Boys and Girls Holiday Hockey tournament
New Ulm Eagles Girls Hockeys took on St. Cloud for their holiday tournament.
“We have been going to this tournament since the season of 2014-2015,” said Head Coach Jeremey Reed.
“We usually do pretty good when we come up here; we compete really well,” Reed said. “We have never come up here and got blown out. Several times, we have come up and swept the teams.”
Coach Reed also said, “We get asked if we want to come back next year when we leave that year before and I have said yes every year because we like coming up here.”
Coach Reed’s assistant Coach is Molly Scheid, a former player of his, and now she gets to come to this tournament as a coach. “It’s fun to be on the other side of things I know how fun this tournament is for a player and know I get to experience it as a coach now.”
When Coach Scheid played in the tournament, it was only a two-day tournament. This year they switched it to a three-day tournament to get all the teams playing each other in their bracket.
I asked Coach Scheid if she would rather have played in the three-day tournament than the two-day tournament, and she said, “No, I liked how it was two days because we didn’t have a JV team, so we still got lots of team bonding time.”
Jersey Hauge, defenseman #6, said this about the holiday tournament: “I look forward to the holiday tournament. I like how much team bonding we have, and it brings us all together.”
I asked her if “she got a good room” (meaning, did she get put with her friends in her hotel room)? She said, “Yes and no, I got my sister, which I like. I don’t really care who I get because it is always fun to get put with girls you don’t know as much because then you get to know them better.”
Jersey said, “I think we will do okay when we go up there, we just need to put pucks in the back of the net and stay disciplined in our defensive zone, and I think we will be fine.”
The girls left Thursday at 11 am after they had their morning skate. When they got there, they checked into the hotel, dropped their stuff off, and were off again to grab some food before heading to the rink for their game that night.
The Eagles would play Northern Lakes. They won 4-3. They ended their night with pizza and some team bonding. On Friday, the girls started the morning off with some team bonding by watching the movie Mufasa: The Lion King.
After their movie, the team went out to eat before heading to the rink for their second game of the tournament. They played Litch Field. They lost 2-1.
After the game, they ended the night with team supper from Chick-fil-A and some games. On Saturday morning, the girls packed up and headed to Starbucks and then to the rink, where they would play their third game.
They played St. Cloud and ended in a 1-1 tie. After the game the girls loaded the bus up and headed home to conclude their holiday tournament.
The New Ulm boys high school hockey team parted ways with the Christmas holiday tournament in Fergus Falls for the 2024-25 season and went to Proctor for the tournament this year instead.
The Bus Departed from the Civic Center at 8:30 a.m. on December 26, lasting over three hours and forty-five minutes. The ride was split in half when the bus stopped at Keys Cafe & Bakery in Forest Lake. From there, it was a straight drive to Proctor.
The Eagles played the home team, the Proctors Rails, first at 7:30 p.m., defeating them 4-1. After the win, everyone returned to the hotel to get a quick shower, then back on the bus to eat at Buffalo Wild Wings.
The following morning, the varsity team ate breakfast at the Holiday Inn Hotel in Hermantown while the JV team returned from an early morning game. After breakfast, the boys got in a quick stretch in the hotel’s fitness center.
Later, everyone went out to lunch at Skyline Social & Games. Once everyone finished eating their food, it was off for some bowling.
ST. Luke’s Sports & Event Center was next on the agenda to play the Brookfield Stars from Wisconsin at 7:30, which ended in an 8-2 loss for the Eagles. After the loss, they returned to the hotel, showered, and headed down to the lobby to eat pizza as a team from Domino’s.
The following day, everyone ate breakfast again in the lobby. After breakfast, everyone went to their rooms to pack. Once everyone was done packing in their rooms, packing their hockey bags from the meeting rooms, and loading up the bus, they drove up to Duluth because there was extra time before the last game at 4:30 against Osseo. For lunch, the bus parked at a strip mall, and everyone had the choice to eat at either Chick-fil-A, Chipotle, or Noodles and Company.
Then the team got back on the bus and headed to Canal Park, walking down the Lakewalk and seeing the Duluth Canal, Lake Superior, the Duluth Aerial Lift Bridge, and the Canal Park Lighthouse. Then they walked back to the bus, headed to the arena, and watched the game.
The Eagles eventually lost to Osseo 4-1, taking 4th place in an 8-team tournament. The Proctor team let everyone who wanted to shower before heading home use the showers in their locker room.
On the way back, the bus made its first stop at a Kwik Trip off I-35 and Highway 210 in Carlton County. Everyone went inside and got some food and something to drink.
Around halfway through the ride, someone on the team woke up and threw up. This caused the bus to pull over and clean up the mess. It took around 30 minutes before the bus was back on the road, and after a stop at a gas station to use the restroom, the bus finally arrived back at the civic center right around midnight.
