It’s never easy to beat a team three times, particularly if they’re closely matched.
That’s the challenge facing the Ely Timberwolves Saturday, as they take on Moose Lake in the “play-in” round of the Section 7A high school hockey tournament.
Game time is slated for 2 p.m. at the Ely Arena, and comes just two weeks after the Wolves edged the Rebels 6-4 in a tight contest at Moose Lake.
The teams also met to open the season in Ely in late-November, with the Wolves also emerging victorious from a tightly-played contest.
Game number three will also take place here, with Ely (7-14) coming in as the eighth seed in the nine-team tournament and the Rebels ninth at 1-21.
But Moose Lake played the Wolves to within a goal in November and were within one late in the rematch.
They also had tight games with North Shore and Greenway in section play.
Ely, meanwhile, has slumped as of late, dropping four of its last five contests.
Saturday’s winner has a tall order - with a trip to Hibbing on Tuesday night to take on the top-seeded Bluejackets.
Quarterfinal play in the 7A tournament is slated for Tuesday with the semifinals taking place on Saturday, Feb. 21, at Duluth’s AMSOIL Arena.
The finals are also at AMSOIL on Feb. 25, with the state Class A tourney opening on Wednesday, March 4 in St. Paul.
• In what amounted to a battle for the seventh seed Monday night at Silver Bay, North Shore’s Levi Lovely broke the Wolves’ hearts with a goal 23 seconds into overtime, giving the host Storm a 3-2 victory.
Goals by Jayden Zemke and Owen Marolt lifted the Wolves to a 2-1 lead after one period, but the Storm’s Dalton Seagren tied things up midway through the middle period.
That’s how it stayed through regulation, as both teams misfired on power play chances in the third period.
Ely outshot the Storm 14-8 in the third and had two shots in overtime but goaltender Dax Krech was up to the task, finishing with 36 saves.
Freshman goalie Henry Fetterer finished with 26 saves for the Wolves.
Sean Merriman assisted on one Ely goal, while Seagren, Lovely and Josh Johnson scored for North Shore.
• Park Rapids scored twice in the first period, three times in the second and twice more in the third on the way to a 7-4 victory over the Wolves last Saturday, in the regular season home finale.
The visitors took advantage of Ely penalties and scored three times with the man advantage.
Park Rapids built a 4-1 lead, but back-to-back goals by Ely senior Rhett Johnson trimmed the gap to one goal midway through the second period.
Again, penalties doomed the Wolves as Gustaf Pedersen scored on the power play to make it 5-3 after two periods.
Two Pedersen goals iced it in the third.
Johnson had two goals while Marolt and Cooper Mayranen also scored for the Wolves.
Ely’s Stig Majerus had two assists, with Mason Kurnava,Zemke, Marolt and Ryland Sandy also recording assists.
Lewis Powell had 22 saves in the Ely nets.
Winning goalie Rylie Wesa had 19 saves, with Pedersen finishing with a four-point day. Teammate Konnor Ball contributed three assists.
