RYLEE SOLHEIM & REESE SWANSON SCORE HAT TRICKS TO LEAD CROOKSTON TO AN 8-4 WIN

It took a while, but the Crookston Pirate Girl’s Hockey team pulled away in the second and third periods with six unanswered goals to defeat the Devils Lake, N.D. Firebirds in a girl’s hockey game played at the Crookston Sports Center.

Devils Lake came to Crookston with 12 players, two of them goalies and a 1-15 record, and when Rylee Solheim scored her first goal of the game on a quick shot from the lower slot to make it 1-0 just a minute and a half into the game, a lot of people thought the run was on for the red hot Pirates. Devils Lake never got the memo, particularly Siri Olson and Ashlyn Abramhamson. About two minutes after Solheim’s goal, Olson, on a power play from the boards to the left of Crookston goalie Jaycee Larson, fired a pass/shot that in the crease area, and Larson played it and if went off her stick into the net to tie the game at 1-1. Less than a minute later, Rylee Solheim scored again, keeping a Firebirds clearing pass in, and fired an almost same type of shot, but just a little farther out that beat Devils Lake goalie Mathea Nelson and Crookston regained the lead at 2-1. “This year is playing out like others for me,” said Rylee Solheim, “I seem to improve my goal production as the season goes on.” It didn’t take long for Abrahamson to tie the game, 34 seconds later, she blew by a young pair of Pirate defensemen and was in alone of Larson and sniped a shot that tied it 2-2 with just over five minutes to go in the first period. Abrahamson would give the Firebirds their first lead with just under three minutes to go, she was coming down the boards to the right of the Crookston goal and snapped a shot off that was a bullet that hit the crossbar to the right of Larson and down and in for one of the prettier shots you’ll see, and Devils Lakes was up 3-2. “It was a heck of a shot,” said Crookston head coach Emily Meyer, “I’m sure Jaycee would like that first goal back, but I’m not sure what any goalie could have done on that last goal, it was an amazing goal.” The two teams skated the rest of the period without any damage, and it was 3-2 in favor of Devils Lake. “I came into the locker room, and there was nothing, no noise, no music, nothing which is hardly ever the case in our locker room,” said Meyer, “Reese Swanson was talking about what it’s going to take for us to get goals for the next two periods and at the same time shut them down, which included putting quality shots on net and play defense in our zone and take the body. We had a few more penalties than we usually do, I think, but we have to play with a little bit more of a chip on our shoulder.”

The strategy was sound, but Abrahamson had nothing to do with it as she had taken a penalty early in the period. When she stepped out, defenseman, Julia McIvor, slid her a pass near the Crookston blue line. The center was in alone and beat Larson to a very narrow opening on her blocker side, and Devils Lake had its biggest lead at 4-2, three and a half minutes into the period. Crookston made a goalie change at this juncture, putting Kailee Magsam in. “It was a couple of things, first a confidence one where Jaycee wasn’t quite at the top of her game today, even though a couple of those shots nobody probably would have stopped,” said coach Meyer, “but also a wake up call to the rest of the team that we have to start playing Pirate hockey or we’re going to lose this game.” Crookston did start to play ‘Pirate Hockey’ as they dominated the offensive zone with a lot of passing but not much scoring. The Crookston power play was not a strong part of their game today, but they did score a couple of shorthanded goals, both by Swanson. Including a one-timer off a pass from Rylee Solheim just over seven minutes into the period, and Devils Lake’s lead was 4-3. Swanson would score again four minutes later when she did her coast-to-coast thing, swooped in on the Firebirds goalie, and beat her to tie it at 4-4. “When I played bantam, they called it the Swanson circle,” said the sophomore, who was playing both defense and wing today, and which does she prefer? “probably, forward as I can get into the play more and create some more offense,” said Swanson. Crookston would add another tally with a couple of minutes left as Brekken Tull tipped in a scrum in front of the Firebirds goal, and Crookston had regained the lead at 5-4. “We really stepped it up after that goalie change,” said Meyer, which was agreed with by Swanson, “I think the goalie change woke us up, made us realize that we weren’t playing our type of hockey, and we had to get going.” After the goalie change, Crookston outshot Devils Lake 11-1 the rest of the second period. “We got back to playing our game and wanted to keep it going into the third period,” said Meyer. With Swanson back at forward, she wanted the same, “we just want to keep our offensive momentum going and make sure that we are always aware where Olson and Abrahamson were on the ice.”

It took a while in the third, but Crookston did score three times in just over four minutes later in the period. Swanson registered the hat trick with another shorthanded goal that she took care of herself with a neat shot that beat Mathea Nelson, the Firebird goalie. With a minute and a half left, Rylee Solheim registered her hat trick on a pass from Swanson, and it was 7-4. Freshman Kaylie Clauson would close out the scoring with 23 seconds left on a nice shot after a nice pass from Morgan Nelson, and Crookston would walk away with an 8-4 win that wasn’t all it seemed. “We really underestimated them for sure,” said Coach Meyer, “myself included. They had some very good players that we didn’t realize. We didn’t have a lot of spark in the entire game and were lucky we could turn it around in the second and third period.” Crookston outshot Devils Lake 17-1 in the third period, and in the last 30 1/2 minutes, Crookston outshot the Firebirds 27-4!!

Crookston is now 14-7-1 on the season and has TWO games left of their regular schedule. They managed to pick up a game with Moorhead on Monday where they play at Cullen Rink in Moorhead, JV at 4:00 PM and Varsity at 6:00 PM. Crookston will finish the regular season on Tuesday night at home with East Grand Forks. It appears Crookston will be the number two seed in Section 8A behind Warroad, and if that’s so, Crookston would play until the Section semi-finals a week from today in East Grand Forks against either the Green Wave or Thief River Falls.
Devils Lake drops to 1-16 on the season.

1st Period
1:39 – Crox – Rylee Solheim (4) (Morgan Nelson, Brynley Coleman)
8:45 – DL –  Siri Olson  unassisted
4:42 – Crox – Rylee Solheim (5)  unassisted
5:14 – DL – Ashlyn Abrahamson  unassisted
14:10 – DL – Ashlyn Abrahamson  unassisted

2nd Period
3:24 – DL – Ashlyn Abrahamson (Julia McIvor)
7:18 – Crox – Reese Swanson (16) (Rylee Solheim)   (SH)
11:34 – Crox – Reese Swanson (17) unassisted
15:56 – Crox – Brekken Tull (11) (Aleah Bienek, Addie Fee)

3rd Period
12:57 – Crox –  Reese Swanson (18) unassisted    (SH)
15:34 – Crox – Rylee Solheim (6) (Reese Swanson)
16:37 – Crox – Kaylie Clauson (4) (Morgan Nelson)