Eagles win two in three-game road trip

The Northland Pines boys hockey team proved to play tough as it won two of three road games last week with wins against Stevens Point Pacelli and Waupaca.
Pines took a loss at Waupun last Saturday in a 5-3 game.
The Eagles opened with a Tuesday game at Pacelli and had to battle to carve out a 4-3 overtime win that ended with Michael Schmidt netting the game-winner.
Pines co-captains Josh Graves, who scored the Eagles’ first goal, and Morgan DePuydt, left the game in the first period with injuries.
Their teammates picked up the slack and much more, firing an amazing 67 shots on goal. Evrett Leslie stopped 39 of 42 Pacelli shots for Pines.

“Evrett played great for us in the net,” stated Eagles’ coach Zach Otto. “We put enough pucks on the net to win; now we have to work on finding the back of the net a few more times.”
Each side tallied two goals in the first period before skating to a scoreless second.
Pines freshman Cooper Saari scored his second of the night early in the third before Pacelli forced the overtime period with a tally at 12:43.
From there, Schmidt found the puck on his stick during a powerplay and finished the game off.
After a few days off, the team went into Great Northern Conference (GNC) action Friday at Waupaca.
Pines wrapped up a 4-2 victory when Schmidt scored an empty net goal with three seconds left, assisted by goalie Evrett Leslie who also stopped 35 of 37 Waupaca shots on goal.
Waupaca scored at 2:19 of the first period for a quick 1-0 lead, but an unassisted goal by Julian Merschdorf at 4:08 sent the game to the second period tied at one.
Pines got the lead back at 4:55 of period two as Sam Shrock scored an unassisted shorthanded goal. Waupaca tied the game seven minutes later.
The third period was a tough defensive battle before Nicholas Hahn set up Merschdorf at the 10:32 mark with the eventual game-winner before the empty net goal sealed the deal.
“Great to go on the road and get a big conference win at Waupaca with some players out,” noted Otto. “We had some boys step up and play a larger role, and four different players scored.”
The Eagles went looking for a sweep of their three-game road trip Saturday when they visited Waupun, which was off to a 0-2 start in the traditionally powerful Badgerland Conference.
Freshman Jazek Jantzen scored from Hahn and Saari late in the first period to give the Eagle a 1-0 lead, but Waupun would go on to win 5-3.
Pines held the 1-0 until Waupun finally got on the board at 8:33 of the third period. Sam Shrock put the Eagles back on top 2-1 at the 9:18 mark.
Waupun then lit the lamp three times in just over three minutes for a 4-2 lead.
Pines got one more goal from Hunter Tameling, but Waupun sealed the game with an empty net goal.
“Another game where we needed some kids to step in and log quite a few minutes on the ice. It’s been great to see our team’s competition level, no
matter who we decide to put out there,” said Otto.
Northland Pines is 4-3 overall and 1-1 in the GNC. The Eagles were scheduled to play Tuesday at Marshfield before hosting GNC rival Lakeland on Thursday, Dec. 19, in Eagle River. The Lakeland game is scheduled for a 7 p.m. puck drop.