The Raider Girls Hockey team enters the final two weeks at 12-9 overall and 2-5 in the conference after splitting their games last week. First was a win against North/Tartan at home followed by a loss at South St. Paul. The girls have three games left in the regular season.
On Tuesday against the co-op of North St. Paul and Tartan (N/T), the game was controlled by Hastings for the most part. N/T had a few random opportunities in the Raider defensive end, but most shots at the Raider net were easily stopped by Raider keeper Victoria Steinke and the Raider defense.
Hastings scored 52 seconds into the first period when Kacey Plank and Jade Schauer connected with Autumn Burt. Madyn Hanson scored the second goal of the period at 7:09. Hanson’s goal was a powerplay goal with the assist of Grace Petrich and Jade Schauer.
Things settled down after the first two goals and in the third, with 1:03 left in the game, the Titans made things a little more interesting by sneaking the puck past Steinke on a late powerplay to make the game 2-1. The goal broke up the shutout, but the Raider defense held them to that one goal.
Steinke stopped 18 of the 19 shots she faced for a .947 save percentage. Both teams had four opportunities with skater advantages and both teams converted only one of those powerplays into goals. Hastings had 25 shots on goal to the Titans’ 19.
Friday, the ladies made the trip up Highway 61 to Doug Woog Arena to take on the South St. Paul Packers and it was a bit of a rough road trip. The Packers scored twice in the first despite the Raiders putting 13 shots on goal to the Packers 11. In the second, South St. Paul scored just over a minute in to take a 3-0 lead and Hastings again led in the shots on goal side six to five. Hastings did not fare any better in the final period, logging only five shots to the Packers 14. South St. Paul added a goal to win 4-0. The Packers ended up with 30 shots on goal to Hastings’ 24. South St. Paul had three powerplay opportunities scoring on two while stopping the one Raider powerplay.
The final three games of the regular season are on Saturday, Jan. 27 at Hill-Murray at 2:00 p.m., then Tuesday, Jan. 30 at home against Farmington at 7:00 p.m. and they finish the season at East Ridge at 7:30 p.m.