Northfield comes back to cruise to section quarterfinal win

To open the Section 1A tournament, Northfield rolled to a 9-2 victory over Faribault on Thursday, Feb. 22 at the Northfield Ice Arena.

The Falcons had advanced to the Section 1A quarterfinals after posting a 7-2 win over Red Wing in first round play on Tuesday, Feb. 20.

Faribault opened the game against the Raiders with a goal by Ethan Amundsen at 8:52 of the first period before Northfield tied the game at 11:08 with a power play goal by Kam Kaiser, which included assists from Cayden Monson and Jake Geiger.

The pesky Falcons then nabbed a 2-1 lead before the close of the first period with a goal at 13:17 by Oliver Lindemann.

From that point, it was all Northfield as the Raiders scored five unanswered goals in the second period to take the upper hand. Andrew Winter started the scoring for NHS with a goal at :21 as Ty Frank and Kaiser had assists on the tally. Just :27 later, Geiger posted the game winner with assists from Winter and Frank.

Kaiser charted his hat trick then after he scored the next two goals for Northfield at 2:53 and 11:31 of the second before Geiger completed period at 15:20 with his second goal of the night. Kaiser currently leads the team with 35 goals this season.

In the third period, Nortfhfield’s Charlie Becker scored his first goal of the season at 5:11 to give the Raiders a 7-2. To wrap the up, Geiger put up another hat trick as he scored his third goal of the game at 8:08 of the third before Barret Bradley ended the game’s scoring at 16:00 to make the final 9-2. Geiger continues to lead the team with 61 points and 36 assists this season.

The Raiders also dominated the scorecard as they outshot the Falcons 56-23 with Max Frank earning the victory in goal with 21 saves. On special teams, NHS was 1of-2 on the power play and 4-of-4 on the penalty kill.

#1 seed Northfield now advances to the next round of the Section 1A tournament with a date at the Rochester Recreation Center against #4 Albert Lea on Saturday, Feb. 24 at 5 p.m. The winner of that game will then advance to the Section 1A title game in Rochester on Feb. 28 at 7 p.m.

In the other semifinal game, #2 seed Dodge County will face #3 seed LaCresent-Hokah on Saturday, Feb. 24 in Rochester.