Luverne sophomore forward Justin Arndt tips the puck off the stick of Mankato West’s Bobby Umhoefer during Thursday’s boys’ hockey game at the Blue Mound Ice Arena. West downed the Cardinals 4-2, saddling LHS with its third consecutive loss.
By John Rittenhouse
The Luverne boys’ hockey team completed a 13-8-1 regular season by playing a pair of home games late last week.
The Cardinals dropped a two-goal decision to Mankato West Thursday before snapping a three-game losing skid with a four-goal win over Minneapolis South Saturday.
Luverne drew the No. 10 seed for the Section 1A Tournament and will skate against No. 7 Waseca at 7 p.m. tonight in Waseca. The Cards played Waseca twice during the regular season, falling 3-1 at home Jan. 4 before losing 5-3 in Waseca Jan. 25.
Luverne 5, MS 1
The Cardinals ended a three-game slide with a four-goal victory over Minneapolis South Saturday at the Blue Mound Ice Arena.
With Tony Smedsrud, Andy Hess and Tom Gluf leading the way, Luverne scored the game’s first four goals to open a commanding lead that was never threatened.
Smedsrud recorded three assists and scored a goal for the winners. Hess netted a pair of goals, and Gluf registered two assists.
Hess opened the scoring at the 6:01 mark of the first period with an assist going to Gluf.
Smedsrud scored an unassisted goal to make it a 2-0 game in the second period.
Gluf and Smedsrud received assists for a power-play goal scored by Dan Park with 8:47 remaining in the third period, and Smedsud set up a goal by Nick Otten 1:19 later to make it a 4-0 game.
After MS recorded its first goal with 4:06 left to play, Hess scored 10 seconds later with assists going to Otten and Smedsrud.
Cody Gehrke blanked MS during the first two periods of the game in net for LHS. Pat Bennett and Brad Van Santen shared time as goalies in the third period.
MW 4, Luverne 2
The Cardinals dropped their third consecutive game when they hosted Mankato West at the Blue Mound Ice Arena Thursday.
Luverne outshot the Scarlets 29-16 in the game, but MW scored two goals in the first six minutes of play and never trailed during a two-goal victory.
Graham Kuehner opened the scoring at 12:25 of the first period before teammate Danny Umhoefer netted a power-play goal at 9:18 to make it a 2-0 game.
Luverne’s Hess pulled the Cardinals to within one goal of the Scarlets when he scored at 7:07 after being set up by Park and Chris Morgan, but MW’s Taylor Wallace scored 23 seconds later to make it a 3-1 game.
Luverne’s Tony Smedsrud netted the lone goal of the second period at 12:02 after being set up by Eric Lammert to make it a 3-2 difference.
MW, however, blanked the Cards in the third period, and put the game away when Wallace put a power-play goal into an empty net with 34 seconds remaining.
Gehrke made 12 saves in 15 attempts as Luverne’s goalie.
