SARTELL-ST. STEPHEN USES TWO THIRD PERIOD GOALS TO BEAT CROOKSTON BOYS HOCKEY

The Sartell-St. Stephen Sabre’s used their depth and outstanding goaltending to steal a 3-1 victory over the Crookston Pirate Boys Hockey team in an entertaining game played at the Crookston Sports Center. 

FIRST PERIOD –
Sartell started the game by putting a lot of pressure on the Pirate defense and goalie Noah Dragseth. Noah came up with six saves in the first half of the period, and the Pirates were back on their heels a bit to start the game while being outshot 6-1. The momentum took a 180 in favor of Crookston when Sartell took a five minute major for contact to the head.  “We killed off the first penalty of the game,” said Crookston head coach Josh Hardy. “We were having some good chances but couldn’t get the puck to the next, but we get the five minute major and hopefully would have some better chances now.”
Crookston started the power play with a flurry, but they turned it over, and Sartell had a breakaway. As the Sabre player was breaking into the Crookston zone all-alone and instead of shooting the puck, he waited for a teammate to catch up and slid the puck over to him. The pass didn’t work as the play was to slow to develop, and Dragseth was ready to knock the puck away, and the game was still scoreless.  “I thought the first half of the major power play wasn’t that great for us,” said Hardy. “Sometimes in those majors, you sit back and say we have a lot of time and I didn’t think we were aggressive enough or inpatient enough.”
Over the next three minutes, Crookston dominated and had a handful of shots on goal, but the Sabre goalie made save after save.  Less than four minutes into the major penalty, Crookston was putting more pressure on, and the Sabre’s were called for a cross-checking penalty, giving the Pirates a 5-on-3 for 68 seconds. “We wanted to get the puck down deeper on the five on three,” said coach Hardy. Crookston didn’t waste any time with the two-man advantage as Ben Andringa found Joey Doda open by the net. Joey would circle around the Sartell zone looking for an open teammate or open shot and he found his brother Jack Doda wide open on the other side of the net, and he slapped the puck in to give Crookston a 1-0 lead with 3:22 left in the opening period. “We say if you don’t have the puck in those situations you get open and that is what Jack did,” said Hardy. After going on the major power play, Crookston would have the next 10 shots on goal in the game and ended up outshooting the Sabres 14-10 in the period. Neither team scored the rest of the period, and the Pirates took a 1-0 lead into the first intermission. 

SECOND PERIOD –
Sartell-St. Stephen came out strong in the second period and outshot Crookston 12 to 3 in the first nine minutes. The 13th shot was the charm as Sartell-St. Stephen’s Will Schiffler scored a goal with seven minutes left in the period to tie the game 1-1. There was some discussion after the goal. “They were trying to get the puck out of the goal for a kid that got his first assist I think,” said Hardy. “I called the ref’s over about Noah getting pushed in the net after the whistle, but I just wanted to try and stop their momentum a bit as they were jacked up after they had scored.”
Crookston picked up their play in the final seven minutes of the period and had some quality scoring chances, but Sartell’s sophomore goalie, Quentin Sigurdson made some big saves including two point blanks shots from Jack Doda and Kaleb Thingelstad, “Yeah, I’m not sure where they ended up,” said Hardy. “The goalie got some of the puck, but we’ll have to look at the tape and see how.” The two teams went into the second intermission tied at 1-1. “I told our team that I was excited to see what we will do in the third period, either way, it’s going to be a good experience to build off for another 17 minutes of play,” said Hardy.

THIRD PERIOD –
Sartell started the third period as they began to the previous two as they came out strong and were buzzing all over the ice. Just over two minutes into the period, Sartell’s Tory Lund put a shot on goal and Crookston goalie, Noah Dragseth made the save but was down and out a bit which left a wide-open net for Hayden Walters who rifled the puck into the back of the net for a 2-1 lead with 14:55 left in the game. ” You could feel that one coming,” said Coach Hardy. “We were twisted up with our numbers and lines and I was telling them if we don’t do something here we are going to give one up and right away they bang one in.”
Just over seven minutes later, Sartell-St. Stephen added an insurance goal when William Yu was able to send the puck in deep and Tory Lund who had gotten deep into Crookston’s zone earlier, came walking out from behind the Crookston net and tapped the puck by a surprised Dragseth to make it 3-1 with just over seven minutes to go in the game. “They are a good team that capitalized on their opportunities while we didn’t on our’s,” said Hardy.  Sartell-St. Stephen didn’t allow Crookston to get many quality scoring chances the rest of the way and held on for a 3-1 victory. “We told our players to remember how this feels, we have a chance to come right back in a quick turnaround with Little Falls at NOON tomorrow,” said Hardy, “Little Falls will come in with a nice team, they were young last year and come in with a nice 2-2 tie at Thief River Falls today, so it should be another good test for us.”

Crookston drops to 0-2 on the year and will host Little Falls at Noon on Saturday varsity and JV at 10:00 AM.   Sartell improves to 1-1 on the year and was headed back home after tonight’s game as they postponed their game at Warroad Saturday because of the impending weather.
J.V. – Sartell-St. Stephen won 6-0

1st Period
3:22 – Crookston – Jack Doda (1)  (Joey Doda, Ben Andringa)  (PP)

2nd Period
7:00 – Sartell – Will Schiffler (Parker Comstock, Ryan Zulkosky)

3rd Period
14:55 – Sartell – Hayden Walters (Tory Lund)
7:47 – Sartell – Tory Lund (William Yu)