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School is still in session, which is a good thing, because school is still out – as they say – on the Minnesota Twins. They seem intent on playing as poorly as any team above sandlot ball can possibly play for several games, then suddenly come around and play impressively enough to win some games and look, well...competent. Then, without so much as a “just kidding,” they revert back to the bumbling, surround-it-but-don’t-catch-it gang that gets blown off the field.
The Timberwolves, meanwhile, have just finished what might be called a fraudulent season. They repeatedly have been accused of trying to lose, or at least trying to not win, so they could finish low enough in the NBA standings to have a chance at the top draft pick. Yet they have resisted any temptation to address the accusations or to come up with any rational excuse for such horrendous play. Acquiring Kevin Garnett to play a game or two and then sit out the rest of the season was an insult to the intelligence of any basketball fan.
We hockey fans, of course, can laugh off the ineptitude of the Timberwolves or even the Twins, because we are enjoying the amazing thrill-ride of the Minnesota Wild as it battles the high-skilled St. Louis Blues in the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
There have been disappointments around the NHL. It seems that Ottawa deserved better than to spend most of a decisive game against Montreal in the penalty box, and both the Senators and the Winnipeg Jets were oh-so-close to competitive runs before falling behind three games to none against Montreal and Anaheim, two of the league’s elite teams, and teams that don’t need the assist of questionable officiating to win.
 The Wild, meanwhile, are not getting any breaks from the league’s officials against a St. Louis Blues team that is an intimidating foe when it plays strictly hockey, but is ironically less-intimidating when it tries to play an intimidating physical style. There is no better example that the NHL clearly accepts, and even encourages, vicious play when it lets outrageous things happen in games.
The Wild went to St. Louis and beat the Blues 4-2 in a thrilling first game. In the closing minutes, David Backes, our own captain and former MSU-Mankato star, lined up opposite Mikael Granlund for a center-ice faceoff. Think about it. A center-ice faceoff after a decisive goal. Are the officials, and cameras, focused anywhere else than on that faceoff? The official dropped the puck, and as Granlund lunged for possession, Backes cross-checked him up high, in the chest, or face, or wherever you want. Granlund was stunned, but didn’t retaliate.
Backes was ushered to the penalty box. This is a Minnesota guy, and the captain, and we’d all like to see him do well, even if we want the Wild to beat his team. But we don’t need to be embarrassed that he is sitting in the penalty box while the Wild scores an empty-net goal to clinch the victory. My point is that the refs could have called a major, and the blow could even have drawn a game’s suspension. I mean, when you ignore the puck to cross-check a foe up under the chin, are you intending to NOT injure him?
My thought was that the Blues wanted to send the message that Game 2 would be a lot rougher, and it was. Because the officials allowed it to be. Steve Ott, a rugged winger who should be remarkably unknown in this series, commanded the limelight by his outrageous play. He ran over people, cross-checked whoever was in reach, and could have been tossed for a penalty on virtually every shift he played. No question he got the attention of the Wild with his play, but to their credit, the Wild seemed to ignore his antics by refusing to be goaded into any reaction and tried to keep playing the game.
It was a close game, although it got away late for a 4-1 equalizer for the Blues, thanks to a hat trick by Vladimir Tarasenko that included an empty-net tally. There was enough nasty stuff that it seemed to get the Blues rolling, but it also proved to me that the officials had accepted that the flow of this series would be the Blues trying to intimidate and the Wild maintaining the discipline to play on. Trouble is, that means the refs are calling degree of infraction on the Blues, and letting a lot of the ugly stuff go. Near the end of Game 2, for example, the Wild trailed 2-1 and had a 3-on-2 rush. A fourth Wild attacker joined the rush and got a pass in the slot. Excellent scoring chance. Except that a trailing Blues player slashed at him with enough force to break his stick. The scoring chance, and the rush, were nullified, but at least there was the certain slashing penalty. Oops! Guess not. The refs let it go, and the Wild went down.
The series moved to Minnesota for Monday night’s Game 3, and the Wild again proved masters of holding their tempers, ignoring every Blues attempt at intimidation. The point is, why were such blatant attempts allowed to continue? Brian Engblom, former Wisconsin and NHL star, was doing commentary, and after spending the first game complaining that there didn’t seem to be the proper amount of hatred between the two teams, he then praised to officials for letting things go in Game 2. Letting things go is a wonderful attribute of officiating, when the teams are equally loose, equally aggressively, and even equally cheap. But when one team clearly is the intimidator and the other is sticking to hockey, then that officiating is sadly misrepresented.
The Wild, and their raucous crowd at Xcel Center played a near-perfect Game 3, and beat the Blues 3-0. It’s caused even non-hockey types in the media to take notice. Suddenly, they assume the Wild are the better team. That may not be true, but their dedication to playing the game the way it’s supposed to be played is commendable.
 I must say that I’m one of those followers of the game who can take only so much, and then I’d like to see Matt Cooke step out on the ice and beat the heck out of Steve Ott. But Wild coach Mike Yeo knows better. It may be because he has talented Scandinavians on his team like Mikko Koivu, Jonas Brodin, Granlund, and Erik Haula, who all grew up playing with no-retaliation discipline that installing such a theme works with this group of Wild players. And if holding back, accepting the abuse, and scoring enough goals to win enough games, can work to take the series, then Yeo should win coach of the year.
That Game 3, by the way, hinged on brilliant play by Granlund centering Zach Parise and Jason Pominville. Parise set up Pominville in the crease for a tap-in that broke the scoreless tie, and Parise showed his remarkable skill and quickness to pick the puck out of a couple of skates and snap a shot into the upper right corner to give the Wild a 2-0 lead and command, until an empty-net goal clinched it. But one other subtle move by Yeo was significant, too.
The announcers praised the emergence of the third line, with Charlie Coyle centering Thomas Vanek and Nieterreiter, for strong play. Overlooked was that after two periods, Yeo shifted Justin Fontaine up from the fourth line to the third, and it was in the third period that the line suddenly seemed to have great scoring chances every shift. Fontaine had a big hand in Vanek’s late-season scoring outburst, and reuniting them was a great coaching stroke.  

Great Weather for Wild-Rice Soup and Hockey

If you’re a hockey fan, you probably appreciate the concession-stand food inside various arenas in the area. One tip: If you want a hamburger at AMSOIL Arena, go to the corner nearest the entrance from the DECC lobby, because they char-grill their burgers and they are the best around. Another given is to have some soup with your brat or hot dog at Heritage Arena.
But one of the major attractions is that if you’re going to a game at Northwoods Arena in Cloquet, make sure you take advantage of the hot dogs from B-B Meats, and the chicken wild-rice soup at the concession. It’s one of those features I always advise college or pro scouts about – save the per-diem and eat well at the rink.
So it came to pass that on Monday, when the Wild was playing St. Louis on television, there were three or four prime attractions going on in Cloquet. First, the Minnesota Wilderness was playing the Coulee (Wis.) Region Chill in the fifth and deciding game of the first-round North American Hockey League junior tournament, at 7 p.m..
Also, Superior High School has had a great run in sports this fall-winter-spring, so I’m assuming they’ll be strong in baseball as well, and the Spartans were playing at Cloquet, which is always competitive in baseball. That was at 5:30 p.m.
After a long season of sports, however, I need to find inducements to convince my wife, Joan, to attend a sports event with me. It takes something extra by the time we get to April. She already had said “No. way, am I spending time in a cold arena,” when I mentioned attending the Wilderness game. With fishing season opening, I baited my hook carefully, with the suggestion that maybe when she got home from work, we should drive to Cloquet to celebrate the seasonal opening of Gordie’s Drive-In – always a family favorite.
Joan said OK. The burgers, the fish-and-chips, and the blackberry milkshakes are impossible to pass up.
   It was after that, delicately, when I suggested that maybe we should cruise by the Cloquet High School field just to see if the Superior-Cloquet baseball game was still going on. We got there, and barely. Superior was batting, but when I opened the door, we felt the sting of sub-40-degree air being blown at us by a harsh wind. Joan chose to stay in the car, so I parked where at least she could see the action from outside the left-field fence. Then I hopped out, camera in hand.
Superior had a runner on third, and one on second, when I glanced at the scoreboard. It said Cloquet was leading 1-0, and it was the top of the seventh!
I focused in on the runner, who, at the crack of the bat, broke for home. He got there, but it didn’t matter, the crack of the bat led to the final out of the game, and the Lumberjacks celebrated a narrow and tough – and bone-chilling – 1-0 victory over Superior.

Thirty seconds, max, and I was back in the car, driving away toward Gordie’s. Joan mentioned that it was so cold, that the fun of sitting at an outside table at Gordie’s might be nullified by the December-like weather. I suggested that if we headed over to Northwoods Arena, we could get a bowl of that great chicken-wild-rice soup and one of those great hot dogs. And I promised that after shooting a couple of meaningful photos, we could take off – because I wanted to get home to see half of the Wild-Blues tilt.
Joan went for it. We were early, got a good parking spot, and me with my press pass and Joan with her $5 ticket ambled over to the concession stand. Unfortunately, they had run out of their long-season supply of soup. And while the hot dogs looked good, as usual, we chose cheeseburgers and French fries. Then we sat at the lobby counter and enjoyed a hockey arena feast.
It was not any more impressive than the Wilderness feast on the ice. The deal with the NAHL is that they square off for first-round playoffs, best-of-five format, and then move on to quarterfinals, and so forth. Coach Corey Millen’s Wilderness outfit had a solid season, but Coulee Region came in and stung them -- not once, but twice -- in Cloquet a week ago. Being down 2-0 in games after two home games is not exactly the recipe for playoff success, but when the series shifted to LaCrosse this past weekend, the Wilderness blew a 4-0 lead but held on to win 5-4 in Game 3 Friday night. Suddenly in Game 4, everything clicked, and the Wilderness romped to a 9-1 Saturday victory to tie the series two games apiece, with nary a home victory.
That brought the teams back to Northwoods Arena in Cloquet. The Wilderness started off a bit shaky, and took a penalty to avert a breakaway chance by Coulee. But Dan Litchke, a kid I watched play for the Superior Spartans, smacked in a short-handed goal and the Wilderness took a 1-0 lead at 4:40. Several minutes later, a Grand Coulee player drew a delayed penalty, and on the delay, another visitor ran a Wilderness player into the side boards. The officials didn’t need to discuss it very long before issuing two penalties. Obviously, they wouldn’t be qualified to officiate a Stanley Cup game!
On the 5-on-3, Aaron Miller scored the power-play goal for a 2-0 lead. Miller is another player I watched last year star for the Spartans. With his goal, the Wilderness was off and running. And so were we. I packed up the camera, gave Joan the high-sign, and we drove for home and our tv link to the Wild. It turns out, the Wilderness went on to blow out Coulee Region by another 9-1 count. Lichke scored two goals, and Miller had a goal and two assists, while Tyler Cline and Niklas Lehtimaki each also scored twice.
The amazing comeback from a 2-0 deficit to win the round on the only home victory means the Wilderness advances to face Fairbanks this weekend, with games Friday and Saturday. Then the series moves to Fairbanks for games 3, 4 and 5. Other quarterfinals have Minot at Austin, Soo at Janesville, and Topeka at Lone Star. After that...we’ll figure out the semifinals.
But if the chilly weather persists, making it nasty for baseball and softball, we will still have Northwoods Arena and another round or two of some of the best arena concession food you can find.