For a second straight year, the Luverne Cardinals girls’ hockey team is heading to the Xcel Energy Center for the Class A State Tournament.
On Friday, March 19, the Cardinals punched their ticket to the state tournament by defeating Mankato East 7-2.
“To win a section championship on your home ice is pretty cool,” Luverne head coach Tony Sandbulte said. “It’s never been done before. It has to be a special feeling for those girls to leave this rink.”
It was a battle for the Cardinals just to get to the section championship. With the COVID-19 pandemic, it was unclear if there was going to be a winter sports season. If there was a winter sports season, it was unclear if there would be postseason play.
The Cardinals put their nose to the grindstone and took care of what they could control. That hard work resulted in the Cardinals finishing the regular season with a 14-4 record to earn the No. 1 seed in the section tournament.
“We knew coming into the season that everybody was going to be after us,” Sandbulte said. “Everybody was going to want to beat us because we were the team that went to state last year.”
He said the team did a good job staying on course.
“You get yourself to the point where you’re the No. 1 seed,” Sandbulte said. “You did everything right. We just stayed on it and finished through to the end.”
Mankato East scored the game’s first goal to take a 1-0 lead over the Cardinals.
Kamryn Van Batavia scored a power-play goal to even the score at 1-1. Reghan Bork and Shelby Kracht both recorded assists on the goal.
Mankato East scored the first goal of the second period to take a 2-1 lead.
Bork scored the equalizer four minutes later to tie the game at 2-2. Van Batavia and Brynn Thier both recorded assists on the goal.
With Mankato East on the power-play, Van Batavia scored a short-handed goal to put the Cardinals up 3-2. Following Van Batavia’s second goal of the game the Cardinals never looked back.
“We didn’t make a lot of adjustments,” Sandbulte said.
“We liked where our game was. Mankato East is a really good team. It was back and forth there. We just stayed with it. We were down 1-0. We were down 2-1. The girls kept fighting. We knew once we got the lead we weren’t going to look back.”
Van Batavia scored her third goal of the game to wrap up the scoring in the second period to give the Cardinals a 4-2 lead.
Peyton Behr scored the first goal of the third period to put Luverne up 5-2.
“That fifth goal, Peyton Behr buried it,” Sandbulte said. “That broke their back. We just went from there.”
Van Batavia scored the next two goals for the Cardinals to put the final touches on the section championship victory. The talented sophomore finished the game with five goals and one assist.
“We were really waiting for her to shine against a good opponent,” Sandbulte said about Van Batavia. “She showed it tonight. When she’s going, watch out.”
The Cardinals will open up the state tournament on Friday, March 26, at the Xcel Energy Center against Proctor/Hermantown.
Proctor/Hermantown finished the season with an 18-0 record. They won their section championship over Duluth Marshall 6-0.
The Cardinals advanced to the section championship by defeating Windom 11-0 on Wednesday, March 17 in Luverne.
The Cardinals scored six goals in the first period to squash any hopes that Windom may have had about pulling an upset.
Oye opened the scoring in the first period to put the Cardinals up 1-0.
Bork scored the next two goals to put the Cardinals up 3-0.
Van Batavia buried one to put the Cardinals up 4-0.
A goal from Gee put the Cardinals up 5-0.
Van Batavia scored her second goal of the period to put the Cardinals up 6-0.
Oye opened the scoring in the second period to put Luverne up 7-0.
Behr scored a goal to put the Cardinals up 8-0.
Van Batavia scored the next two goals to put Luverne up 10-0.
Oye scored her third goal of the game to put the Cardinals up 11-0.