Thursday, March 28, 2024
STAFF PHOTO BY JOHNNIE PHILLIPS Preston Meier of the Huskies keeps his eye on the ball as he defends a Northfield attacker in the opening round game of the Section 1 tournament. Meier had a team-high three points in the Huskies 11-10 loss to the Raiders.STAFF PHOTO BY JOHNNIE PHILLIPS Owatonna’s Jack Sande tries to shield a Northfield attacker from the ball after a faceoff during the two teams’ opening-round game of the Section 1 tournament last week. Sande was held scoreless in the Huskies 11-10 loss in Northfield.

Huskies lacrosse suffers heart-break to end season

After finishing the regular season 2-6 in the Big Nine Conference and 4-9 overall, the Owatonna Huskies entered the first round of the Section One lacrosse tournament against Northfield as underdogs and lost a close 11-10 game to end the season.

Owatonna took the game to the Raiders early, but could not maintain its lead and ultimately fell to the Raiders after a late push by Northfield in the fourth quarter.

The Huskies came out firing against Northfield and picked up an early 2-0 lead just six minutes into the game with goals by Jack Strom and Preston Meier.

Northfield answered shortly after to make the game 2-1, but Owatonna pounced on offensive opportunities to make the game 4-1 after Beckett Seykora and Caleb Hullopeter both scored.

The Raiders struck first to open the second quarter, however, Owatonna kept pouring on the offense and eventually took the biggest lead of the game at 6-3 with six minutes left in the half.

Unfortunately for the Huskies, the momentum of the game began to shift near the end of the half as Northfield brought the game to within one goal at 6-5 with 3:55 remaining before the game went to halftime at an eventual score of 7-6.

With a one-goal lead, Owatonna came out from the half firing to take a 9-6 lead after back-to-back goals by Lucas Jensen and Michael Heitkamp.

Northfield responded by scoring its lone goal of the third quarter to make the game 9-7 heading into the final 12 minutes of the game.

Both teams battled defensively in the fourth quarter, but Northfield eventually got the best of Owatonna en route to outscoring the Huskies 4-1 and taking home the 11-10 win.

The Raiders scored the game-tying goal with 9:58 remaining before scoring the go-ahead and game-winning goals in a two-minute stretch late in the fourth quarter.

Leading Owatonna on offense in the loss were Preston Meier, Beckett Seykora and Jack Strom with three points apiece.

In net for Owatonna, Korban Stricklin faced 13 shots and made two saves, allowing 11 goals.

The loss to Northfield officially ended the Huskies’ 2022 season.

Player Stats

vs. Northfield

                        G     A     P

Meier               3      0      3

Strom               3      0      3

Seykora           1      2      3

Jensen              1      1      2

Hullopeter        1      1      2

Heitkamp         1      0      1

Spurgeon         0      1      1

                        SA   SV   GA

Stricklin   13            2              11

 

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