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Wiebusch, Crusaders Fly By Tritons In Semifinal

By Bill Berg Jr, WiPH Staff, 03/05/22, 8:15AM CST

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The first time the #2 Notre Dame Academy Tritons and #3 Madison Edgewood Crusaders met this season, Edgewood was missing a few players, and one of them was Player of the Year finalist JJ Wiebusch.

Wiebusch scored the first two goals of their WIAA State Tournament semi-final matchup en route to a 3-1 Edgewood win over the higher seeded Tritons.

The dynamic first line of the Crusaders made their presence known in the first period. Cody Menzel pressured the Notre Dame defense into a turnover, and he knocked the bouncing puck to Aiden Lenz who passed it back to Menzel and he sent it across the slot to Wiebusch to sniped the corner for a 1-0 lead.

Later on a power play opportunity Parker Murn went across the ice to Wiebusch who walked in through the circle an sniped another corner to make it 2-0 Edgewood.

Notre Dame didn’t give up however. Michael McIntee hit Brenden Gruber with a long lead pass and Gruber poked it ahead Hunter Bill who came in and made a power move on Rowan White to put Notre Dame on the board, down 2-1.

On the next shift, after just 27 seconds Edgewood got a break away of their own. Menzel took a long lead pass from Lenz, which was partly deflected by a Notre Dame defender, and came into the zone all alone against Triton goalie Lleyton Jaschke and scored to make it 3-1.

That would be it for the scoring in this one. In the second period both teams clamped down defensively and combined for just 11 shots.

In the third period, Notre Dame controlled the play for the most part, out shooting Edgewood 13-5 but they weren’t able to crack White, and in doing so they gave up three breakaways to Edgewood. Lleyton Jaschke came up strong for Notre Dame and stopped all three.

The Tritons pulled Jaschke with a minute left but they still weren’t able to score and Edgewood took the 3-1 win.

Jaschke stopped 15 of 18 in the loss for the Tritons. White stopped 27 of 28 for the Crusaders who will face returning champion Hudson in the championship game.

WiPH Game Summaries