skip navigation

Nagel's OT game-winner gives Section 3 SCT title

By Michael Trzinski, WiPH Staff & Submitted, 03/22/16, 7:00PM CDT

Share

Antigo forward scores late in extra period in victory

It took almost five minutes longer than expected, but a victor was crowned in Sunday's Senior Class Tournament title game.

Section 5 and Section 3 battled for 54 minutes, only to see the score knotted at two as the horn sounded to end the third period.

It looked like the contest would need to be determined by a shootout, most goalie's worst nightmare—I know, my daughter was a goalie and participated in many shootouts.

But S3's Alex Nagel took matters into his own hands and sniped a shot past S5 goalie Dylan Phinney with 31.9 seconds left on the clock to give Section 3 the SCT championship, their first since 2009.

Section 3 came out on fire, scoring twice in the first two minutes of play to take a 2-0 lead.

Kyler Oliva scored on assists from Cale Bowman and Colton Raymond at the 1:38 mark to give S3 an early lead.

Twenty seconds later, Gavin Bunnell scored with help from Arin VerHagen to make it a two-goal lead for the eventual champs.

The Wisconsin HS Player of the Year cut the lead to one in the middle of the period.

Trenton Bliss scored on the power play, assisted by JR Lesatz and Jack Wied to make it 2-1 with over seven minutes left in the period, but that's how the stanza would end.

Michael Alfaro tied the game for S5 with 9:30 remaining in the middle period. He was assisted by Jett Jaraczewski.

That would set up Nagel's heroics in the overtime session.

Alex Jones (19) and Noah Sennholz (11) combined for 30 saves in the winning effort.

Walker Smith (4) and Phinney (22) stopped 26 shots for Section 5.

SCT acting coordinator Jonathan Schubert had high praise for both teams.

"It was a great game back and forth the entire game, an absolute battle. It was extremely physical with a lot of puck movement and heads-up play."

Was Schubert thinking the game would require more than one OT period?

"Everyone in the building was confident that both keepers were going to force the game into a shootout," said Schubert.

Enter Alex Nagel.

He took a pass at the top of the left circle and sent a laser past Phinney that went bar-down for the game winner.

"It was an unbelievable, unstoppable shot," raved Schubert. "It was a fitting way to end a great weekend of hockey and was a great showcase for our top-end seniors."

WiPH Game Summaries

senior class tournament picture galleries