Pines goes toe-to-toe with the defending champ Hatchets

It was a game you didn’t want to miss as the Northland Pines varsity boys hockey team traveled down to Tomahawk Tuesday night to face the D2 defending state champions at Sara Park Arena. 

It was a heavyweight battle as both teams stood toe-to-toe with each other in a 6-5 win for Tomahawk. 

Pines and Tomahawk were battling for first place in the Great Northern and to remain undefeated early in the season, as both teams sat at 2-0 in the conference and 4-0 overall. The visiting Eagles came out skating hard and got ahead early with two first-period goals. Nick Hahn found the back of the net on a one-timer near the left circle to make it a 1-0 game 39 seconds into the contest. Senior Josh Graves made it a 2-0 game nearly 10 minutes later on a scramble in front of the net to give Pines the 2-0 advantage. Jonah Dickens eventually got Tomahawk on the board with four minutes left in the first, which was the score at the intermission. Tomahawk held a 12-8 shot advantage after the first period. Pines came out in the second and scored first, but momentum swung quickly towards the home Hatchets as the middle period progressed. Graves gave Northland Pines a 3-1 lead with 11:02 left in the second after the two teams took turns with shots on net. 

Pines junior Evrett Leslie stood strong in the net, which included a breakaway save on a shot from Dickens before Graves’ second goal. 

Tomahawk scored its second goal of the night with just under five minutes left in the second after Leslie came out of the net to play a puck and Pines coughed it up, which led to a wide-open net. That was one of the three goals the Hatchets scored in a 4:50 span to take a 4-3 lead into the second intermission. Tomahawk got into a groove and outshot the Eagles 16-4 in the middle frame. 

An early goal from Tomahawk in the third made it 5-3, before Sam Shrock and Cooper Saari tied things up with consecutive power-play goals at 8:19 and 11:49 of the third as the two sides continued to throw counter punches. Dickens scored the eventual game-winner on the man-advantage at 15:15 of the period as the Hatchets secured the 6-5 victory in a thriller. Leslie finished the night for the Eagles by saving 35 of 41 shots faced. 

The Eagles (4-1, 2-1) move on to face Somerset and Rice Lake at home this Friday and Saturday, Dec. 12-13, at 7 and 3 p.m., respectively.