Photo by Jake Przytarski Marshall Jackson Bladholm controls the puck during their Section 3A tournament game against Luverne on Thursday. The Tigers fell to the Cardinals 4-3.

MARSHALL – A goal scored by Luverne just 14 seconds into Thursday’s Section 3A quarterfinals matchup put the Marshall boys hockey team behind the eight ball early on in their third meeting with the fifth-seeded Cardinals. Luverne went on to add three additional markers in the back-and-forth contest to defeat the Tigers 4-3 and advance to the semifinals.

After previously defeating the Cardinals twice during the regular season, Marshall coach Michael Weiss said the difference this time around was the four goals allowed which proved to be too big of a hole for the team to come back from.

“Right off the bat they got some good bounces that went their way and we struggled to get a couple bounces those first two periods and just dug ourselves a little bit too deep of a hole giving up four goals,” said Weiss. “We played hard though, and I have to give our boys credit they gave a heck of an effort.”

A resilient effort

falls short

If you’re a believer in bad omens, Luverne’s goal less than 15 seconds into the game off the stick of Colby Crabtree was a sign of things to come for Marshall.

Even with the less than ideal start, however, the Tigers remained focused for the remainder of the period as Weiss rallied his team to stick to their game plan knowing it would take multiple goals to come out on top.

“We just told them we have to score one to win anyway and we just have to keep playing,” said Weiss. “We were playing well. After that we played a good first period and another good second, the puck just wasn’t bouncing for us.”

Landon Frost did his part with a rebound goal off a shot by Jenson Meyer at the 5:28 mark of the period to knot the game up at one apiece. Unfortunately, the Cardinals — despite being outshot 13-3 — quickly responded by recording a back-breaking goal five minutes later to retake the lead at 2-1, which stood until the second period.

Out of the break, the Tigers maintained control of the puck in Luverne’s defensive zone for long stretches and generated numerous opportunities to find the equalizer but came up empty time and time again with the Cardinals’ netminder making sprawling saves.

Marshall’s pursuit of a tying goal became even more of a challenge midway through the frame when senior captain and top defenseman Kaleb Welvaert went down hard into the boards and was forced to miss the remainder of the game with an injury. Minutes after, Luverne added a pivotal third goal at the 8:50 mark of the second period.

Weiss acknowledged that the loss of Welvaert was a huge blow to the team, but said he’s proud of the way the rest of the defensemen stepped up in his absence.

“He’s a big-time leader for us and it hurts, but I thought all of our defensemen did a good job of stepping up,” said Weiss. “Cooper came in and played some big minutes and made some big plays and I’m just proud of our guys. He went down and nobody quit, everybody stepped up and kept going hard.”

Without the services of one captain to start the third period, fellow captain Bryson Whyte made it a whole new game 29 seconds into the third period with a goal to make it 3-2. Knowing the type of players he has, Weiss was not surprised to see his team continue to battle when the chips were down.

“They just keep fighting and the senior class (has) put a lot into this and they didn’t want to see it end, so I’m not surprised that they went out swinging in trying to get that last one all the way to the buzzer,” said Weiss.

Even after Luverne’s fourth goal at 11:22 of the third period that put them ahead 4-2, the Tigers kept applying offensive pressure and brought the Marshall crowd into a frenzy with another goal — this time by Jackson Bladholm — to cut the deficit to one with 3:01 left to play. The Tigers went on to pull the goalie with just over a minute left to play but were unable to score the tying goal with the extra attacker, falling 4-3.

Dominik Caspers finished with 12 saves on 16 shots faced for Marshall.

With the loss, Marshall finishes the season with an overall record of 16-10.

Reflecting on their run, Weiss says he’s proud of the way his team battled through adversity over the course of the entire season.

“I thought we had a good year. We struggled kind of scoring goals there and we had a lot of injuries. I think this is our second game with our complete lineup, so it’s been a struggle and a battle and we’ve faced some adversity and I thought we did well to face that,” said Weiss.

Luverne 4, Marshall 3

Luverne 2 1 1 — 4

Marshall 1 0 2 — 3

SCORING SUMMARY

First Period

Luverne: Crabtree, 0:14 (Watts-Boll, Roberts).

Marshall: Frost, 5:28 (Meyer)

Luverne: Roberts, 10:35 (Braun, VanTersch)

Penalties

Luverne: Nekali, 13:55 (Tripping, 2 min).

Second Period

Luverne: Behrend, 8:50 (Unassisted).

Penalties

Luverne: Wenninger, 6:34 (Tripping, 2 min).

Luverne: Steensma, 15:29 (Hooking, 2 min).

Third Period

Marshall: Whyte, power play goal, 0:29 (B. Meyer, J. Meyer)

Luverne: Roberts, 11:22 (Crabtree)

Marshall: Bladholm, 14:15 (VanDeVere)

Penalties

Marshall: VanOverBeke, 2:24 (Interference, 2 min).

Marshall: Bladholm, 5:01 (Hooking, 2 min).