PP)