Walk through the players lounge tucked into what they call the “Zamboni end” of Aldrich Arena in Maplewood, and the memories of Hill-Murray hockey come at you like waves crashing on a windy beach.
The framed jerseys date back to the 1970s, when private schools could not yet compete in the Minnesota State High School League. They commemorate 1983, when an unbeaten Pioneers team became the first non-public state champ. They show the school’s most recent state prep title in 2020, amid the myriad moments that fans and alumni love to savor.
The 2024-25 season looked for a time like it would be another chapter in that book of triumphant memories. Instead, as coach Bill Lechner and his assistants put the finishing touches on the coming season’s roster, the abrupt end of the previous campaign is something they’re trying to forget and move past.
Last season’s Pioneers were a juggernaut, even by the lofty standards the program has set. They averaged better than six goals per game on the way to winning 22 of 25 regular-season contests, with a tie and two one-goal losses – to St. Thomas Academy and Edina – to their credit. Hill-Murray opened the playoffs with 11-1 and 10-0 wins.
Then it all came crashing down. In the section final, the Pioneers fell to neighborhood rival Stillwater in double overtime, then had to watch the Ponies march to the state title game. There, Stillwater lost to Moorhead – a team Hill-Murray had beaten to close the regular season.
Even eight months later, the painful memories are always there.
“It sticks. And probably shouldn’t in the scheme of life and all the things that go on in the world,” said Lechner, who has been the Pioneers’ head coach since 1997, after running the show at Stillwater for the five seasons before that. “It’s a bump in the road. But in this world, I couldn’t wait until Monday to get going and try and start erasing that moment.”
Over the summer, Lechner’s program got a taste of the new world of hockey development for the 16- to 20-year-old crowd.
Three players that could have returned for another season with the Pioneers headed elsewhere: defenseman Carson Scott is playing for the USA Hockey National Team Development Program in Michigan, defenseman Casper Lang headed to junior hockey in British Columbia, and high-scoring forward Riley Zupfer elected to spend the entire season with Des Moines in the USHL, after his original plan was to return to Hill-Murray for his senior season.
“It’s all trickling down,” Lechner said, referring to the change in NCAA rules a year ago that added Canadian major junior hockey as an option for players interested in college hockey. “If you look around and you talk to the Minnetonkas and Edinas, they’re plucking a couple of the top guys, and they’re getting them.”
Still, the coach likes the Pioneers’ experience in goal, with Grayson Hanggi back for his senior year after winning 19 games last season. With good size and better numbers, Hanggi is considered by many as a candidate for the Frank Brimsek Award, given to the state’s top senior goalie.
The team’s offensive experience starts with senior Chaz Lentz, who averaged better than two points per game last season and is easing into a leadership role.
“It will be different,” admitted Lentz, who cut his teeth in the Cottage Grove youth hockey system. “I’ve got to step up my game to the next level. It’s fresh guys, younger guys, and we’re the guys that they look up to.”
In Lentz, Lechner sees a versatile player who will center the Pioneers’ top line and is comfortable and productive in just about any offensive role.
“He’s got great hands, great instincts. He has got to get bigger and stronger, but they all do,” said the coach. “Anywhere you want him, he’ll do whatever you want.”
After tune-up scrimmages versus Shakopee and Cretin-Derham Hall, the puck drops for real on Nov. 25 with a visit to Eden Prairie. The Pioneers’ home opener is Nov. 29 when Class A power Hermantown visits Aldrich.
Lentz said that every game feels big when you get used to being perceived as the enemy, like Hill-Murray is everywhere they go, but games versus White Bear Lake and Edina, and the rematch versus Stillwater, are all circled on most Pioneers’ calendars.
As he works to get past the disappointment of their most recent game, Lechner savors the chance to reload and give it another run with a new group of Pioneers.
“We’re not one-and-done. It’s Hill-Murray,” he said. “If we’re not being talked about every year, I don’t have a job, to be blunt.”
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