Building Towards the Future

Here's the 1st installment of the season recaps. Some people have offered to write a season recap on each team in our program and we thank them tremendously! We'll start with Peewees and finish with our Greenwave Varsity team. A lot of great accomplishments look to pave the way for future success for our Greenwave! Here's the article on the Peewee B American Legion squad.

2009-10 EGF Youth Hockey Recap

The Pee Wee B Legion had a remarkable season. UND students Billy Brewitz and Mark Schafer, both from Rosemount, MN, with a little help from Tony Weber and Chip Shea, knitted together a team made up of players that had skated Pee Wee B, Squirt A, and Squirt B hockey the previous season. The 2008-09 Pee Wee Legion team had a tough year and 2009-10 found Pee Wee Legion again the second of two B teams so expectations were not real high for this club, finishing around .500 would be considered hugely successful…so most thought! Final record was 28-6-0, averaged 4 goals a game to 1.74 for the opponents which translated to 136 to 59 scoring edge for Pee Wee Legion.

The season started with three games on the road, which they swept! That brought them to the EGF Pee Wee B tournament where they beat Grand Forks, Minot, and Bismarck sending the undefeated Pee Wee Legion team to the championship against the defending Winnipeg City Champs, the Assiniboine Park Rangers. The Rangers won the game 3-1 with an empty net goal, but Pee Wee Legion proudly claimed 2nd place and with their 6-1-0 record, having already surpassed most expectations by the first weekend in December. They played 6 more games in December and won all of them including a sweep over the two Bemidji teams, a win against Red Lake Falls, and a tough game up in Roseau.

January started out great with two wins, one against the Fargo Angels in EGF and another later that day up in Thief River Falls. The next weekend they dropped their first district game in the rematch in Red Lake Falls. The rest of the month saw Legion lose two more district games to East Grand Forks American Federal Bank and Bemidji Blue as well as a game to Grand Forks and were 18-5-0 heading into the Roseau Pee Wee B Tournament. In Roseau the boys cruised through pool play beating Grand Forks, International Falls, and Roseau, again putting them in the championship game, this time against Mesabi East who had made short work of their pool including an 8-4 win over East Grand Forks Pee Wee American Federal Bank. This was the most brilliant piece of coaching and player execution that most Eastsider's have seen in how the defensive corps completely shut down the scoring ace for Mesabi and kept every threat outside. The forwards played as a well oiled machine with excellent passing and threw everything at the net. The hero was the EGF netminder who stood on his head, totally frustrating the Mesabi East squad. After 45 minutes of nail biting, stomach churning suspense, Pee Wee Legion slammed the door on Mesabi and took the 4-0 win and the tournament championship! With this win, the February 4, 2010 edition of Let’s Play Hockey Magazine named Pee Wee B American Legion the Sports World USA Youth Team of the week! Really, really? WOW!

After Roseau, there were just two weekends and 4 games left in the season, and the boys swept those games. Legion finished district play at 10-4-0 in a tie for 2nd with Red Lake Falls, trailing only EGF American Federal Bank who finished district play undefeated at 14-0-0. RLF won the tie breaker and Legion got the #3 seed in the tournament matched up against the Roseau team they had beaten three times during the season. Roseau scored early in the first and Legion matched it in the second. Nobody scored in the third and this one went to overtime! Roseau pretty much owned the overtime and a couple minutes in won a battle in the corner, threw the puck in front of the net which pin balled around and into the net for the overtime winner. Legion worked their way up the consolation side of the bracket beating Thief River Falls and Bemidji Blue to claim the Consolation Championship.

Team members include: Connor Shea, Garrett Thoreson, Ben Olson, J.D. Rodriguez, Davis Beauchamp, Josh Blazek, Jarod Reak, Cole Weber, Clarke Peterson, Cody Wolff, Tyler Lindstrom, Cody Stengl, Cody Barta, Ben Gottberg
Coaches: Billy Brewitz and Mark Schafer