Almost everyone knows the story behind the saying "Miracle on Ice" or has seen the movie "Miracle". In that movie, the USA Hockey team must Believe in themselves as a team to overcome a larger, highly favored, Russian team. From the beginning of the season, that story was introduced to the Monroe Avalanche team by their Head Coach Josh Smith. "Believe in yourself and your team and great things will happen." Last Saturday's Region 4 WAHA Pee Wee 3B Playdown Finals between Reedsburg/WI Dells and your very own Monroe Avalanche team was truly a test on how much these young Avalanche players BELIEVED in themselves. Although the Pee Wee B team went into the game as the higher seed, their last recorded win was back on December 15th, 2013 and Reedsburg had just won 4 of their last 6 games. Wins have definitely been tough to come by for the Avalanche so when they got down 3-0 in the first six minutes of the game against Reedsburg the chance to play at State was looking dim. The only thing they had to overcome now were themselves. Did they BELIEVE they could do it? Could they find enough heart, desire, and drive to overcome the adversities that were put in front of them, to pull out the most unbelievable win these young players endured this season?

 

With the Avalanche down 3-0 after six minutes of play, the Avalanche's energy somehow turned around. It was like a wake up call....but now they had their work cut out for them and had to play from behind. Feeding off that energy, with less than 2 minutes to go in the first period, Avalanche Ryan Molitor received a pass from Defenseman Brady Smith and Molitor took the puck around the net and caught the Reedsburg Goaltender off guard and slapped a shot in to put the Avalanche on the board ending the first period 3-1. The Avalanche regrouped during the clearing of the ice. "As a coaching staff, all we wanted our players to concentrate on was one goal at a time. Score one, then go for the next one. Don't worry about being down by 3 or 4 or whatever it is. Let's concentrate on ourselves and BELIEVE." With 2 periods left to play, the Avalanche were raring to go but would have to do the second period without one of their stronger skaters, Riley Jones. Jones injured his knee in the first period and was playing it off but did not look good so the coaching staff sat him the second period, hoping rest would do it good. With being down a player, Avalanche Defenseman Kendall Wild, Smith, and Alex Henry stepped it up in the second as they rotated one defender at a time in the second period and Bryce Montgomery went up to play forward, to replace Jones. Back and forth play occurred for the first 8 minutes of the second period but unfortunately, it was Reedsburg that scored first and were back up by three goals, making the score 4-1. However, with three minutes to go in the 2nd period, Avalanche Ruger Hansen answered that goal by stealing the puck from the Reedsburg defenseman and took the puck in one-on-one with the goalie and lifted a backhand over the goalie to bring the Avalanche back within two goals. At the moment, this seemed to be a game changer for the Avalanche, with the momentum swinging their way....but they let their guard down and Reedsburg somehow, someway answered that goal in two seconds off of the face-off ending the second period 5-2. "That goal by Reedsburg really shot us down. Heads started to hang, faces dropped, but the spirit of us coaches was still alive and we had to get them pumped up for the final 15 minutes of the game. That's a lot of time in hockey as we just witnessed a goal in two seconds. Anything can still happen and we just continued to stress to our players one goal at a time." commented Head Coach Josh Smith.  And that is indeed what the Avalanche did in the third period. With Jones back in the line-up, Avalanche player Rebekah Rath volunteered to go on defense to keep their lines even. They came out firing and never looked back. The first goal in the third period for the Avalanche came off an aggressive surge by Colton O'Connor who found the back of the net, with Ty O'Connor and Molitor receiving assists on the play. This brought the score to 5-3. The next goal by the Avalanche came two minutes later by a rejuvenated and pumped up Jones, who came off the bench after sitting the second period to rest his knee. He scored unassisted bringing the Avalanche within one, 5-4 with more than 10 minutes to go in the game. The fans were back in it, the crowd had grown around the boards of the ice, and Reedsburg were back on their heels. They did not know what just hit them. Reedsburg Coach took a time out with 6 minutes to go in the game to get his players regrouped, but that only gave the Avalanche time to also get regrouped and be reminded of their game plan of one goal at a time. After the time-out, Reedsburg seemed to be playing "not to lose" and the Avalanche were playing to win as the puck seemed to stay in the Reedsburg end quite a bit. With just over two minutes to go in the game Defenseman Alex Henry stopped the puck at the blue line and passed it over to Jones who rocketed a shot past the Reedsburg Goalie to tie the game up. The Avalanche were back in it. Reedsburg however had their chances in those final minutes with at least three break-a-ways to score on Avalanche Goaltender Heath Bear, but he held them off and made some amazing saves in the last 2 minutes of the game to send the game into a Sudden Death Overtime. The Avalanche by far had the momentum going into the 8 minute sudden death overtime, where the first team to score wins, as they had just scored 3 unanswered goals but it was Reedsburg that came out firing in the OT period. They landed 12 shots in 3 minutes of play on Goaltender Bear but Bear stepped it up and prevented every shot allowing his teammates time to eventually find a break. And it was at the 3:43 mark where Colton O'Connor was able to pick up a loose puck at center ice and lead the break with Molitor at his side. Colton took it in past the blue line, cut across in front of the net, kept the puck in close and slid the puck between the Reedsburg Goalie's legs and the game was over just like that! O'Connor, once again scored an OT goal to send his Avalanche team to the WAHA State Tournament. "I am very proud of the fact that the team played as a team and never gave up even when they were down. These kids learned an important life lesson about handling adversity. They grew as a team and as maturing young men and women. That's all a coach can ask of their team." stated Assistant Coach Scot O'Connor. Head Coach Josh Smith added, "These players fought for every minute, every inch, and every puck and never gave up. They earned and deserved every single bit of that win." Goaltender Bear recorded 37 saves on the game. Pee Wee B team will represent Region 4 in the WAHA Pee Wee 3B State Tournament in Amery, WI March 14th - 16th.  CONGRATULATIONS AVALANCHE! Their next regular season games are set for Saturday February 8th at SLICE arena at 9:15am against Oregon and then Sunday, February 9th at 8am in Beloit.