If it’s the first Friday in March, odds are better than 50-50 over the past four decades that Hill-Murray and White Bear Lake are playing for a trip to the state boys hockey tournament.
Those numbers increase dramatically when it comes to chances of the Pioneers advancing.
But not this year.
Jack Stanius scored in the game’s opening minute, Leo Gabriel earned his eighth shutout of the season with a 35-save effort and second-seeded White Bear Lake upset top-seeded Hill-Murray 3-0 in the Class 2A, Section 4 championship game inside a sold-out Aldrich Arena.
Blake Eckerle and Nolan Roed added empty-net goals, and White Bear Lake is going to state for the 20th time, and first since 2019.
“It’s awesome. I mean no one likes those guys, nobody,” Gabriel said. “This is just great.”
State tournament action in Class 2A begins Thursday at Xcel Energy Center; Class A starts Wednesday. Brackets are scheduled to be announced Saturday morning.
Gabriel’s performance wasn’t a surprise to his teammates, who are plenty enamored with what their junior goaltender has done all season. His goals-against average dropped to 1.87 and his save percentage went up to .924.
“Every game we suit up for we know that we got a good backbone,” Stanius said.
First-year coach Chris Anderson, a longtime Bears assistant, said a key for White Bear Lake was using its big defenseman to box out and largely keep speedy Hill-Murray to the outside. “I can’t really think of one other than off the pipe where it was a Grade-A, intense situation in front of the net.”
It is the sixth time in seven years the schools have met for section crown. Hill-Murray won four of the previous five, and, dating to 1985, the Pioneers are 14-6 against White Bear Lake in section finals.
“They did what they had to do. They got a lead, and they held it,” said Hill-Murray coach Bill Lechner.
The bulk of the first period was spent in the White Bear Lake zone — Gabriel made 16 saves — yet it was a goal by Stanius off a scramble 36 seconds in that put the Bears ahead.
White Bear Lake (20-7-1) had just four shots in the period and four in the second. It finished with 16.
Stanius missed 15 games with an injury before returning Feb. 13. Since then, the junior forward has four goals in six games.
“I’m definitely hungry, but at the end of the day it’s a team game. My linemate Nolan Roed is obviously a great hockey player, I hope he wins Mr. Hockey. But, yeah, it’s good to get back and good to win this one,” he said.
Hill-Murray (17-9-2) continued to spend more time in the White Bear Lake end in period two but could not get the equalizer. The closest the Pioneers got was Chaz Lentz sliding a rebound through the crease.
“When you start hitting pipes or just miss open nets you start to get concerned, you feel like maybe this isn’t our night, but you can’t do that,” Lechner said. “I really believed we’d probably at least get it tied 1-1. We’ve had six overtime games and we’ve won five of them against good teams. … It just wasn’t meant to be tonight. Nobody’s going to have sympathy for us because we’ve been very fortunate through the years, but it’s somebody else’s turn out of Section 4.”
Hill-Murray, which scored three times in the final six minutes to beat Gentry Academy 4-2 in the semifinal, just missed tying the game midway through the third when Caden Zasada lifted a shot over Gabriel, but it clanged off the crossbar. Zasada put his hands to his helmet while bending forward in disbelief.
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