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1990... Kelly Fairchild scored in overtime against Anoka to take Grand Rapids to the finals against Roseau.

First memory: The 1983 tourney on TV while my dad & I played hockey in the living room.
First game attended: 1984 championship game between Edina & Kennedy. Sat in the top row. I watch highlights of the game now, but don't remember much about the game because I was 6 at the time. I remember being fascinated by the kids making paper airplanes and throwing them a great distance.

Random memories over the years:
-1985: Scott Bloom's GWG in the title
-1987: the Kennedy & Greenway game (Jason Miller & Joe Decker vs. Ken Gernander & Kris Miller)
-1988: To me, the best overall tournament in terms of competitive games with all the 1 goal games, the overtimes, and the 2-1 2OT semi between Edina & Warroad.
-1989: How JM goalie Sam Pearson was a rockstar all weekend along and the let in an awful slapper from Chris Tucker in OT in the title game
-1990: The relentlessness of Roseau's attack
-1991: The last one-class championship
-1994: Joe Bianchi somehow making all tournament team with 0 goals & 2 assists over the tournament.
-1995: The Spehar & Matt Cullen show
-1996: Obviously AV-East, but how three of the top five going into sections didn't make it to St Paul (Hill-Murray, St. Paul Johnson & Minnetonka) and the underrated championship game between Apple Valley & Edina, which is often forgotten about due to what happened the night before
-1997: Edina winning the 3 OT classic over Hill-Murray and then an even more improbable 1-0 win over East a night later
-1999: Dan Welch's ridiculous goal against Blaine
-2000: Edina winning in 2 OT's over Hill-Murray
-2001: Elk River's ridiculous quality overall team, which I would put in the 8 team tournament for best state champion.
-2002: A private school final that nobody liked
-2007: Burnsville's crazy 3 goal comeback against Grand Rapids, only to come up just short in OT
-2008: Edina-Benilde semifinal, which I'd put in the top 5 of greatest tournament games ever.

Sorry, I really wanted to bring this back! I enjoy hearing these stories and it already (sadly and happily) time to think about the tournament.

i wish the season was a couple of months longer!!

What are your first memories?

1996, AV and East. Watched the game live and it was great. I happened to be staying at the same hotel as East, don't remeber what hotel. From 4 or 5 floors up you could see the entrance to the hotel and when East walked in they got a round of applause and there were people on every floor. It was pretty neat to see.

1999, Hastings vs Roseau. #1 and #2 ranked in the state for the entire season. Hastings had a hard fought battle with Elk River the night before and it must have taken a lot out of them because they came out flying for the first 10 minutes and the Rams took over after that. Got to see a close friend celebrate the championship, priceless.

Lots of memories that cannot be typed and am looking forward to many more.

First memories were the 1973 and 1974 tournaments. I distinctly remember a John Rothstein (Grand Rapids) goal, end-to-end by all five opponents and hitting the backhanded shot while falling down. Precious.

cheerleaders at the hotel....

1st memory (other than vague snippets of Mike Antonovich and the '67 & '68 Greenway teams) was seeing Southwest beat Edina 1-0 in OT in the '70 championship game.

Best memory: Spehar '95. Three games. Three hat tricks. First championship for East in 35 years. Nothing has come close.

Worst memory: Edina 1, East 0 in the '97 Class AA championship game. Although at the time, losing to Apple Valley in '96 stung more, nowadays I re-watch that game in awe of what happened that night. Even if it did take ten years before I could bear to watch it again.

Lee

Not sure what year it was but in the early 80's my father took me to the Civic Center and we were sitting by the Roseau Band. One of the members of the band gave me his baseball cap (roseau ram cap) and several of them spent time talking to me....I was only about 8 or 9 at the time. This was when Roseau and Warroad were Section 8 Kings in a one class system.
I also remember Minnetonka student section or sections standing up in unison yelling WE ARE THE SKIPPERS! and the arena would shake.
My favorite was when the entire arena would join in with the Warroad chant of to the theme of the Hams song. Great time's
Worst well its 7 times swallowing the bitter pill of 2nd place.... But like most I wouldnt trade it for anything!

Potatohead9 wrote:My favorite was when the entire arena would join in with the Warroad chant of to the theme of the Hams song. Great time's
Worst well its 7 times swallowing the bitter pill of 2nd place.... But like most I wouldnt trade it for anything!

"From the land of sky-blue waters...." Yeah, I loved that song. Still do.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o83xxWCel8g

My first live state tourney experience was in '99 at the Target Center.

AA
-The year that gave birth to Holy Angels.
-The Hastings/Blaine 7-6 barnburner. I was right behind the net for the game winner.
-Watching Paul Martin get shadowed the entire game against Hastings in a 3-2 2ot loss.
-Got to see a stacked Rams squad walk to another state title.

A
-Silver Bay at state?
-St. Thomas Awho?
-Fergus Falls shocking Red Wing
-East Grand Forks' miracle run ends.
-BSM and the Riddle's burst onto the scene in a big way.

First watched game with my dad on t.v. 1977 Roch J.m. [Scott and todd Lecey spell?] First tourn I went to 1983 Col. hieghts won the first game.

winning the dance contest at the st. paul hotel, and cheering for Roseau in the Edina sec., those cake eaters didn't know what to do!!

After being on the waiting list for season tickets to the Tournament for at least 5 years, my parents finally got theirs in 1972. Both of them have now passed away, but my fondest memories were going to some of the games when one of them volunteered to give up their ticket and give it to one of us 'kids' (especially me! ). They would usually keep all of the Thursday tickets because they loved the anticipation and the tremendous buzz in the arena on opening day. But it was real quality time going with either Mom or Dad on Friday or Saturday night, and over the years I got to see so many great battles.

However my most vivid memory by far came in 1974 when the whole extended family went to all of the games at the old Met Center to see my brother's Henry Sibley team make a pretty good run. After beating Hibbing 4-1 in the opening game, they were aligned to meet powerful Edina East in the semi. Edina was loaded even more so than usual that year, and coming into the tournament they were undefeated at 21-0 and were everyone's overwhelming pre-tournament favorite to win it. Their opening 9-0 slaughter of St. Paul Harding certainly did nothing to change anyone's mind. Even so, this was, by far, Sibley's most talented team ever, and came to the tournament with just one loss, at 20-1.

As we nervously looked on, somehow Sibley managed to take the early lead, then they scored a couple more, and amazingly were up 3-0 well into the 3rd period. With time running off the clock in the 3rd and the three goal lead, we were all feeling pretty good, but with Edina's talent and depth you just knew it wasn't over. Sure enough, starting at about the 11 minute mark, Sibley's fortunes began to unravel. They were getting noticeably worn down, and the more balanced Edina East team started to take control, and began coming in waves. Edina ended up scoring 5 straight in the final 11 minutes and won going away, 5-3. Even though it was a crushing defeat, especially after coming so close, only to lose it at the end, it was certainly a game none of us will ever forget.

Edina East easily went on to win the title the next night, by a 6-0 score over Bemidji. Overall they outscored their opposition 20-3 in the three games, so netting the only 3 against them was at least some consolation.

The first tournament I recall was in 1976, I was 9 and it was the first year my parents let me stay home on Thursday afternoon to watch the tournament on TV. I remember getting up that morning and being so excited, I read the whole tournament preview that the pioneer press put out and would talk my mom's ear off about all the stats I had read about players and teams. By the time the first game started at noon my stomach was in knots. I watched every second of every game and in between periods I would run down to the basement and shoot a tennis ball against the wall and then try to block it like a goalie, pretending I was in the state tournament. And then I would run back upstairs to watch the next periond.

The first tournament game I attended was in in 1983, my girlfriend and I went to the consolationa and Third place games because it was easy to get tickets for that. It was a blast, I couldnt believe I was actually their in person.

In 1986 I struck gold, my dad's boss had tournament season tickets and had seen enough and asked my dad if he was interested in them. So my dad asked me if I wanted them and of course I did. My best friend and I rented a hotel room even though we lived in the cities and went to St. Paul for the weekend. It was incredible, I had been to the consolation games but this was much bigger than that. I remember seeing BIG George Pelawa come onto the ice. It was a great tournament, some great goalies and players were in that tourney. It ended in dissapointment though when Burnville beat Hill for the second year in a row. I was a big Hill fan going back to when I first started watching the tourney. I saw every tournament game live from 1986 thru 1991 when the tickets were not offered up again. Every year we would rent a hotel room and party with the teams parents and following, the Warroad parents were the best!

I didnt go to another tournament game until 2001 when I received my own season tickets and have only missed a few in person since then because I like to give them to my son to bring a friend sometimes. I started the same tradition with my son in letting him stay home from school to watch the tourney. The best time of the year for me is when he and I go to the tournament together and watch the more great players and teams compete for that State Championship.

my first memory was section 206 and 216

I moved here from WI and went to see the state tourny final. I walked up to the box office and asked for tickets. When the woman at the ticket counter said they were sold out I simply could not believe it. I said, "the high school game is sold out???!!!". I had been to the WI state tourny twice and they sold about 6,000 seats, I just couldn't imagine the X completely full.

Anyway, I scalped some tickets. And saw an UNBELIEVABLE game.

It was Centennial's undefeated team vs one loss Moorhead. 1-0 game. Centennial goalie had a shutout in every game. Only time ever.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zl6MFmkU-EE

Unbelievable game

LASERBLUE135 wrote:I moved here from WI and went to see the state tourny final. I walked up to the box office and asked for tickets. When the woman at the ticket counter said they were sold out I simply could not believe it. I said, "the high school game is sold out???!!!". I had been to the WI state tourny twice and they sold about 6,000 seats, I just couldn't imagine the X completely full.

Anyway, I scalped some tickets. And saw an UNBELIEVABLE game.

It was Centennial's undefeated team vs one loss Moorhead. 1-0 game. Centennial goalie had a shutout in every game. Only time ever.

Centennial never had an undefeated team. They lost to Edina during that state championship season.

wbmd wrote: Centennial never had an undefeated team. They lost to Edina during that state championship season.

I stand corrected.

I have to add that the Burnsville comeback against GR was unbelievable. I thought the roof would blow off the X!!!!! And that was after half the fans had left! If I walked out on that game I would never forgive myself.

Burnsville versus Warroad in the 80's. Slight enrollment discrepency. Guess who I was pulling for ............ they lost.

Have to agree with East Hockey "seeing Southwest beat Edina 1-0 in OT in the '70 championship game" was special. As I recall Edina refused to play SW in their annual game at Braemar Arena because SW was in a "rebuilding year" and wouldn't give Edina a good game. Edina and SW, both teams undefeated, would finally meet in the finals.

Edina had the perfect opportunity to win the game in the final seconds as Krieger blew by a SW D like he was an orange cone and went in alone on Shelstad. Krieger didn't see Carlson breaking down the left wing for an easy pass and tap-in and opted to shoot. Shelstad stood tall and stoned Krieger. Score 0 - 0 going into OT and a high shot from the point going wide left hit a SW player in the chest and dropped behind Thayer for the win. The old Met Center was rocking after the city school won the State Championship, a feat that unfortunately will never happen again.

My dad used to watch the tournament on TV, we had a black & white set, looked like a pretty stupid game, back and forth, missed passes, etc., I thought it was booooring!

My first tournament game experience was taking the bus from Minneapolis to the Saint Paul Auditorium with my buddies to watch Edina get beat for the seventh straight time in the opening game, this time by South Saint Paul in and Southwest beating Roseau in the other game. The excitement, the atmosphere, it can't be beat! I was hooked!

wingsrule wrote:Have to agree with East Hockey "seeing Southwest beat Edina 1-0 in OT in the '70 championship game" was special. As I recall Edina refused to play SW in their annual game at Braemar Arena because SW was in a "rebuilding year" and wouldn't give Edina a good game. Edina and SW, both teams undefeated, would finally meet in the finals.

Edina had the perfect opportunity to win the game in the final seconds as Krieger blew by a SW D like he was an orange cone and went in alone on Shelstad. Krieger didn't see Carlson breaking down the left wing for an easy pass and tap-in and opted to shoot. Shelstad stood tall and stoned Krieger. Score 0 - 0 going into OT and a high shot from the point going wide left hit a SW player in the chest and dropped behind Thayer for the win. The old Met Center was rocking after the city school won the State Championship, a feat that unfortunately will never happen again.

I heard the story was Edina had won their first chmapionship the year before, and their only loss was to Southwest. So the next year they didn't want a tarnished record and wouldn't play SW, not dreaming they would meet as two unbeaten teams in the championship!

My first experience with the tournament was when I was in first grade. Watching Johnny Pohl lead Red Wing to complete its perfect season by beating Breck 6-5 in OT, Fergus Falls 4-1, and finally avenging the previous years embarrassing loss to Warroad winning 4-3. I have been to every tournament since then. It's about this time of year when you can feel it in the air and the butterflies start to come back. I'm counting down the days until March 10th!!!

2nd grade
Chicken Pox
State Tourney Week