Bismarck sweeps Wilderness out of playoff contention

To say that tough times have fallen on the Minnesota Wilderness is putting it far too mildly. The Wilderness have suffered nine straight losses. And last weekend they were eliminated from the North American Hockey League playoffs after being swept at home 3-1 and 6-2 by the Bismarck Bobcats.

On Friday night the Wilderness fell behind 1-0 just 2:38 into the game when Tim Piechowski of the Bobcats picked up a goal assisted by Willy Stauber and Jacob Marti.

The Wilderness evened the game at the 8:30 mark of the first when Donte Lawson notched a highlight-reel goal assisted by Nick Portz and Aaron Myers. Lawson, who just joined the Wilderness after playing in the Minnesota State High School Hockey Tournament for Greenway, fought through a pair of Bobcat defenders and managed to tuck the puck home while sliding towards the goalie. That would be the only goal for the Wilderness in the 3-1 loss.

The game was tight the rest of the first, all of the second period and most of the final period until Adam Stacho slammed home a goal for the 2-1 lead with just 2:59 remaining. The Bobcats added an empty net goal with 1:11 left by Daniel Chladek.

For the game, Wilderness goalie Ryan Fanti finished with 19 saves, while the Wilderness put 30 shots on Bobcat goalie John Roberts, who stopped 29 shots.

"I felt we deserved a better fate on Friday," said Dave Boitz, head coach of the Wilderness. "They scored with just under three minutes left to make it 2-1 and then they got that empty net goal."

Saturday night things got ugly for the Wilderness in the first period when they gave up the first three goals of the game and trailed it 3-0 entering the locker room after the opening stanza.

"Saturday we just got down early and it was an uphill battle all night," Boitz said.

Wilderness forward Aaron Myers cut into the Bobcat lead at 7:02 of the second period with Lawson and Brandon McNamara tacking on the assists. It looked like Minnesota might have had a chance to crawl back into the game, but a late goal by Stauber pushed the lead back up to three heading into the final period.

Cloquet's Dylan Johnson, a 2017 Cloquet grad, tried to pull the Wilderness back into the game with a power play goal at 3:05 of the final period with an assist by Myers, but the Bobcats kept the pressure on with goals by Chladek and George Grannis at 10:12 and 17:25 to finish out the game.

After losing Friday, the Wilderness were still mathematically in the hunt for a playoff spot, but they would have needed to win the remainder of their eight games and Bismarck would have had to lose all its remaining games for the rest of the regular season.

"The team was very disheartened after the loss on Friday," Boitz said. "We would have had to win out and they lose out after Friday. For all practical purposes it was over after the game on Friday as far as our chances to make the playoffs."

Things went south in the win column for the Wilderness in February when they lost four key players.

"We lost four 20-year-old players in February after already going through an incredible influenza virus and a lot of injuries in January," Boitz said. "It just became too much for us to overcome."

Despite the lack of recent wins, the Wilderness have still packed in large crowds with both Friday and Saturday night bringing nearly 2,000 spectators to Northwoods Credit Union Arena for Military Appreciation Weekend.

"We had great crowds all weekend," Boitz said. "There is just great respect for our community and they came out and showed their respect for those in the military."

The Wilderness currently sit in fifth place in the Central Division with 51 points and will play on the road in Brookings this weekend, then head to Minot the following weekend before coming home for their final two games of the season April 4-5 against Aberdeen.