Northstar Playoff Central: March 6
Playoffs have begun in Minnesota, March Madness is officially here. NHR kicks off our post season specialty, NHR Playoff Central.
The Big Stage. Rochester Civic Center. The Civic Center is hosting four games this evening so it is the best place to go and watch multiple games. Tonight from Class A you can see one of the best teams in Class A Spring Grove take on Kingsland as well as Rushford-Peterson face Wabasha-Kellogg in the sub-section semi-finals.
Also at the Civic Center Class AA first round section games from 1AA match Lake City versus Zumbrota-Mazeppa and PEM against St. Charles. One set of games is in the auditorium and the other in the main arena.
Game of the Night. St. Peter at GSL. St. Peter beat GSL in the opening game of the year 60-55 so yes one of these teams will open and close with the same opponent. St. Peter at one point was 5-0 before a five game losing streak, than a three game win steak, following by a three game losing streak, etc.
GSL has been similar. Start with a three game losing streak followed by nine game losing streak followed by losing 8 of ten, and then four wins to end the year. Streaky! St. Peter comes in struggling (recently lost to OT games and they were crushed by WEM) but maybe the winning starts over? They did beat GSL once already.
Upset Alert!. Norwood-Young America has Belle Plaine at their house this evening. Belle Plaine is .500 and has lost to the Raiders twice already. The games were competitive and somewhat close though, and we all know beating teams three times in a year is tough.
Also, just down the road a sneaky hot Lester Prairie club has won five in a row and takes on Mayer Lutheran. They’ve played once before with Mayer Lutheran winning but the Bulldogs have turned their year around to go 12-14. Could be a fun game.
Weekend Playoff Notes. Tonight is of course not the first night of section play, just the first night for this article. Over the weekend ACGC knocked Minnewaska Area out of the playoffs in overtime, T-M-B’s injury riddled year is over as Redwood Valley put up 92 on the them, and MACCRAY defeated Canby by 15 in a match-up of surprising .500 teams.