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Times Up

By MJ Hammett, 02/25/18, 9:00PM CST

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Cougars hold off late furious rally to head back to State

The Cap City Cougars last season knocked off Rock County in the Sectional Final in double overtime. The two conference foes split this regular season with a loss to the Cougars stopping Rock County from an undefeated conference season.

This season the Rock County Fury were looking to avenge both losses if it came back to the same teams in the Sectional Final.

The same two teams got there again.

This time no overtime.

And no avenging that loss.

Cap City got out to a 3-0 lead and held off a furious comeback late and held on to go back to State with a 3-2 win over the Badger Conference champs.

The Cougars used all three facets of the game, power play, shorthanded and even strength in their scoring.

After a scoreless first period the Cougars got on the board with a power play goal by Amanda Bauer who got off a shot that was centered out front into the net behind McKaylie Buescher (26 saves) for a 1-0 lead.

With exactly 10:00 left in the second period they scored again on a shorthanded goal by Colleen Milligan. She was able to win the puck out of the corner and get a backhander shot off that went in for the 2-0 lead thru 2 periods.

Early in the third period it was Bauer again this time tipping a shot in for the 3-0 lead with 14:46 to go.

Rock County was not gonna go away easy and 52 seconds later on a power play it was Fury leading scorer Maggy Henschler scoring a power play goal. The Fury kept battling and with 1:25 left they got within 1 on a shot by Dani Heitsman that rang off the post and went in behind Cougar goalie Taylor Thornton who had 33 saves in the game 

The Fury in the last minute were able to get the extra skater on but could not get the game tied and the Cougars celebrated their back to back State trips.

For Rock County their season ended with a conference title, but no trip to State which was their top goal. they end the season with a 22-4-2 record.

For Cap City it means another shot at a State title with a semifinal game Friday against the Warbirds at approximately 12:15 pm.

WiPH Game Summaries