Junior

Streak hits 18 as Lights clinch MnJHL title

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Last Updated on Sunday, 27 May 2012 23:31

By Nick Clark
MnJHL Director of Media Relations

The last time the Twin Cities Northern Lights lost a hockey game, it had yet to snow in these parts.

Considering the type of winter Minnesota has experienced in recent months, that statement could qualify as hyperbole.

But there is nothing exaggerated about the type of season the Northern Lights have put together.

Twin Cities clinched it’s first Minnesota Junior Hockey League regular season championship since the 2002-03 campaign last weekend after adding three more victories to what was already impressive stretch of unbeaten play.

The Lights last defeat came Dec. 3. Since then, Twin Cities has played 18 games, and won them all.

That included the three-game set last weekend in which the Northern Lights won a pair on the road over the Dells Ducks, before returning home to beat Hudson 8-5 Sunday, Feb. 12 back at the Bloomington Ice Garden.

Results such as Sunday’s have become a theme for head coach Erik Largen, who said regardless of circumstances, the group has been able to win games almost at will.

“We’ve been very consistent,” Largen said. “The guys haven’t taken games for granted, and have made sure to give an honest effort most nights. I’ve been happy with that, and I think that’s why I think we are just playing good hockey right now.”

Truth be told, it’s been that way since the onset for the Northern Lights.

They have four games yet to play in the 48-game march through the regular season – at Rochester Feb. 17, vs. Dells Ducks Feb. 19, at Maple Grove Feb. 25 and then against Rochester in Owatonna Feb. 26 – but will enter the final stretch with 39 victories already tucked away.

In all, Twin Cities has lost just four times. Two of those defeats came in the season’s first eight games. They responded to that second loss with an eight-game winning streak, and then answered loss No. 3 with six consecutive wins before setting off on the 18-game tear the team took with it into this weekend.

The current streak dates back eight-full weeks, and it turned into a stretch in which they put a 13-point spread between themselves and second-place Rochester in clinching the league title two weeks before the MnJHL regular season concludes.

“We’ve been preparing all season for the playoffs, and more than anything, what we’ve done is a result of that,” Largen said. “There hasn’t been a whole lot to it. We’ve just tried to get better everyday.”

In doing so, the Lights have also set themselves onto what could be the fast track into the Tier III national tournament.

By winning the regular season championship, Twin Cities receives a bye in the opening round of the Bush Cup Playoffs, meaning the team will have to win just one best-of-three series to claim one of the MnJHL’s two national tournament bids.

The bye week will be an interesting one, Largen admitted, primarily because he’ll have to find a way to keep the group sharp while the rest of the league gets a taste of playoff hockey.

But for a team that been anything but dull for the better part of the last six months, a weekend off isn’t likely to change much.

“They’ll be ready to go,” Largen said. “They know that if we aren’t ready to win two games then, all of what we’ve accomplished is really for nothing. They understand what is at stake.”