Blaze Burn Tigers 8-2

By Pat Rupp

Farmington had allowed just one goal over its past three games and feeling confident high heading into last Saturday’s South Suburban showdown with Burnsville at Schmitz-Maki Arena. Maybe a little too confident.

The Blaze outshot the Tigers 11-3 in the opening period but still led only 1-0 after the first period. The deficit climbed to 4-0 after three unanswered goals early in the second before Jenna Bethke (from Madison Kadrlik and Sam Moehle) finally got the home team on the board later in the second stanza.

The Tigers played better over the final 17 minutes, outshooting their guests 13-8, but it didn’t translate to the scoreboard as a spate of defensive lapses led to four more Blaze goals.

Moehle scored the second and final Farmington goal of the afternoon early in the final period.

Junior goaltender Kieley Curow handled the net duties for the Tigers and finished with 32 saves. Burnsville outshot their hosts by a solid 40-24 margin.

“This was game we need to flush  out of our system and get back to the business of preparing for next week,” Farmington coach Jon Holmes said.

“Early in the first period we played ok, but then slowly and surely we got less active and that carried over into the second…In the third period we actually picked up our play but we had three or four times where we just seemed to take a break. You can’t do that in our conference or section and expect to win.”

Holmes said the loss was not without some positives, however.

“We killed off all four penalties we had,” he said. “That’s the type of play we need when we are playing at even strength…From a coaching perspective, we learned a lot about where we are as a team and what we need to do going forward. I am confident and optimistic that will help us over the last part of our season.”

The loss leaves the Tigers’ season record at 5-5 overall and 4-4 in the South Suburban Conference.

Next up is the Louis Schmitz Holiday Classic Tournament that Farmington has hosted for the last 17 years.  The Tigers will face two section foes in Owatonna and Northfield.  They will also play East Ridge on the second night of action.  There are eight total teams in the tournament, and it is scheduled to run Tuesday December 28th through Thursday December 30th with games at 11:00AM, 1:15PM, 3:30PM, and of course the 6:00PM game with the Tigers hosting each night.

After the break the Tigers jump back into conference action when the girls close out the opening round of conference play with a home game against the current number five ranked Rosemount team that owns an eye-catching 12-1 season record and stands 7-1 in league play, good for second place behind league-leading Lakeville South.

Saturday evening the Tigers kick off the second round of the conference campaign with a trip to Apple Valley. The Eagles beat Farmington 6-3 when the two teams met last month in Farmington.