Good Journalism, 4/19/18

Here is week two in my attempt to collect a smattering of semi-related pieces of good journalism on topics that I think deserve more attention than anything in the regular news cycle.

From Franklin Foer, one of the Atlantic’s most fascinating writers, comes a discussion on the end of reality. It should leave you quite concerned about our virtual future, and the past couple of years show just how much it can threaten a traditional understanding of truth and, yes, reality itself. As a defender of reality, it’s a timely call to arms.

From something called The Educators’ Room, which is dedicated to teachers’ empowerment, here is a list of ten things that teachers today have to deal with that they didn’t ten years ago. The timing here is apt, as I close in on my own 10-year reunion. Sure enough, few to none of these things existed when I walked out of Duluth East ten years ago, and just about all of them leave me saddened or frustrated with the state of education. Some of them key off the concern over virtual lives that comes out of the Foer piece, but others deal with safety, a decline in authority conferred to teachers, and broader social forces that affect home lives. My own profession is often complicit in #10, and while I do think there is very good work being done in better aligning curriculum with realities of a changing economy, whenever I get caught up in these discussions I just want to yell at people to stop and make sure we’re not thinking about education or childhood in a strictly utilitarian way. The journey should be just as important as the destination, both here and in the testing culture the author rightfully decries.

Spinning out of our theme of losing touch with the world around us, here is David Brooks on loneliness. From my own travels and observations, I would wholeheartedly concur that this epidemic is as dangerous as any afflicting contemporary American life. One line sums it up well: “the clans have polarized, the villages have been decimated and the tribes have become weaponized.” We will either find some way to heal these wounds or we will continue to crumble away from reality.

Next, some notes on the political journey of a man who, while facing long odds, had as good a chance as anyone to heal the wounds of a fractured nation: RFK goes to Pine Ridge. There have been some timely RFK reflections of late, including a number on the 50th anniversary of his Indianapolis speech following the assassination of Martin Luther King, and I expect they will continue as we close in on the anniversary of his death. I’m not sure there’s a more haunting figure in American history.

Following up on last week’s theme, but closer to home: Jana Hollingsworth and Brooks Johnson at the Duluth News Tribune delve into a sexual abuse case in Itasca County. One can certainly throw some stones at local papers like the News Tribune, but something I’ve noticed in recent travels to smaller communities is the hole left by the decline of newspapers as a communal source of knowledge. Once upon a time, these places had a common source of information; nowadays, ask a resident where to catch up on local happenings and many of them will shrug, or admit they’re relying on Facebook gossip (which many hate but can’t escape) or just the good old rumor mill at the coffee shop or bar. Institutions like newspapers play a vital role. And I’m pleased to say that the DNT reporters who I’ve interacted with in recent years, which include Jana and Brooks, along with Peter Passi on local government and Louie St. George on hockey, are all in it for the right reasons, and do great work. May they continue to have the resources to do more of this.

And, staying local for my final piece, here’s an obituary that caught my eye this week. Mary C. Van Evera is a name I’ve heard around Duluth from time to time, usually as a donor somewhere in the background. I often wonder who these people are, and how they amassed their wealth, and what spurred them to grace certain causes with their patronage. With Mrs. Van Evera, it’s obvious enough: her maiden name was Congdon, and she was a granddaughter of Chester and Clara Congdon, the builders of Glensheen and the exemplars of Duluth’s golden age a century ago. Obviously few to zero people reading this blog will have Congdon-level wealth, and I can’t claim to have known her or how she operated. But when it came to civic involvement, and to commitment to a place while maintaining a global perspective, Mrs. Van Evera was exemplary.

I’m building some steam here. Let’s do this again next week.

This Week in the MN-8 Soap Opera

Minnesota’s Eight Congressional District has chewed up and spit out a second Democratic frontrunner. Last time we checked in, I asked if Leah Phifer’s insurgent campaign was the foundation for the new DFL in MN-8, or if she was merely playing Eugene McCarthy to Rick Nolan’s LBJ. The answer is the latter, as Phifer has dropped out of the race following her failure to secure the endorsement at last Saturday’s hung DFL convention.

Phifer showed both the promise and the pitfalls of being the young person who inspires activist energy. She became a vessel for a lot of people’s opinions: first, she was a hero to the environmental wing of the party, as she became a rallying point for people who thought the incumbent Nolan had gone a bridge too far. While she herself was somewhat more nuanced, she’d had an image bestowed on her, and the Iron Range wing of the party was swift to strike back. When she left some daylight to her left on non-ferrous mining, in came Michelle Lee to siphon off some support, too. The more jarring blow, I suspect, came from the Latino Caucus, which burst in to denounce her candidacy at the party convention due to her past work for ICE. Her opponents, naturally, were none too sad to see her challenged here, and while she tried to explain herself and move on, the Latino Caucus didn’t flinch. With a plea for unity, she stepped away.

Perhaps in a different world the young woman who barnstormed the district on her motorcycle would have taken the MN-8 DFL by storm. With a background that included rural roots, time in law enforcement, and reliably liberal views, Phifer looked like a transitional figure to a new generation for the party in this sprawling district. But the fault lines in 2018, both in the local mining debate and the national immigration debate, are far too sharp. Spurts of heartfelt emotion in many directions, to say nothing of endorsements and fundraising power, overwhelm anyone’s cautious takes or nuanced pasts. Politics is war in this environment, and even a former intelligence officer didn’t seem to have the appetite for going into the trenches.

In the end, I think Phifer’s biggest mistake was trying to rely on the party caucus to secure her place on the DFL ticket. Perhaps her budget forced her hand there, but caucuses are not friendly environments for newcomers: the small number of participants means a few established players wield a lot of power, and the people willing to give up a random Saturday in April are also far more likely to be true believers in their causes. Despite what some people tried to project on Phifer, that was never who she was. She was an optimistic, perhaps naïve change agent whose candidacy rose and fell with tides beyond her control, as they toppled a powerful figure but left no clear path forward in their wake. Time will tell if this brave new world benefits the MN-8 DFL or not.

Who benefits most from her withdrawal from the race? Lee, potentially; while short on resources compared to the others, she is now the only obvious choice for the mining skeptics in the party. Her best hope is probably for a knockout fight between Joe Radinovich and Jason Metsa, where she could win a primary with 35-40 percent of the vote. Kirsten Kennedy could also possibly gain, but she needs a much stronger infrastructure to go anywhere. If anyone is set back somewhat, I think it’s Metsa, who would have benefitted from the institutional support that turns out reliable votes in a more crowded field. Given that backing, though, it’s hardly a knockout blow for his candidacy, and if the race gets bloody, Metsa has the benefit of having some of the Iron Range’s best fighters in his corner.

But for now, I think the DFL nomination is Radinovich’s to lose. He’s positive and telegenic; like Phifer he is trying to be a lot of things to a lot of people, but since most of his young life has been in politics, he does know what he’s getting himself into. Like Rick Nolan, he hails from Cuyuna Country, so he’s independent from the traditional Range power elite, but still from a similar place culturally. At some point or another there will need to be more substance there, especially if it comes down to him and Pete Stauber this fall. But if he can continue to float above the fray, he can find a middle ground where he is, if not the first choice of both mining and environmental wings of the party, acceptable. Unless there are some skeletons in the closet that we don’t know about, he’s in a good position for the primary.

As for the general election, well, I won’t chance a prediction there. Pete Stauber waits in the wings, and few congressional races in the country will say as much about the shifts in Trump era political coalitions as MN-8. Buckle up. We’re only getting started.

Programming note: I’d hoped to have another collection of news stories up today, but that got bumped by this more timely piece of news. It’ll be along tomorrow.

A Bunch of Good Journalism, 4/11/18

I’ve been reading a lot of random stuff this week. Here are links to some of it.

In my dreams this might become a weekly or semi-weekly feature, though that also requires me to read and collect enough interesting things over the course of a week, and these things will need to be linkable from a blog. (My book-reading goes in fits and burst these days, as I sometimes spend days buried in print, and then lapse into weeks of nothing but articles on the screen, or in print editions of magazines.) I’ll do my best to collect a wide range of thought on timely topics, though I make no claim that they will aspire to some sort of balance, and much good writing is not necessarily timely (or always is). I will even resist the urge to take potshots at Mark Zuckerberg as part of this, even though this week’s events have teed me up there. The intent is really just to collect good, thoughtful journalism.

No, instead of any take on Facebook, I’ll direct readers to the most jarring thing to hit the presses this week: Junot Diaz’s confessional on the abuse he endured as a child, and how it left him sexually broken for years and years thereafter. It’s a searing take on how trauma can linger, and is a valuable window into human brokenness and sympathy, which can be all too rare in highly charged times. It deserves to be read a billion times more than the latest piece on why Donald Trump is destroying America/is its savior.

Sticking with the New Yorker, we come to Vinson Cunningham’s review of Ross Douthat’s new book, To Change the Church, which is a critique of the direction of the Catholic faith under Pope Francis. The review is one of the most clear-eyed takes on Catholicism in recent popular press, and engages the Church as the complicated institution that it is, instead of trying to cram a take on the church into a liberal or conservative worldview. (I’m not Catholic, but I dabble in Catholic circles more than anywhere else.) Cunningham seems to share my appreciation of Douthat, who is a master of poking holes into liberal orthodoxy and making people think, while also delivering valuable critiques to his book within a historical context. The concluding stab pairs nicely with Diaz’s piece, and points to something that turns off at least one person with some curiosity about the Church far more than any doctrinal debate ever could.

Okay, fine, I’ll find one article about Trump: David Brooks, another member of the Times‘s Endangered Conservatives Club, speaks to the failures of  Never Trumpism in his Tuesday column. I’ve defended David in the past and have him to thank for a supporting role in my drift into my current career trajectory, but have found him a frustrating columnist in the Trump Era. He’s at his best when doing pop sociology and reviewing others’ scholarly work, not when he’s trying to mount a defense of a mushy view of the American republic from his privileged throne. (He said he was going to make a better effort to understand his country post-election, but evidence of any such effort is pretty thin.) This time around, though, he’s exactly on point as to why the forces arrayed against Trump, whether on the left or conservative critics such as himself, have failed, and will continue to fail unless they change tack.

Or maybe the issue is just baked into the media. Over at The American Conservative, Telly Davidson provides a take on a dust-up over Kevin Williamson, the National Review writer who was hired by the Atlantic for a hot second before the Atlantic got cold feet over his comments on. Williamson is a firebrand who likes to unsettle people; I quoted the piece that put him on my radar when he took a conservative angle to blast the working class white people who became a focal point among the chattering classes during the 2016 election season. I’m ambivalent on all of this; my instinct is usually to appreciate a skilled writer who brings an original perspective, yet I’m also not really a fan of Williamson’s level of bombast, and while the Atlantic‘s waffling elicits an eye roll, he largely dug his own grave. But, whatever one thinks of Williamson’s current employment status, Davidson is on to something in discussing the broader media environment in the time of clickbait. It’s broad brush writing, and there are obvious exceptions, but it’s also a very fair diagnosis of an industry that deserves much of the criticism it has merited in recent years. So quit reading all that junk and stick to intellectually curious blogs.

Lest we get down on journalism, though, here’s Roger Cohen from a couple of weeks ago, writing beautifully about the importance of his craft. I make no claim to being a journalist, but it does get at why I write, and is a reminder of how a lifetime of observing can burst forth in a few moments of clarity that, with any luck, will mean something to someone, somewhere. We’re drowning in supposed journalism today, but a few pieces really do pierce through the endless news cycle and the default cynicism that seems to pervade an era. May we continue to find those pieces, whether in the Times or some local rag, and share them as widely as we can.

Ridgetop Requiem

This post is the eighth in a fictional series that began here. The previous installment is here.

At least his father had the good sense to bite it in summer, Mark thinks as he drives up the rutted gravel road toward the clifftop villa overlooking Lake Superior. He can only imagine what would have happened if the diagnosis had come in winter. The hospice nurse probably would have gone over the edge in that puny little Volvo parked at the gate, or maybe no one would have found the body until the snows melted. Perhaps not an inappropriate end for the Ice King of the North Shore, Mark muses before scolding himself for his impropriety.

Mark had always known he’d likely lose his father at an early age. Pierpont Brennan conceived his youngest son at age 56, an unhappy side product of a tryst with a woman twenty-three years his junior. But when Mark pushes the lodge door open and announces his arrival, the feeble welcome that bleats out in response jars him. He greets the nurse and makes the perfunctory small talk before asking for some privacy. She wobbles between her practiced pity for children of the dying and a dose of fear at Mark’s coolness: bespoke suit sans tie, perfectly windswept hair, no outward betrayal of emotion. Mark suspects she diagnoses some stage of grief, and he is content to let her believe he is in shock or denial, not blithely indifferent to death.

He wonders how hard it would be to seduce her. She looks to be early thirties, cute in a weather-beaten sort of way, very much the motherly type. The sort who tells herself she has standards, but most likely will let them crumble when faced with a louche, exotic East Coast boy. Right in his wheelhouse, he thinks. She offers him some reassuring clichés on her way out the door, and he berates himself for this lapse into his basest desire to just fuck everything. This is why he shouldn’t go home. It brings out the worst in him.

After a resigned sigh, Mark goes to stand before Pierpont Brennan. His father rests in the recliner in front of the floor-to-ceiling windows in the lodge’s great room, free to gaze out at a complete panorama of the shoreline 500 feet below, if he ever manages to lift his eyes. Just six months ago, when Mark had last visited, his father had casually boasted about his hikes down to the lakefront and back again. Now, he’s a fading wraith, his skin drawn thin and his once sleek silver mane rendered a patchy mess.

“Kind of you to come back from Shangri-La to see your father die.”

Even in a terminal state, he still can’t help but take digs.

“Evan and I go off the grid when we’re hiking. Didn’t get the message until two days ago, and, well, here I am.”

“Better than nothing.”

“None of the others…”

A derisive snort interrupts Mark’s words.

“Apparently not?”

“You know full well what they think of me.”

“Considering that only one of them even talks to me, I’d say so.”

“My family, loving to the end.”

“Hey, some of us try.”

“You want a medal?”

“Don’t your people have some story about the prodigal son or something? About how the father welcomed him back with open arms?”

“‘My people.’ Hmph.”

“Aw, are we really going to do this now?”

“Why change at the end?”

Mark grumbles, but manages a retort after a pause that is only slightly too long. “You changed. You broke totally free after you had me, lived a totally different life.”

“The last few chapters of my life haven’t been all that happy.”

“Glad you enjoyed your time with me.”

“Shut up with your goddamn smart mouth.”

“What, I’m supposed to take this lying down?”

Mark’s father pauses before retorting. His precision is fading, as sure a sign of decline as any, but he fires up the engines once again.

“It’s not about you. It’s about what I did…loyal and God-fearing for all those years. Finally breaking out to stop living in misery. I got nothing in return. Maybe this is all I deserved.”

“You know, when my last girlfriend dumped me, she said I somehow managed to be arrogant and always self-pitying, all at once. Guess I know where I got it from.”

“Quit sniping and take a seat next to me.”

Mark nods and nestles into the Spartan wooden chair next to the recliner. Silence reigns in the chalet, save for the rumble of a braking truck that echoes up from the highway at the base of the cliff. Clouds wander in and out of their line of sight, darkening the lake below them in scattered patches. Every silent second feels like an eternity.

“I will miss this view,” Mark chances. His father doesn’t reply, so Mark keeps his gaze outward on the lake. He shies from looking at this frail remnant to his left, his formidable father reduced to a shell of his former self. Even the hint of vulnerability in his most recent utterance feels wrong: this isn’t how Pierpont Brennan should go. The two of them should be fighting to the last breath, playing out their vicious charade, the two narcissists’ simple acknowledgement of their intertwined fates. It’s the closest thing they can muster to a declaration of love.

Only once before has this façade cracked, that back when Pierpont lamented his affair with Mark’s mother, only for Mark to remind him that without it, he wouldn’t exist. For the first time, Pierpont had acknowledged that his last son was very much his own, unsure of whether this was a point of pride or not, torn between his desire to justify his late-life dalliances and his regret that they never brought him the satisfaction he sought. Pierpont, ever an agent of his own happiness, his love life’s value cast in the utilitarian terms that made him so ruthlessly successful on Wall Street.

Mark barely knew his father in his prime. His three half-siblings hold him in thinly veiled contempt for what he brought into the open. His father, diminished by the collapse of his ever-so-perfect family, had resigned his presidency of a multinational holding company and settled for an obscure consulting position at a mining plant on the shores of Lake Superior, where his new wife had come from before her ambition led her to the world of New York’s escorts. Pierpont Brennan’s early exploits are legend to Mark, vague rumors of past glory that he can believe but never has fully seen. His gravitas never faded, however, and Mark suspects his father courses through him when he coolly swats aside his own emotions to project the power he knows is his destiny. It comes as no surprise when his next ask brings out that dismissive leer.

“Tell me what you’re thinking about all this now.”

“I’m not sure it’s a story worth telling. I made a lot of money. It didn’t buy me happiness. At least it’s bought you a good education, even if it’s made you ask too many questions. What more is there to say?”

Mark mulls any number of things he wishes his father would say, but nothing can quite bring itself to issue from his lips. He settles for standing before the window and gazing out at nothing in particular.

“You always used to say you felt closer to God up here,” he says.

“I did say that.”

“You believe it?”

“Depends on the day, honestly.”

“And you wonder why I’m not a believer.”

“No, I know exactly why you aren’t. And I don’t blame you.”

“Appreciate that.”

Mark’s lower lip wobbles. His father first cheated on his mother when he was ten, was caught when he was thirteen, divorced at fifteen. Not once in the eight years since has there been any mention of what transpired. Now, on his deathbed, his father concedes some of the damage done by that festering wound. Twenty-three years, hidden in darkness.

Mark cannot stay at his father’s side. He turns his back without a word and wanders the house one final time. The last time in which it is intact, at least; he’s sure he’ll be back here overseeing some estate sale and ushering it on to the market, with no one else to do the job. It may sit there for years. How much demand can there be for a multi-million dollar home at the end of an eroding gravel road in northern Minnesota?

He starts his tour downstairs in his old walkout bedroom, still cluttered with the detritus of stray weekends spent back here during high school. Some trophies, a pile of hockey programs, the empty vodka bottles stashed in the dresser, the summer clothes that are now out of fashion and were always too preppy for rural Minnesota anyway. He’d weeded out anything of sentimental value years ago, in an attempt to purge this house of any semblance of his old life. Now he almost wishes he could find something that could spark an old twinge of happier days. But who is he kidding? There were no such days. He was miserable from the day they moved here in a futile attempt to save his parents’ failing marriage.

He wanders back upstairs, skirting the great living room to slip up the staircase to the lofted bedroom. This was supposed to be the guest room to showcase the North Shore to his parents’ friends from back East, though few of them ever came. Instead, it became the site of his father’s liaisons, and also where Mark enjoyed his first blowjob from Emma, his obsessive middle school girlfriend. He has his phone out of his pocket to learn what became of her before he remembers he never has any service here. This is symbolic of something, he figures.

The room is coated in dust, cluttered with his father’s usual poorly ironed clothes and empty nightcap glasses. Once he had the place to himself, Pierpont had taken to sleeping up here until he could no longer manage the stairs, and Mark doubts anyone has been up here since. The view is as magnificent as it ever was, and he can still hear Emma’s gasps in awe when she saw the twenty-mile shoreline panorama. His teenage conquests now leave him both proud and repulsed, unapologetic but afraid that he is nothing more than a sleazy sex addict who’s never learned a thing, despite all his pretentions of truth-seeking and intellectual growth.

Mark looks down from the loft at his unmoving father and wonders vaguely if he is the sole heir, or if Pierpont has thrown some bones to his estranged older children. If his father were a generous man, he would have just left it all to charity to spurn his ungrateful offspring, but he has no such causes left to earn his loyalty. Pierpont was eternally short on compassion for the downtrodden, grumpy about the internal politics of his alma maters, and stopped going to church after his second divorce. Even the Republican Party ceased to be worthy of his largesse after it started to turn against the free trade policies that let Pierpont make millions off of various offshoring maneuvers.

Mark has played his cards ever so carefully. He started the game even in high school, right after he moved out with his mother, and endured long weekends back here to ensure a future payoff. He suffered through tales of old board room meetings and leveraged buyouts, and made sure his patron knew he was using his old network as he made his way in New Haven and New York. He brought in the lawyer to make sure Pierpont had his affairs in order, always pulling strings from a distance. The more cynical part of his brain is pleased with how well he’s pulled it off, but on those scattered occasions where his father’s humanity does pierce through, he feels a pang of guilt over how shamelessly he’s plotted for this day.

Mark heads back down the stairs and goes to his father’s side. No acknowledgement. He settles into a crouch; his father always preferred talking to people when he could look down on them. He whets his lips and tries the first words that come to his mind.

“Can I get you something? A snack? Water? That bottle of absinthe I know you have in the pantry?”

Pierpont laughs. “I’m scared for you, Mark. I always have been.”

“Scared? Why?”

“You have too much of me in you.”

“I won’t deny it…but, shit.”

“Same ego, same vanity, same sense that you always deserved more. After doing everything in my power to make a clean break from my old life…my youngest son was more like the old me than any of my other three children. Seeing that? It was the beginning of the end with your mother. I saw that running away with her was all a sham.”

“You seriously gonna try to pin that on ten-year-old me?”

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t…you see how confused it all is? Why I’m not dying in peace?”

“Is this really the way you want to go out? Like this?”

“Do I have any choice?”

“Yes. You’ve got to. Where did it go wrong?” Pierpont averts his eyes, cowed, and Mark feels another twinge of guilt. He shouldn’t abuse a dying man like this. But if not now, when? Mark knows this is his own greatest sin: he must know. His appetite knows no bounds. He cannot linger in doubt, even for a second. And that awful doubt that has hung over the entire story of his life, that both he and his father see perpetuated in him, may never see an answer on this earth.

“Answer me.”

“You’re cruel.”

“I have too much of you in me.”

The two share a wry laugh.

“The mistake, I think, was in thinking I could break free. I believed it, and it was convenient when your mother came along, to think I could flush down that past. I couldn’t. And yet I can’t say it was a mistake, either…as you always remind me.” For the first time since Mark’s arrival, a smile crawls on to Pierpont’s face. “It was always me, all of it, the good and the bad, and every shade of grey in between. We’re complicated creatures.”

Mark nods. “I feel that. We want it all to make sense. Be the hero. And some days I am. Look what I’ve done with my life. But then…”

“You fall right back into the gutter that you know all too well.” Pierpont closes his eyes and settles back into the chair. For a moment, Mark fears this is the end, but his eyes suddenly bulge open with new life.

“I wish I could have told my kids that the world isn’t the way it is. That we’d all find ways to live happily ever after. Both of my wives thought so, in their own way. But I couldn’t lie to you. I may not have said it right, but I do think I taught you how to fend for yourselves. And you all do.”

“Is that what it’s all about? Being able to fend for yourself?”

“I don’t know. Some book I read once probably said that, but I don’t know that it’s worth all the philosophical babble anymore. I wanted you to be confident in who you are. I don’t think you can find any fault in that.”

“Maybe not. And I am, usually. But…I’ve always felt torn. Between the East Coast and Minnesota, between you and Mom, between all this wandering curiosity and all those questions, and then that side of me that wants to cut through all the bullshit and get things done and make bank.”

“It all adds up to you as you are.”

“I’m not sure how I feel about that.”

“It’s a burden to bear. Not one that I’ve always done a very good job of. Though…maybe I’m salvaging something at the end here.”

Tears begin to well in Mark’s eyes.

“Don’t cry for me, kid.”

“I’m not. Not really. I’m crying for what could have been.”

“Don’t dwell.”

“That’s rich.”

“I am rich, and I’ve earned the right to say what I please.”

Mark laughs. “That you have.”

“Help me up.”

Mark’s first urge is to dissuade his father from exertion, but he suppresses this sorry impulse and lends Pierpont Brennan an arm. The two make a slow, lurching walk along the full length of the wall of glass, then step out on to the side deck. Mark puts on his sunglasses to hide his swimming eyes and tosses his hair in the soft lake breeze. His father takes deep, rasping breaths as he sucks down the cool air, collects himself, and gazes up at his son.

“You may miss this view. And I’m glad you feel some nostalgia for this place. But don’t miss it too much, you hear me?”

“No?”

“This place…it’s beautiful in its solitude. But it’s never had enough life in it. You know this.”

Mark nods.

“When are you headed back east?”

“There’s no timeline.”

“I don’t know how long this will take, you know. I did take pretty good care of myself, booze aside. And I’m stubborn.”

“Got your genes on all those fronts, too.”

“I am afraid for you. But I will admit that I’m proud, too.”

“Thanks, Dad.”

“I know you’ve been looking for answers. Trying not to make the same mistakes. You don’t need to tell me if you’ve found something, but…promise me you won’t ever stop.”

Mark blossoms into the most genuine smile he’s ever known. “That I can do.”

That evening, Mark will make a simple meal for his father, and they will trade some tales of their early days on the trading floor. After they share some of the absinthe, Mark will tuck Pierpont beneath a blanket in his recliner, and his father will expire in his sleep. The next morning, Mark will tell some of his father’s story to the nurse, though he will neither cry in front of her nor make any effort to woo her. He notifies the lawyer and the undertaker, and he calls Evan to invite him up the Shore so the two of them can have a wake, the only memorial service that will be held in his father’s name. Content, Mark heads back down to his old bedroom’s closet and finds one salvageable item: a battered old pair of running shoes. He laces them up and heads out on to the trails on the property to run them one last time.

Evan tells him he will never truly find closure, and he has no reason to doubt his friend’s hard-earned wisdom. But he can take time to process, and to sear certain lessons into his mind so that he never forgets them. Yes, Mark thinks as he picks himself up from a fall in the mud and keeps on running. For now, that will have to be enough.

This series continues here.

Continuity Issues

Over the past seven months, I’ve released six posts in a fictional series, which have followed two boys from high school and now past college graduation. Chronologically, the next piece in this series was, in fact, the first one I wrote. I posted it on this blog back in 2016, before I had any designs of putting additional stories involving its characters on this blog. As I think this story is best read in chronological order, I’ll direct anyone who’s following along back to that post, which you can find here. It has undergone some mild revisions to make it consistent with the six that precede it within the arc of Evan and Mark’s stories. At least four more will follow.

This post is so short it feels like cheating.

A State Tournament Look Back: 2008

As I round out my hockey coverage this winter, I offer one last piece that I promised my Twitter followers: a recap of the 2008 State Tournament. While I’d been to it as a Greyhound fan before and watched most of the games the previous few years, this was the first time I locked in to all the games, and I dragged my dad down for the AA final. (I haven’t missed a AA Tourney game since.) It’s the first year for which I have a Tourney program, and one of my favorite features of that program, as an 18-year-old Greyhound, was the 10-year look back on the 1998 state champs from my high school. But even before the MSHSL lobotomized the programs two years ago and removed that feature, a blog post along these lines was brewing in my mind, and now that we are ten years out it seems ideal to look. (MSHSL, if you’re out there reading, I’d gladly pay much more than $5 to get the old version back!) All but the most exceptional players who participated in that Tourney have now seen their playing days to come to an end, and I’ve done some mining of HockeyDB to track where all the players listed in the program went on to play.

Class AA

2008 was a memorable Tourney in large part for its big four: the top four seeds were four of the top five teams in the state heading in, and they all advanced to the semifinals to set up a Friday night session that set an attendance record that stood for several years. Top-seeded Roseau, the defending State Champs, were the darlings of the Tourney, as they came in with an undefeated record, presumptive Mr. Hockey winner Aaron Ness, and the top goaltender in the state, Mike Lee. With Jason Fabian, Tyler Landman, and head coach Scott Oliver’s son Nick leading the offense, the Rams had the balance to repeat.

The dream final was to feature the Rams and second-seeded Edina, a matchup that would have brought together the state’s two most decorated programs. The one-loss Hornets had lost in the quarterfinals to Grand Rapids as the top seed in 2007, and their Fab Four junior core of Zach Budish, Marshall Everson, Connor Gaarder, and Brendan Baker had added one Anders Lee, a transfer from St. Thomas Academy who is now in the NHL. Senior Mr. Hockey finalist Joe Gleason led the defense, and a couple of the depth players gave them a full eight future D-I players. The Hornets looked primed to atone for the previous year’s miss.

The third seed was private school Benilde-St. Margaret’s of St. Louis Park. After some success at Minnetonka, Red Knights head coach Ken Pauly was back with the program with which he’d won two Class A titles, and this time around, they had a fighting shot at the big crown. They’d vanquished the only top five team missing from the Tourney, Minnetonka, in the 6AA final, and while they didn’t have the front-end talent of the two favorites, they were deep with a group attuned to Pauly’s up-tempo style. Six Red Knights would go on to Division-I hockey, including Chris Student, Matt Berglund, Tom McCarthy, and Patrick Borer.

And then there was the fourth seed in the field, Hill-Murray. Like Edina, the Pioneers were looking to atone for recent upset losses at State; they’d lost to unseeded Rochester Century in the quarterfinals in 2007, and in 2006, a one-loss team had fallen to Grand Rapids in the semifinals. This team was led by its defense, including Bo Dolan and Dan Sova, who brought the hits all weekend, and its goaltender, Joe Phillippi. Seniors Dan Cecka and Ryan Furne were their leading scorers, and a deep junior class including Isaac Kohls, Nick Widing, and Tyler Zepeda gave them scoring depth. Like Benilde, they didn’t have the draft picks of Roseau and Edina, and came in somewhat unheralded, but in retrospect, this group looks as formidable as any in the field, with six D-I players and excellent depth.

The rest of the field wasn’t devoid of talent, either. Woodbury, appearing in its second consecutive Tourney, had a couple of front-line forwards in David Eddy and future 3rd round pick Max Gaede. Blaine, making its third consecutive Tourney appearance after an upset of Centennial in the 5AA final, had a freshman named Nick Bjugstad on its roster. The surprise entrant was Cloquet-Esko-Carlton out of 7AA; a year after bowing out in sections with a much stronger team on paper, the Lumberjacks advanced to the Tourney on the backs of two D-I players, the giant Justin Jokinen and defenseman David Brown, whose scoring binge in sections stunned favored Duluth East and also eclipsed Anoka. Rounding out the field was a .500 Lakeville South team backstopped by the wonderfully named Hakan Yumusaklar.

Quarterfinal Thursday went according to form. Edina rolled past Cloquet 5-0 in the early game, and while gameplay wasn’t overly lopsided, the Lumberjacks had no answer for the Hornets’ front end talent. Benilde beat Woodbury 4-1 in the second game, and while they outshot the Royals 41-26, Woodbury did stick around the whole time, and cut the deficit to 2-1 in the middle of the 3rd before an empty-netter and a last second goal padded the scoreline for the Red Knights. Roseau put on a show with an 8-2 blitz of Blaine in primetime, with Tyler Landman locking up a hat trick less than a minute into the 2nd and Aaron Ness scoring two of his own. Hill wrapped up a strong day for the top seeds by slipping three past Yumusaklar in a workmanlike 3-0 win.

Semifinal Friday delivered on its promised drama. Edina and Benilde, which had its share of Edina youth players, put together one of the most entertaining games of the decade in the opener. Edina built 3-1 and 4-2 leads, but goals early in the 3rd from Student and Berglund tied the game, and a frantic third period produced no more goals. Everson, Edina’s great sniper, won it in overtime for the Hornets. The nightcap would be hard-pressed to match that drama, but it quickly turned into a shocker. Hill’s heavy hitting set the tone early, and the Pioneers then erupted for three goals late in the first and early in the second. Roseau clawed one back early in the third, but came no closer, and both the perfect season and the dream final ended in a couple of Pioneer empty-netters.

The title game thus matched the favored Hornets and the surging Pioneers in a battle of state powers. (“Cake tastes better on the East Side,” read one sign from the Hill-Murray faithful.) The Pioneers opened the scoring just 2:30 in on a goal from Ryan Furne, but the key came with one second left in the first period, when a seemingly harmless shot from the blue line by Furne bled through Edina goalie Derek Caschetta for a 2-0 Hill lead. From there, Phillippi in goal and the relentless Pioneer defense went to work. Budish rang one along the top of the crossbar on Edina’s best chance, and after Delaney Metcalf put away the third Pioneer goal, the Hill band cranked up “Another One Bites the Dust.” The Pioneers would shut out Edina 3-0 to claim their third state title, and first since 1991.

Elsewhere, Woodbury fought past Cloquet and Benilde for 5th place in a competitive consolation bracket, and Benilde bumped off beleaguered Roseau 5-1 in the third place game on the strength of four third period goals. Aaron Ness took home his Mr. Hockey award, while Budish, the most heralded of the Edina stars at that time, would not play another high school game due to a football injury in the fall of his senior year. Joe Phillippi parlayed his Tourney performance into a cup of coffee at St. Cloud State, and while Hill would return to State in 2009, four members of their vaunted junior class would not be a part of it, as they were removed from the team midseason for disciplinary reasons.

In 2008, though, the Pioneers’ performance at State was one of the most memorable of all time, given the teams they beat and the dominant fashion in which they did it. They allowed just two goals in the Tourney. Their showing ended Roseau’s dream run for back-to-back titles, and while their 2014 team had a fighting shot, as of this writing, this was the 7-time champs’ last great chance. It left a bunch of Edina juniors thinking they had unfinished business, and promising they would come back for another shot a year later. It was a launching point for Hill-Murray coach Bill Lechner, who up to that point had not enjoyed a ton of playoff success relative to expectations; that script would flip in the following years. His defensive assistant, Pat Schafhauser, got some much-deserved credit for the force with which the Pioneers bullied the two top-ranked teams in the state out of their way. Hill-Murray was back on top.

The chart below lays out how many players from each grade on each team went on to D-I and post-high school hockey, respectively. While this isn’t a perfect metric of how good they were in 2008—some good players hang up the skates after high school, others peak early or bloom late—it does give some idea of the talent level in this field. A single game is enough to get a mention, and we’re using HockeyDB standards for post-high school careers, so low-level junior leagues like the NA3HL are not included. Anyone who was on the State Tournament roster is counted.

2008 aa

Looking back, it’s pretty clear why the Pioneers won. They had the deepest senior class and were supported by a strong junior class, and while they didn’t have the front-end skill of Edina or Roseau, they were deeper. Edina had a ton of talent, but was perhaps a year away from what should have been their peak; Benilde was senior-heavy but not quite on the same level as Hill, and Roseau’s relative lack of depth comes out here. An observer looking at this table who didn’t know the results might guess all the games correctly based on what’s here.

Class A

In Class A, top-seeded St. Thomas Academy was both very young and very skilled, with six future D-I players: sophomores Christian Isackson, Justin Crandall, and Ryan Walters, plus freshmen Zach Schroeder, A.J. Reid, and Matt McNeely, were all on the roster. Factor in some experienced upperclassmen, and the Cadets were clearly the class of the field. Their greatest threat for the crown, such as they were, was Duluth Marshall, a team that lacked much in the way of star power, but had good depth and the hero of the previous season’s win over St. Thomas, defenseman Dano Jacques. The Cadets had beaten the Hilltoppers in the 2006 title game, while the Toppers clipped St. Thomas in overtime in the semis in 2007, and the top two seeds seemed destined for a title game rubber match. The three next-best teams in Class A all featured an underclassman future NHLer: Warroad with Brock Nelson, St. Cloud Cathedral with Nate Schmidt, and Little Falls with Ben Hanowski. Warroad, the deepest of the bunch, claimed the 3-seed, while Cathedral took the four and Little Falls drew the short straw and was saddled with a first round date with St. Thomas.

In the quarterfinals, Duluth Marshall got something of a fight from Corey Leivermann-led Mankato West, while Warroad brushed aside Litchfield, and Cathedral handled Blake. The highlight of the day was St. Thomas’s win over Little Falls, in which the Flyers twice came from behind to tie the game on Hanowski goals, one of which inspired Hanowski’s salute to the Cadet faithful. Hanowski missed a penalty shot in the second period, and late goals from Ryan Walters and James Saintey earned the Cadets the win. After that, things held to form: Marshall fought past Warroad to earn a third straight trip to the title game, but St. Thomas simply rolled, with a 9-2 win over Cathedral and a 5-1 blitz of Marshall for a second title in three years.

The Class A Tourney made one thing clear: the Cadets now set the bar in Class A, and while they would miss the next two tournaments, they were now reeling top-end talent like no other small school program. Marshall fell off somewhat afterwards, and never could quite claim a title, and Warroad, Cathedral, and Little Falls would all be back as the top three seeds the next season.

2008 a

Looking at this, St. Thomas’s dominance makes all the sense in the world. Marshall, perhaps, overachieved this season, given that they’d run out of Connollys to lead the offense, though this might look different if Jacques had continued playing. The big surprise here is the Blake team that I don’t remember at all, but actually had a pretty good collection of Class A talent (Josh Birkholz is a name I’d completely forgotten.) The Bears went 0-2 and mustered little against Cathedral and Little Falls. Otherwise, this one largely went according to form as well.

Hope you enjoyed this, and I plan to make it a yearly feature.

Tourney Reflection 2018

I’ve been to every AA Tourney game for ten years running, but this one drained me more than any of them. From emotional investment in my alma mater to the rigors of running commentary for Youth Hockey Hub to a simple desire to delight in every possible moment of Tournament finery, this one took its toll. It was worth every second. Even my knees are bruised from wedging into Xcel seats, the battle wounds of a Tourney well-lived.

2018 ended with a Lake Minnetonka boat party in both classes, as two first-timers ascended to their thrones. The Class A quarters did enough to tease us with upsets, though none delivered; the first day of AA saw three methodical wins from the top seeds and the start of a fourth before the Centennial Cougars roared to life, stunned St. Thomas Academy, and broke their section’s decade of despair in St. Paul. After that, it was all nervous tension, with intrigue in every single late-round game.

This Tourney came to its zenith on Semifinal Friday, always my favorite day of the Tourney: the quarterfinals always have something of a carnival atmosphere, with teams just happy to be there and hair on display, and the Championship Saturday has its own mystique that brings in the winner and the loser. Friday, however, is all business, where dreams are either dashed or passed along to primetime. Class A delivered the goods yet again in the afternoon, as Orono burst out to a 4-goal lead before Mahtomedi blew all the way back, only to see the Spartans finish them off in overtime. Next to me in the stands, Chase from Mahtomedi rode the waves of emotion down and up and then into a crash, but bounced back to chat up the Mora girls in front of us for the nightcap. Helping the rebound was the stunner in game two: down went Hermantown. For the first time this decade, the Hawks would miss the Class A final, their streak undone by a hard-hitting core of Cardinals from Alexandria. While the Cards’ parade to the box on Saturday kept them from being able to interrupt Orono’s steady push, they certainly sent the state their message.

The evening session began with a match-up that has become synonymous with the Tourney, the very phrase saying it all: Duluth East-Edina on a Friday Night. East answered the first Edina punch and refused to crumble as the Hornets piled on, and the giants of the north continued their great run against the state’s foremost hockey power. Scrappy Centennial again threatened to upend the Tourney in the second game, but Minnetonka kept churning away, and once they got one, it was no surprise when four more followed. Those Skippers kept the momentum rolling into Saturday. The stars came to play in this Tourney, with Bobby Brink slicing, Sammy Walker dicing, and Garrett Worth sniping. But for my money the difference-maker was the Minnetonka top defensive pair of Josh Luedtke and Grant Docter. They were the fulcrum for the Skippers’ seamless motion machine, their fluid breakouts doing just enough to break through the Duluth East barricades that had turned back the Hornets the night before.

A deep run by one’s alma mater only adds to the drama, and I did my part for the cause when I defended Duluth East pride with a bubble hockey win over some Minnetonka kids before the championship. We’ve been here before in my time as an East fan, but this one had the infectious spirit of a deep run where we loyal Hounds knew we had a very good chance. Out came the former players, the familiar faces among parents, and some alumni I hadn’t seen in years. I met some Red Wing guys with no direct tie to Duluth East who nonetheless proudly sported their Greyhound gear, and shared a couple drinks with the legendary Blackout Todd. I even had brushes with some Hounds in the student section like Tommy and Superfan Sam, who now get to learn how deeply the Hound hockey legacy can linger.

The Tourney mixes and matches us with people from beyond our own little tibes. I spent the Thursday night upset next to a diehard Cadet and directly in front of a box of Centennial moms, their reactions to events a perfect yin and yang. The next night, the box was home to some vicious Edina squirts, while in front of us, a dignified Hornet couple who appeared to have mistaken a hockey game for a night at the opera sniffed at our primal reactions to Greyhound goals. But even the Cake can join the fun: an Edina dad at McGoverns passed along a gift, and I consoled a Hornet alumnus friend who came down to visit for the second AA game on Friday. Toss in a couple of Tourney Virgin friends who fed our motley collection toward the back of Section 108 that night, and we had our own little party under way. “Why so sleepy?” we chanted at the Fairview Health ad when it appeared on the screen for the umpteenth time. Why? Because we’ve given it all in our nonstop hockey carnival, and it’s time for a good, long rest.

Not yet, though: the cast of characters goes on. There was The Lady, a posse of private school coaches at Grand Seven, and the St. Thomas parents. There were the familiar faces down the row playing the quarters game, and the press corps friends who sought out Danny and I in the lower bowl: Randy from Hibbing, Tim from Moorhead, and Zach from White Bear, the only one to bring us cookies. (Perhaps the Hockey Gods will smile upon the Bears in thanks for your kindness, Zach.) Some of the old hands stopped by, too: Dan from Plymouth,  the Bemidji guy who jokingly sought my autograph on his printout of my game previews, the Saturday session break with the Ryans, and Eric and Kara, who snuck away from their newborn for a little while to maintain a tradition. Finally, I owe a shoutout to my normal Thursday dinner date at the St. Paul Grille, whom I missed this year because he was too busy doing his part with a team on its way to a state title. I’m sure I’ve left off someone who should be on this list, and if you’re not here there’s always room for more.

I also spent more of this Tourney brushing shoulders with kids still in school than I ever have. “The Tourney is kind of our thing,” one of our Eveleth friends told us, as true a statement as there ever was. I made my annual Friday night circuit of the 200 Level, a sure way to make oneself feel like a fossil, and found myself googling cell phone games I’d never heard of. The Tourney is a jarring study in emotion that only teenagers can produce, from schoolboy raunchiness in the upper deck to some antics on the ice, from Joe Paradise’s selfie celly to Edina’s Jake Boltmann setting up Centennial goalie Travis Allen for a one-timer as they mucked around during a stoppage in third place game garbage time. And then, on the other side, sheer raw emotion: the remarkable poise amid tears of joy and pain for Joe Molenaar, Minnetonka’s winner of the Herb Brooks Award who lost his father all too soon.

That weight hit me again in the postgame reception area, where the Hounds players emerged from the locker room to meet their families and dedicated fans. I’ve seen kids’ season-ending tears dozens of times now, written of their moments of realization in Tourney Reflections past, but this was one where I needed to repeat certain phrases over and over again to get myself to believe them. Six years ago, I failed to find the right words for a distraught Jake Randolph in the bowels of the X; this year, I found some of that wisdom that hockey has taught me. It’s all over now, and spring is upon us yet again. But yet it isn’t over, and never does really end for those of us who lived it for four days in March. We are the heirs to something transcendent, and we must never forget it.

The Power and the Glory: Duluth East 2017-2018 in Review

Those of us who follow Duluth East hockey don’t really know the meaning of an unmemorable season. The storylines always seem to fall into place, and win or lose, the Greyhounds find some way to entertain us. But the 2017-2018 team, runners up in the state of Minnesota, somehow found a way to make themselves to stand out above the rest. It was a remarkable year.

While these Hounds had a few more hiccups against mid-tier teams than the other top teams in the state, they still finished with the second-best regular season since the last championship in 1998, and they rolled into the playoffs with more jump than that one team that was better than them on paper, the 2012 group that lost to Lakeville South in the quarterfinals. They flashed their formidable talent in solid wins over the likes of Wayzata, Andover, Centennial, Elk River, and top-ranked Minnetonka, and the only concerning wobbles came against local rivals like Cloquet and Duluth Marshall. After they slaughtered the Hilltoppers in the section semis and found a way to dig deep and overcome scrappy Andover in the section final, they had all the makings of a team on a championship run.

The Hounds faced a spirited test from the Knights of St. Michael-Albertville in the Tourney quarterfinals, but a sudden detonation of WMD (plus some Logan Anderson for good measure) in the second period put away the Knights. Garrett Worth pulled his best Dave Spehar with a hat trick, and at 5-0 the Hounds had their largest Tourney margin of victory since the days of said Mr. Spehar. Parker Kleive logged a shutout in net to prove East goaltending would be no weakness in this Tourney, and Mike Randolph was able to rotate in some depth players to keep his most dangerous weapons in tune for Friday night.

For the fourth time in eight years, the first game on Friday night had the Hounds matched with Edina, a titanic clash between the two best programs of the two-class era. This war has come to define Tourney semifinals, and this Edina squad, which blasted so many quality opponents into running time, looked every bit the most lethal one in the field in its romp to the semifinals. It all ended there. A Worth snipe, an Ian Mageau power move, a Randolph lockdown defense, a Carson Cochran diving save, and a bit of luck on a fluttering puck off the stick of Frederick Hunter Paine proved the formula for a Greyhound victory. Worth fired one last rocket into the open net to punctuate the night: one of the most skilled Hornet squads in history was history, vanquished yet again by their great nemesis of the North.

The Hounds got off to a slow start and an early deficit against Minnetonka in the state championship game, but with a few in-game adjustments they still found a way to generate their share of ever-so-close chances. The second line in particular was flying, with Austin Jouppi and Ricky Lyle providing the offense for the night. WMD, however, was snakebitten, and the tight defensive corps took a beating as the clock ticked down on their third straight game. None of those close chances went in, and with a little puck luck of their own, the smooth-skating Skippers denied the Hounds the crown.

I’ve been through a lot of East year-end losses now, but save for the unique pain that comes from the end of one’s own senior year, this one hurts the most of all of them. Even if it didn’t have the heartbreak factor of a Kyle Rau triple-overtime dive or the lingering what-ifs of losing to a less skilled opponent in 2009 or 2012, it hurts because this was such an easy team to like, and more than any of them seemed to have both the talent and the heart to win it. The team just felt like a loose, goofy group that knew its mission. It said something Mike Randolph’s first hug after a big win always seemed to be for Worth, a kid who had to aggravate him at times, but remained lovable in spite of it, and certainly showed his share of growth over his years as a Hound. (Garrett listed Randolph as his greatest fear in the team program.) The buy-in was complete, and the right blends of skill and balance, of experience and confidence, of coaching and freedom, were all there.

This team wrote its way into the East record books. Worth’s 47 goals were the most by a Hound not named Spehar, while Ryder Donovan’s 48 assists were the most by any Hound not named Chris Locker. The top line of Worth, Ian Mageau, and Donovan will go down as one of the team’s best, and certainly the one with the best nickname. Ricky Lyle’s gritty second line added the power and a strong dose of offense, the third line kept grinding away, and the four-man defensive corps grew into one that outplayed Edina’s bevy of D-I blue line talent. By the end, there wasn’t a weakness to be found.

And so we say farewell to one of the more special classes of seniors to wear the red and grey. This group lived up to its considerable hype, and its longest tenured members both began and ended their East careers with second place finishes and upsets over Edina. One last roll call: Parker Kleive, who came from somewhere completely off my radar to win the goaltending job this season, and was rock-solid when the pressure was on. Porter Haney and Hunter Hren, who provided valuable depth, and Tommy Higgins, with his state record save percentage. Will Fisher, a captain and a rock in the four-man defensive corps, and Nick Lanigan, the scrappy third liner who was always rocketing around the ice and getting his nose right in the thick of things. Austin Jouppi, who blossomed into a superb power forward and put it all on the line on the state championship game. Ian Mageau, a top line force who set up the dagger to finish Edina in 2015, scored the go-ahead goal this time around, and quietly slid his way up the East all-time scorer ranks. Luke LaMaster, named the top senior defenseman in Minnesota for his two-way play. And the sniper, Garrett Worth, whose goal barrage earned a place in the annals of East history. As always, we wish them well, both in hockey and in life, and hope they learned a bit about the latter while living it up as the former as a Greyhound.

I usually keep some distance from East players. I don’t want to come off as some weird old fanboy, and sometimes I’m probably better off not knowing what’s going on behind the scenes. This is about them, not me. But this year, I couldn’t help but throw out some hugs to players as they emerged from the locker room after it was all over. They’d invested everything they had in a game, and I’d invested a healthy amount of the past few months watching their exploits. The boys of winter didn’t disappoint: there is no better, more convenient entertainment than this, and when it’s part of a community that one can call one’s own, all one can do is offer up some appreciation. I’ll miss this group, and after a healthy rest, we can start the countdown to next November.

State Tourney Preview 2018

The annual carnival is about to begin, so here are my annual storylines and quarterfinal previews. Tony Scott, Danny Ryan, and I have preview podcast for your enjoyment, and my Danny and I will also put out our itinerary for the week on Youth Hockey Hub so that our loyal followers may stalk us. As usual, I’ll be tweeting regularly here, though don’t come to me for score updates—there are 583 other people doing that, so I see it more as my role to add scattered insight, along with some inane humor to go along with the Tourney. So, here are some things to watch this Tourney:

Fab Four Final Four? The AA field is one of the strongest ever at the top: the same four teams have stayed ranked somewhere in the top four since December, and those four have all made the State Tournament. (Listen to the podcast to get an idea of just how rare that is.) Edina, Minnetonka, St. Thomas Academy, and Duluth East are all loaded. All three are very complete teams, with several lines that can score and deep groups on defense; Edina has the most firepower, followed by East, while St. Thomas has the best goaltender, and Minnetonka is probably the most balanced across the board. None exactly have a free pass to the semis—just ask the 2012 field, which was nearly as loaded and saw all the top seeds lose in the first round—but if it is those four, or even three of those four, battling it on out Friday night, it could be one of the most memorable sets of semis in recent memory.

The Class A Mystery Ride Half the (all public school!) Class A entrants have at least 10 losses, and none have fewer than six. After last year’s stunning upsets by usual doormats from 1A and 5A, and a spirited run at an upset by the 3A representative as well, no one should be overly shocked by a big result out of one of those sections this season against someone other than Hermantown. And while the Hawks are the clear favorite for a fourth straight season, even they are more beatable than usual, with an offense reliant on one top line. While the favorites remain clear, the gap between the historically weaker sections and the powers is smaller, especially in a year when Class A lacks teams that are on par with AA’s best.

North vs. Metro, 2018 Edition Normally there are bitter grumblings from everywhere north of St. Cloud when the 7AA and 8AA winners meet in the quarterfinals, but since St. Michael-Albertville isn’t exactly a northern team, there won’t be much of that this season. A year removed from an all-north final, Duluth East is alone in carrying the weight of area code 218. In Class A, barring upsets, the semis could likely feature a Mahtomedi-Orono battle for the metro area championship in the first game, and a contest between Hermantown and Alexandria or Thief River Falls for northern bragging rights thereafter. The winners of those would then collide in a North vs. Metro championship.

Depth of Field A year after Grand Rapids rode one incredible line to a AA championship, we have a Tourney in which most of the top teams are defined by balance. Minnetonka has three excellent lines, Edina has two elite scoring lines, East has three that can score within the machine-like Mike Randolph system, and St. Thomas also has a solid supporting cast behind its top group. Even in Class A, Mahtomedi and Orono exhibit more depth than most usual contenders for the small-school crown. The notable exceptions among the seeded teams: Centennial, who will look to ride Lucas McGregor as far as he can take them, and, surprisingly, Hermantown—though the Hawks’ depth is certainly still respectable by Class A standards.

Stars in Abundance As usual, there’s no shortage of front-end talent at the Tourney. Edina’s Sammy Walker, the odds-on favorite for Mr. Hockey, will try to become the first player to win that award and a state title in his senior year since Kyle Rau in 2011. His teammate Demetrios Kouzmontzis is also a Mr. Hockey finalist. Duluth East sniper Garrett Worth and assist machine Ryder Donovan will be on hand, as will the aforementioned Lucas McGregor of Centennial and Luke Loheit of Minnetonka, plus his sophomore sidekick, Bobby Brink. It wasn’t a deep year for defensemen in Class AA, but it may not be a coincidence that the three top seniors—Luke LaMaster of Duluth East, Chase Foley of St. Thomas Academy, and Garrett Daly of Lakeville North—are all in this Tournament. Edina’s corps, while all underclassmen, is as loaded as it gets, and Minnetonka’s is no slouch either. In Class A, it’s mostly about balance, save for the Hermantown top line featuring Tyler Watkins and Blake Biondi, and Alexandria’s Ben Doherty. We’ll see if any stars on the less heralded teams can make a name for themselves, as Ben Ward and Nick Zwack did for Monticello last season.

Class A Quarterfinal Capsules:

MANKATO EAST VS. #2 MAHTOMEDI

11:00 Wednesday

-For the second straight season, Mahtomedi faces the Section 1A entrant in a Wednesday morning quarterfinal. These two have no recent history.

Mankato East (16-10-2, unranked, 2-seed in 1A)

State appearances: 2 (first in 2006)

Key section wins: 3-1 over 3-seed Minnesota River, 6-1 over 5-seed Rochester Lourdes

-Unlike many unranked Class A entrants, the Cougars are not a team to ride just one great player. No one had more than 23 points in the regular season, but they are balanced, Sam Shulz (16) was the top point-getter, while Matthew Salzle (6) and Layten Liffrig (22) led the way in the goals column. Defenseman Jake Anderson (14) is their second-leading scorer, and a strong defensive game will likely be the key to this first round match-up. Jack Cusey (29) had a strong season in goal. The Cougars are probably the biggest mystery in this field; they did tie Mound-Westonka in their lone game against a top ten Class A team and seemed to get stronger as the season went along, though they have some questionable losses, too.

Mahtomedi (21-6-1, #2, 1-seed in 4A)

State appearances: 10 (2 in a row)

Key section win: 6-3 over #16 Simley

-The Zephyrs return to State as a balanced squad with scoring up and down the lineup. Charlie Bartholomew (27), Kory Pilarski (10), and Nikolai Dulak (9) are their most productive forwards, but their top nine forwards were all in double digit points in the regular season against a fairly tough Class A schedule. Noah Skillings (8) and Tommy Broten (14) are the top defensemen. They also have the top goaltender in the field in Bailey Huber (32), who boasts a .939 save percentage. They can match Hermantown’s depth, but must find a way to contain the Hawks’ top line if those two meet, as they can’t match that star front-line talent. And, of course, they have to get there first: for all their Class A success, they’ve never made a final.

LITCHFIELD/DASSEL-COKATO VS. #3 ORONO

1:00 Wednesday

-Two Wright County Conference schools (despite the fact that neither is located in Wright County) collide in the quarterfinals. Orono won both regular season meetings in convincing fashion, with 10-0 and 7-1, and has won 36 straight games in this conference series dating to a Litchfield win in December 2001, including four playoff games when both were in 3A.

Litchfield/Dassel-Cokato (16-11-1, unranked, 2-seed in 3A)

State appearances: 4 (first since 2016)

Key section win: 4-1 over #19 Luverne

-The Dragons return to State after offing Luverne in a mild upset to win 3A. Brandt Pederson (4) is their unquestioned star offensively, while defenseman Orrin Grangroth (18) is their second leading scorer, both in goals and points. Paul Raisanen (27) and Dylan Schutz (10) round out the top line, and also had productive seasons. They’ll need a big performance out of Darby Halonen (30) in goal to have a chance, and he comes in hot off a strong performance over Luverne. Special teams were not a strength, so staying out of the box will be key to their hopes of flipping the script.

Orono (20-7-1, #5, 1-seed in 2A)

State appearances: 9 (first since 2014)

Key section wins: 6-3 over #11 Minneapolis, 2-1 over 6-seed Breck

-The Spartans put together their strongest season in recent memory and came out of one of Class A’s deepest sections. Senior Jack Suchy (16) is their star, and Thomas Walker (23) is next in line on their list of point-getters, but like Mahtomedi, this is a relatively deep Class A group, as they have eight forwards over 15 points. The forwards take care of most of their offensive production, with Daniel Eckerline (37) and Jack Kubitz (22) leading the charge on defense. Evan Babekuhl (33) is one of the stronger netminders in the field. Given the regular season results they should cruise to a date with Mahtomedi for a metro area championship of sorts, but they did lose to a 3A team in Hutchinson this season.

MONTICELLO/MAPLE LAKE VS. #1 HERMANTOWN

6:00 Wednesday

-The evening session opens with a rematch of last season’s double overtime championship game thriller. That Hawk win was their only recent meeting.

Monticello/Maple Lake (19-7-2, #15, 1-seed in 5A)

State appearances: 2 (2 in a row)

Key section win: 4-1 over #18 North Branch

-The feel-good story of last year’s Tournament returns for an encore, and this time around they didn’t sneak up on anyone. They’re without their two big scorers from a season ago, but they do have the highly productive Troy Dahlheimer (18) leading the way. Nick Foldesi (29) is their second leading scorer, Jeffrey Henrikson (5) is second on the team in goals, and Jack Saunders (15) is a productive defenseman for the Moose. Goalie Tyler Klatt (33) is a veteran of last season’s great run. With Hermantown up first they face a tall task, and their handful of games against top Class A teams have not gone well. But they have won on this ice before, and gave the Hawks all they could handle, so a repeat performance isn’t out of the question.

Hermantown (20-6-2, #1, 1-seed in 7A)

State appearances: 15 (9 in a row)

State championships: 3 (2007, 2016, 2017)

Key section win: 5-4 (2OT) vs. #3 Greenway

-The goliaths of Class A return as the favorite yet again after escaping against Greenway in 7A. This time they’re led by senior Tyler Watkins (18), who seems to rise to the occasion in big gaems, and sophomore star-in-the-making Blake Biondi (27), who is the lone D-I committed player in the Class A field. Jacob Herter (7) rounds out the top line, and while the scoring depth isn’t what it has been in recent seasons, the Hawks’ lineup can still hold its own with any other Class A team, and Elliott Peterson (22) adds a physical presence to lead the second line. The Hawks are strong in back, where Darian Gotz (14) is the leader, and Sam High (21) is a Tournament veteran as well. Cole Manahan (33) had a strong season in goal. This Hawks team is more beatable than the past two, but they also have a knack for pulling out the tight ones.

#5 THIEF RIVER FALLS VS. #4 ALEXANDRIA

8:00 Wednesday

-North meets west in the Class A nightcap. Their only two recent meetings came in the past three years, with Alexandria winning a 2015 meeting and Thief River returning the favor in 2016.

Thief River Falls (16-10-2, #20, 4-seed in 8A)

State appearances: 14 (9 in one-class tournament, 4 in Class A; first since 2016)

Championships: 2 (one-class tournament, 1954 and 1956)

Key section wins: 6-4 over #13 Warroad, 4-0 over #10 East Grand Forks

-The Prowlers, after a steady but unremarkable regular season, found their way to St. Paul with upsets over Warroad and East Grand Forks in sections. Aaron Myers (16) is a goal machine, while Tucker Skime (2) provides the assists on the top line, and Jace Jorde (17) rounds out the top group. While the forward corps is not deep, they do have one of the most productive blue lines in the state, with Brady Anderson (12), Keaden Kempert (19), and an emerging star in sophomore Evan Bushy (6). If that group can hold its own in front of star goalie Nick Corneliusen (35), the Prowlers could make their way to a Friday afternoon game.

Alexandria (17-10-1, #12, 3-seed in 6A)

State appearances: 4 (1 in AA; first since 2011)

Key section wins: 4-0 over #7 Sartell, 3-2 (2 OT) over #4 St. Cloud Cathedral

-Their run through sections might look like a surprise on paper, but the Cardinals were an early season favorite, and have now delivered on that promise. Ben Doherty (7), who missed some time this season due to injury, is their star, and Jack Westlund (10) and Caleb Strong (3) round out an all-junior top unit. Jack Powell (21) and Andrew Revering (2) make for a productive defense as well. Their depth isn’t exceptional, but freshman Jakob Stender (27) also did put up double-digit goals. Jackson Boline (30) emerged as the starting goaltender and was strong in sections. This is a young group and their success in a deep section shows their potential, so now it’s time to learn if they can deliver on it on a big stage.

AA capsules:

LAKEVILLE NORTH VS. #2 EDINA

11:00 Thursday

-Two powers collide in a rematch of the 2014 championship game, and the 2015 championship game that wasn’t. This will be their first meeting since North’s 2015 regular season win.

Lakeville North (16-10-2, #17, 1-seed in 1AA)

State appearances: 7 (first since 2015)

Championships: 1 (2015)

Key section win: 4-3 over #21 Lakeville South

-The Panthers haven’t had a dominant season, but they stayed competitive with top teams most of the time, including a tie with Minnetonka and a one-goal loss to Duluth East in December. Blake Brandt (7) and Spencer Schneider (14) are their big guns offensively, with Shane Griffin (25) rounding out the top line. Garrett Daly (16) is one of the top senior defensemen in the state, and they also enjoy the services of a very solid goaltender in Will Johnson (31). The top line can match up with a number of the others in the state, but their depth is where they will be tested, especially against a team like Edina. The list of things that need to go right to avoid Mariucci is long, but not impossible to achieve.

Edina (26-2, #2, 1-seed in 6AA)

State appearances: 38 (6 as Edina East/West in 70s and 80s; first since 2015)

Championships: 12 (1969, 1971, 1982, 1984, 1988, 1997, 2010, 2013, and 2014 as Edina; 1974, 1978, and 1979 as Edina East)

Key section win: 8-1 over #11 Wayzata

-The Hornets may be the second seed, but they’re the force to be reckoned with in this Tournament, as they’ve made some good teams look bad this season, and have lost only to Minnetonka. They have the most explosive top two lines in the state, with presumptive Mr. Hockey Sammy Walker (10) and his linemates Jett Jungels (22) and Mason Nevers (18) are front-line talents in their own right. Their second Mr. Hockey contender, Demetrios Koumontzis (23), leads the second line, and is joined by Lewis Crosby (11). Ben Brinkman (17) has some of the best high-end potential on defense in the state, and combines with Jake Boltmann (2), Mike Vorlicky (20), and Mason Reiners (21) to form an elite blue line club. There are some questions in goal, where Garrett Mackay (30) is their man, and the young defense can get thrown off some at times. But if they play up to their potential, they are the prohibitive favorite.

ST. MICHAEL-ALBERTVILLE VS. #3 DULUTH EAST

1:00 Thursday

-A Tourney regular faces this year’s lone AA upstart. East leads the series 5-1, including a 15-0 playoff win just five years ago; the Knights did beat East in their most recent meeting, in 2015.

St. Michael-Albertville (23-5, #19, 2-seed in 8AA)

First State appearance

Key section wins: 4-2 over #13 Brainerd, 6-5 over #9 Moorhead

-The Knights pulled the biggest upset of the AA playoffs when they took down Moorhead in the 8AA final, and ride season surge into their first ever Tournament. Sophomores Luc Laylin (9) and Adam Flammang (11) are their top offensive threats, along with senior Blake Spetz (2). They also had a productive second line, and will need a good performance from those depth players to advance in this tournament. Garrett Sandberg (12) and Cole Lehmann (4) are their top defensemen, along with Val Popowski (8). Justin Damon (1) will man the net. If they can hold up under the East assault, this team can move the puck well enough to produce some goals and have a shot at the upset.

Duluth East (23-2-3, #4, 1-seed in 7AA)

State appearances: 23 (first since 2015)

Championships: 3 (1960, 1995, 1998)

Key section wins: 9-1 over #14 Duluth Marshall, 3-2 (OT) over #8 Andover

-Like Edina, the Hounds return to State after a two-year absence. East’s top line of Ian Mageau (23), Ryder Donovan (22), and sniper Garrett Worth (5) leads their assault, but this team’s top three lines are all learned in the ways of the Mike Randolph puck control system. Ricky Lyle (15) leads the way on the second line, which was as productive as the first late in the season. Luke LaMaster (25) is the two-way star of a mobile defense and the only defenseman Mr. Hockey finalist, and is joined by his partner, Hunter Paine (20), on a strong top pair. Parker Kleive (41) came on to win the goaltending job down the stretch. When at their peak the Hounds’ game is probably second only to Edina’s, but they need to avoid the periodic lapses of mediocrity that plagued them more than the other top four this season.

HILL-MURRAY VS. #1 MINNETONKA

6:00 Thursday

-Another battle of two heavy hitters in Minnesota hockey, and a rematch of a 2010 4-overtime classic won by the Skippers; Hill also beat Tonka in the 2006 quarters. Minnetonka won a regular season game 4-2 in December, while Hill leads the all-time series 11-7-1.

Hill-Murray (13-11-4, #20, 2-seed in 4AA)

State appearances: 29 (2 in a row)

Championships: 3 (1983, 1991, 2008)

Key section win: 3-1 over #6 White Bear Lake

-Despite a losing regular season, the Pioneers came on strong toward the end, and their upset of White Bear Lake was no stunner. The late season call-up of eighth grader Nick Pierre (11) catalyzed the offense, but he’s just one of a number of very young players with bright futures here. Junior Ben Helgeson (9) and senior Michael Fleischhacker (15) are the veteran leaders, and sophomore Charlie Strobel (27) brings a familiar Hill-Murray name. Like most good Hill teams, they have a couple of veterans leading the way on the blue line in Brett Oberle (19) and Joey Petronack (12), while Matthew Fleischhacker (14) is a freshman standout. If this group continues to play the disciplined hockey we’ve come to expect out of Bill Lechner-coached teams in the playoffs, they’ll be a tough out. They come in with a five-game losing streak in Tourney play.

Minnetonka (24-2-2, #1, 1-seed in 2AA)

State appearances: 6 (first since 2010)

Key section wins: 4-1 over #23 Chaska, 5-4 (2OT) vs #6 Holy Family

-The Skippers claim the top seed with two wins in three games against Edina, and put forth a team with no real weaknesses as they pursue their first state title. They roll three quality lines, and distribute their top forwards to create balance. Sophomore Bobby Brink (9) and junior Jack Bayless (29) pace the offense, while Mr. Hockey finalist Luke Loheit (8) brings a heavy game and will be matched against other teams’ top lines. Joe Molenaar (10) and Teddy Lagerback (34) round out the leading scorers. Josh Luedtke (3) and Grant Docter (2) are both dynamic defensemen, while Charlie Glockner (1) is one of the stronger goalies in the state when he’s on his game. This group won back-to-back Bantam state titles, and will now aim to deliver on its promise under first-year head coach Sean Goldsworthy.

#5 CENTENNIAL VS. #4 ST. THOMAS ACADEMY

8:00 Thursday

-Two quality programs in search of a first round breakthrough wrap up the quarterfinals. St. Thomas has won their only two recent contests, including a 4-1 Schwan Cup meeting last season.

Centennial (19-6-3, #10, 1-seed in 5AA)

State appearances: 4 (first since 2014)

Championships: 1 (2004)

Key section win: 6-4 over 2-seed Maple Grove

-The Cougars roll into the State Tournament as a team that sits somewhere below the big four top seeds, but clearly ahead of the three unseeded teams. Mr. Hockey finalist Lucas McGregor (11), who carries the offense, is as important to his team’s success as any one player in the field. Three additional forwards, Hayden Brickner (14), Carter Wagner (8), and Jack Menne (10) were also highly productive, and Will Francis (7) is their clear leader on defense. They don’t have exceptional depth beyond that, but generally play tight, trapping hockey. Travis Allen (1) is an experienced, solid goaltender. If they can lock in to their defensive style and spring their top forwards a few times, 5AA will have a shot at its first quarterfinal win since 2009.

St. Thomas Academy (25-2-1, #3, 1-seed in 3AA)

State appearances: 3 in AA (2 in a row); 8 in Class A

Championships: 5, all in Class A (2006, 2008, 2011, 2012, 2013)

Key section win: 4-1 over #12 Eastview

-A year after a quarterfinal upset loss, the Cadets are back at it in search of their first AA quarterfinal win. They didn’t lose in regulation this season, though the schedule was somewhat easier than the other top four. Payton Matsui (14) joins brothers Ray (15) and Rob (11) Christy in leading the offense, while Brendan McFadden (21) has also emerged as a serious threat. Chase Foley (17) is one of the most productive offensive defensemen in the state, and Blake Holmes (5) also anchors the blue line. The one edge they do have over the other top four seeds is goaltender Atticus Kelly (30), who is a finalist for the Frank Brimsek Award. They boast a lethal power play, but will need to avoid the looseness that has plagued them in some big games in recent seasons.

Let the fun begin!