Vintage Minnesota Hockey - History

January 23rd, 2010, Hockey Day Minnesota traveled to Hermantown.  This would be a special sort of monster, as the weather wasn’t exactly cooperating with keeping the outdoor ice conditions playable.  Auxiliary plans were in place were in place to move the games indoors if needed, and with rain coming down in the days preceding it seemed almost inevitable.  Mother nature would yield, and the outdoor games took place as scheduled.

Hopkins would start the day off with a 6-0 drubbing of Marshall School, followed by host Hermantown falling to Eden Prairie 4-3 in a game marred by poor ice conditions due to freezing rain and snow.  Weather of course, isn’t helpful for creating optimal conditions, but this would not be the worst of ice conditions HDM would experience over the years.

Following the High School games, the Gophers would welcome the St. Cloud State Huskies to Mariucci Arena for a rematch of the previous years college hockey action.  This go around, the Huskies would get the best of the Gophers, winning a 4-1 game

The NHL action this year would be a battle of the 2000 NHL expansion teams as the Wild would play host to the Columbus Blue Jackets.  This would also be the first year the Wild would play under a new coach on HDM as well.  Jacques Lemaire retired after the 2008-09 season, and first time bench boss Todd Richards had taken over.  Mikko Koivu would score 2 goals for the Wild in the 4-2 victory, with additional goals coming from Eric Belanger and Robbie Earl.

Some other fun names on the scorecard, Antti Miettinen for the Wild this time, Andrew Brunette, Owen Nolan, Shane Hnidy and Martin Havlat, all earned assists in the game.  Derek Boogaard also shows up earning a major penalty for fighting.

Vintage Minnesota Hockey Take:

HDM would move back to the North, this time in history laden Hermantown to the outdoor sheet of ice adjacent to Hermantown Arena.  The days preceding, and the morning of hockey day saw freezing rain making the roads for travel treacherous.  I awakened the morning of HDM to find my car covered in over 1 inch of ice, and couldn't unlock my car door to drive to the Hermantown rink.  It took a hotel blow dryer to unfreeze the door to get in finally, followed by some vigorous windshield scraping.  The HDM rink was similar in fashion to that of 2009 HDM at Phalen Park with no side glass, and chain link fencing only on the net ends of the rink making again for some classic style outdoor hockey.  A now yearly tradition at HDM was adopted in Hermantown with the 1st fire pit rings and burning wood throughout the day, which has become a commonplace scent for yearly hockey day visitors smelling the odor of burning wood that surrounds the outdoor grounds.