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Schools

Rosemount Wins Section Title With 6-2 Victory Over Eastview

The Rosemount Irish girls hockey team is headed to the state tourney.

A one-year wait was worth it for the Rosemount High School girls hockey team.

After falling to Burnsville 6-1 in the 3AA Sectional Championship game last season, the Irish were right back where they wanted to be Wednesday night. And it was clear from the beginning that things would be different in 2011.

Rosemount took control of the action early, built an early lead and rolled to a 6-2 win over Eastview at a sold-out Veterans Memorial Community Center in Inver Grove Heights. The win moved the Irish to 22-5-1 on the season and more importantly advanced them to the state tournament next week at the Xcel Energy Center.

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“I can't even describe my excitement,” said senior forward Rachael Kelly, who scored twice and added an assist Wednesday night. “It hasn't hit yet. It's going to hit. It's an amazing feeling. Being a senior, me and Allison Micheletti, we've been together since eighth grade trying to get this team where we want to go. We did it as a team today. It was awesome.”

Head coach Tracy Cassano was happy to see her team's focus all season on getting back to this point pay off.

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“It's an amazing feeling,” Cassano said. “The girls deserve it. They've worked hard for it all season. We got to this point last year and it was a disappointing loss. We were just so focused on what our goal was throughout the entire year. That was to take it one game at a time and get back to this point."

Kelly got the Irish started at the 3:23 mark of the first period, giving Rosemount an early 1-0 lead. Junior Taylor Sampson came up with a steal in the Eastview zone and got the puck to Kelly, who did the rest. She slipped it just inside the right post and just out of the reach of the glove of Lightning goalkeeper Delaney McKay.

After that goal, it was the Rosemount penalty-killing unit that came up big. The Irish took six minutes worth of penalties in a seven-minute stretch. But Rosemount was able to not only kill the penalties off, they actually controlled the puck for long stretches during each of the Eastview power plays. The Irish used that strong penalty kill to take a 1-0 lead into the first intermission.

“It was nice to get a lead,” Cassano said of Kelly's first period goal. “The penalty kill was huge. We told them after the first to try to stay out of the penalty box. It was aggressive. That's what we preach to the kids all the time, pressure them and force them to make mistakes. I felt like we did that. We didn't give them much breathing room. It's hard to make plays when you've got people in your face and all over you.”

Rosemount out-shot Eastview 14-5 in the first period. It was more of the same in the second, as the Irish held a 28-12 advantage on shots after two periods. As an added bonus for the Irish, a few more of those shots started finding the back of the net. The Irish scored two goals in the first 3:35 of the second period to take command of the contest.

Kendra Goodrich made it 2-0 on a power play early in the second period. Her shot from the point at the 2:21 mark deflected off McKay and snuck under the crossbar. Just 1:14 later, Micheletti picked up a steal, walked in on McKay and drove a shot off the keeper's glove and into the goal for a 3-0 Rosemount lead.

Kelly scored her second goal on one of the more amazing plays of the night. It put the Irish up 4-0 at the 9:19 mark of the second. Kelly lost control of the puck in front of the Eastview goal and in between a pair of Lightning defenders. Just as it looked like the scoring chance had been lost, she reached out, got her stick on the puck and slung it toward the goal. It ended up going five-hole on McKay, as everything was going right for Rosemount at that point.

“I just reached for it, got it and just shot,” Kelly said. “Everyone was freaking out and I was like, 'Oh, it went in.'”

Rosemount took a 5-0 lead three minutes later when senior Sarah Tollefson scored on a one-timer off a nice feed from Kelly. Eastview's Sophie DesLauriers finally got the Lightning on the board at 12:36 in the second period, leaving the score 5-1 after two.

DesLauriers scored on a power play at 4:36 of the third period to pull the Lightning within three, 5-2. But Sampson squashed any thoughts of an Eastview comeback less than two minutes later. Sampson scored seven seconds into a power play, getting the puck off the faceoff and slipping it past McKay to account for the final tally of 6-2.

Cassano and Kelly both said taking momentum early was key to the outcome.

“It was huge,” she said. “We knew we were going to come out strong and just get it done. We could feel the intensity right away. We knew we had to shoot on her. That was one of my goals, not to make that last move and just shoot the puck.”

“It was feet moving,” Cassano said. “Every game we've focused on that, but especially here in the playoffs. We talked about getting our feet moving, get pucks deep, pressure them and get on the puck. Our feet were moving the entire game. That was really the key. I think we blew them away with our speed. It was nice to come out on fire and take that lead. We just never looked back.”

Now, the Irish can look ahead – to the state tournament, which opens Feb. 24 in St. Paul.

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