Hodag Peewees capture state title with dramatic OT win over Somerset

WAUPUN — The Rhinelander Ice Association’s Peewee A hockey team had the better of the play Sunday against Somerset in the WAHA 3A state championship game. The Hodags had more shots on goal and more time in the offensive zone. 

Ultimately, for the Peewees to bring home the RIA’s first state championship since 2008, they simply needed a puck to bounce their way. 

That finally happened 1:29 into overtime as Easton Ostrom threw the puck from behind the net toward the front of the crease and it caromed in to lift the Hodags to a 3-2 victory over the Spartans. It capped off a thrilling weekend for the Hodags in which they won three games in the matter of about 28 hours to bring home a state title.

“What more could you ask for? A state championship game in overtime? I mean, it doesn’t get any closer than that,” Hodag coach Randy Ostrom, Easton’s father, said. “That’s awesome. It was super, super fun. Super proud of the kids, great parent group, awesome, support all year. This is just awesome. I mean, this is what we wanted right here.”  

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Peewees win state title

The Rhinelander Ice Association’s Peewee A hockey team defeated Somerset 3-2 for the WAHA Class 3A state championship Sunday, March 9 in Waupun.

The breaks didn’t seem to be going Rhinelander’s way much of game. Cason Burnis hit the post twice on go-ahead chances. Somerset’s first goal came on a deflection from the point and the Hodags overcame eight penalties in the contest. Finally, a little luck shined on Rhinelander in the extra session.

“A little bit of puck luck goes a long way,” said coach Ostrom, who gave his team good luck charms to put on their equipment bags heading into the weekend. “We talked about puck luck before we ever got to this tournament. We talked about hard work, dedication, perseverance, playing hurt, playing sick, and we talked about after everything comes out a little bit of puck luck could go a long way.”

    Rhinelander’s Easton Ostrom reacts after scoring the game-winning goal in the Hodags’ 3-2 victory over Somerset in the WAHA Peewee 3A state championship game Sunday, March 9 in Waupun. (Jeremy Mayo/River News)  

The Hodags certainly had better scoring chances than Easton Ostrom’s game winner during the contest but, as the old hockey adage goes, good things come when you put the puck on net. Or, in Ostrom’s case, off a defenseman and then on net. 

“I don’t know, I just like went behind the net and then bounced it off the D’s foot and it went in,” he said. “Amazing, we got it done. Couldn’t do it without the boys.”

The Hodags came in as the No. 1 seed in the state tournament, a position they were also in two years ago as Squirts when they came home third in a state tournament held in Rhinelander. This time around, the Hodags cruised past Beaver Dam 11-3 in their opener Saturday morning and then held off a late rally by Waupun Saturday night to win 5-4 and earn a spot in the championship game. 

The end result was the fulfillment of a vision the team had since practice started back in November. 

“We literally talked about this in my preseason team meeting with the kids,” coach Ostrom said. “We had a whole session where we sat down and we went through an entire PowerPoint of our goals for the year, and one of them was a picture where all the banners are right now with the blank spot up there, and I circled it and I put a big thing right there that said, ‘This could be you.’”

Rhinelander finished the season with a 27-15-2 record. There were plenty of ups and downs along the way, and plenty of tough games against much larger youth clubs. All of that paid off Sunday.

“We played really hard teams, all season we didn’t win a tournament until now,” team member Sawyer Peters said. “We were ready for this. Like, we were fired up and ready.”

“Perseverance led us here,” added Jacob Baumann. “We got the job done, we played a bunch of hard teams to get us some training for this. We came out and did it.” 

The Hodags never trailed in Sunday’s championship game, but Somerset seemed to have a quick answer each time the Hodags scored. 

Max Cahee put Rhinelander on the board 6:10 into the first period, scoring on the power play, as he wrapped the puck around the net and in off an assist from Collin Jorata. Somerset scored a power play goal of its own at the 10:34 mark of the first as Chase Gilkerson bounced a shot in from the right point. 

Jorata put the Hodags up 2-1 3:08 into the second period as he was in the right place to fire into a nearly wide open net after Ben Gehrmann’s shot from the slot banged off the end boards and was tipped in front by Cahee. The Spartans responded again as Xavier Schuld came away from a scrum in the Hodag zone with the puck and fired one home with the 6:17 mark of the second. 

The final 24-plus minutes of regulation were scoreless, but weren’t lacking for scoring chances. Burnis was denied from point-blank range moments after Schuld’s goal and hit the post on a breakaway chance late in the second period. Burris caught iron again moments into the third period and the Hodags didn’t get the penalty shot they were hoping to get when Cahee was hooked from behind on a breakaway chance 3 1/2 minutes into the third. Rhinelander was unable to cash in on the ensuing power play chance and had to hold on down the stretch. 

    Rhinelander goalie Quinn Burton makes a kick save on a breakaway chance by Somerset’s Ezra Frokjer late in the third period of the WAHA Peewee 3A state championship game Sunday, March 9 in Waupun. (Jeremy Mayo/River News)  

Quinn Burton played the whole game and made 23 saves in the championship. The biggest came with 1:45 remaining in regulation when she stonewalled Ezra Frokjer on a breakaway chance off the left wing. Rhinelander outshot Somerset 35-25 in the championship game and had a 3-0 edge in shots during overtime. 

Four unanswered goals proved to be just enough for the Hodags in the semifinal win against Waupun. 

Burnis scored twice for Rhinelander in the game, including what proved to be the game-winner that put Rhinelander up 5-2 just 33 seconds into the third period. Henry Voight scored twice for Waupun, including a goal that made it 5-3 with 9:22 remaining. Grady Vande Zande then scored on a 6-on-3 power play with the goalie pulled and 2:06 left. The Hodags were able to stave off the Warriors over the final two-plus minutes to advance to the championship game. 

Gage Chavez, Easton Ostrom and Max Cahee had the goals for Rhinelander in the second period as the Hodags outshot the Warriors 51-16 in the contest. 

“That Waupun game, it got what I would say sporty at the end there — and a lot of it was our own doing,” coach Ostrom said. “It was just us kind of we had some emotions that got in the way of making some plays there, and if we would have just kind of kept that under check, I don’t know that it would have been as exciting as it was, but you know, everybody’s got to get their blood pressure up, every once in a while for something.”

Rhinelander roared in the opener against Shawano, taking a 7-0 lead just more than 5 minutes into the second period as it cruised to an eight-goal win. 

Chavez had a hat trick in that game. Ostrom, Cahee and Burnis each scored twice while Jorata and Gehrmann each added a goal. Ten of the Hodags’ 11 skaters in the game tallied a goal and/or an assist as Rhinelander outshot the Golden Beavers 49-14. 

Burton played all three games in goal for the Hodags at state. In addition to her 23-save effort in the championship game, she made 12 stops against Waupun and 11 saves against Beaver Dam. 

Coach Ostrom was quick to credit the team’s other goaltender, Owen Wallerman, for his selflessness during the tournament.

“That’s not the kind of game that you take a goalie out of, you know, and I talked to Owen about that. I told him before the game that he is probably one of the best teammates I’ve ever seen, as far as understanding and wanting to be here for the right reasons,” he said. “We had a long conversation about how he got us here and a lot of the work that he did that got us here is what set us up for the success that we were able to have this weekend.”

It was the first WAHA state championship for the RIA since 2008, when a co-op squad between Rhinelander and Lakeland won the Bantam 3A state title.

“It feels like (we’re) on top of the world,” Peters said. 

Added Chavez, “We’ve been here three times before, haven’t got it done and we’ve did it this year.” 

Coach Ostrom credited its team for the effort it put into this championship season.

“I’ll be the first to say that if it weren’t for the amount of work that I know went into this season and the amount of time these kids spent playing and practicing and working, and the schedule we played and everything that we did leading up to this, that led up to everything that we were able to do when we got down here,” he said. 

The state championship came just one day after Tomahawk won the WIAA Division 2 state title. The Hatchets were Peewee 3A state champs three years ago and state runners up the following year. With strong teams at the Peewee and Squirt levels this year, coach Ostrom said the future of the Hodag hockey program looks bright.

“We got depth. We’ve got skill, we’ve got size, we’ve got everything that we’re going to need,” he said. “We should be looking at making some good runs in the future with our program here, running up into our high school level. Our Bantams are looking like they’re going to be really good next year with this group moving up — a healthy group of kids at that level, big crop of kids. 

“The development driving our program is huge. We’ve been working so hard as a program just on development, putting kids on the right teams, making sure the right players are on the ice with the right kids. Huge testament to our coaching back in Rhinelander, the vision in Rhinelander for what we’re doing as a program. We’re trying to build up a program that’s developing players, and when we develop players, we do it the right way, we can see what happens, and this is great.”

Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].