MOORHEAD — A year ago, Roseau ended Moorhead’s season with a 3-1 victory in the section semifinals. Taylor Brueske and the Spuds, on their home ice, were not about to let that happen again.
Brueske scored the first and last goal of the game for the Spuds in a 5-4 win over Roseau on Tuesday in the Section 8AA girls hockey semifinals.
“It’s insane. We worked so hard for this all season and in the offseason and this is the best position we could possibly be in,” Brueske said. “It feels so great.”
The top-seeded Spuds will play No. 3 seed Brainerd-Little Falls in the section final at 7:30 p.m. Friday in Alexandria. Moorhead enters the section championship matchup on a seven-game win streak.
“It feels great,” Spuds head coach Ryan Kraft said. “All the words that you can think of to describe a big win like that. To beat Roseau in a section tournament is a huge step for our program.”
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Prior to this season, Moorhead hadn’t beaten Roseau since a 3-2 overtime win in the section quarterfinals on Feb. 9, 2013, which was also the last season Moorhead reached the section championship. The Rams had won 18 consecutive matchups between the programs until the Spuds broke the string with a 4-1 victory on Dec. 14, this season’s first meeting.
Moorhead knocked off fourth-seeded Roseau with strong special teams play after the Spuds saw their 3-goal lead erased. The Spuds scored on two of three power plays and killed all six penalties they received in the contest, including a 5-on-3 late in the third period.
Moorhead’s freshman goalie Taylor Kressin tallied 31 saves. Roseau’s sophomore goalie Jada Pelowski had 32 stops for the Rams, who finished their season at 15-10-2.
Moorhead pounced on Roseau early, putting three shots on net in the first 90 seconds. The Spuds got off to a fast start and generated several scoring chances, including a shorthanded opportunity.
Brueske found the back of the net at the 12:37 mark of the first period. The sophomore forward buried a rebound off an Ella Holm shot to give Moorhead a 1-0 lead that would stick until the second period.
Roseau came out flying to start the second period. The Rams peppered Kressin from the opening faceoff, who stopped a slew of dangerous shots. While Roseau owned the opening minutes of the frame, the first goal of the period belonged to Moorhead.
Freshman forward Olivia Kortan slipped the puck into the net less than four minutes in off a feed from Addie Salvevold. Kortan beat a defender and deked Pelowski with a crafty move to give Moorhead a 2-0 lead.
The Spuds pushed the margin to three seven minutes later after Anika Stromme fired a shot from the right circle that went straight into the back of the net on the power play.
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Roseau trimmed the deficit with two late-second period goals. Senior forward Memphis Mertens scored both goals for the Rams in the 90-second span that cut Moorhead’s lead to 3-2.
“We knew that we still had a lot of game left to play and we didn't get too down on ourselves," Brueske said. "We kept the energy high on the bench and in the locker room, and I honestly think that's what took us to the win at the end.”
The teams traded goals in the third period. Mertens completed her hat trick and tied it up at 3-all 2:37 into the frame with a snipe from the corner. The Spuds responded less than a minute later when Bria Holm banged home a rebound. Roseau evened it up again with a goal from Jasmine Hovda, an eighth-grader.
“Short-term memory,” Kraft said of Roseau’s comeback. “Just leave it in the past. Keep moving forward. That’s what I kept reiterating to the girls. And they kept fighting and scratching and clawing their way basically to a victory tonight.”
Brueske scored the tiebreaking and game-winning goal on the power play. She flicked a backhanded rebound shot into the net from the right circle at the 7:49 mark.
“All I was thinking is I need to get this puck on net right now,” Brueske said. “It was just a little backhand flip and it went in.”
With a narrow 5-4 lead, the Spuds had to kill a 5-on-3 after two players went to the box with 4:11 and 3:54 remaining.
“That was our 15th 5-on-3 that we’ve had to kill off this year,” Kraft said. “So we’re pretty comfortable in that situation, unfortunately. I threw the girls out there at the moment that I thought could get the job done, and they certainly did.”
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FIRST PERIOD: 1, M, Brueske (E Holm), 12:37.
SECOND PERIOD: 2, M, Kortan (Salvevold, Stromme), 3:45. 3, M, Stromme (Kosobud, Spaeth), 10:45 pp. 4, R, Mertens (Remick), 15:12. 5, R, Mertens (Hovda), 16:31.
THIRD PERIOD: 6, R, Mertens (Johnson), 2: 37. 7, M, B Holm (Brueske, E Holm), 3:30. 8, R, Hovda (Erickson), 6:13. 9, M, Brueske (B Holm, E Holm), 7:49 pp.
SAVES: M, Kressin 6-12-13—31. R, Pelowski 9-16-7—32.
