Eagles’ hockey team splits a pair

The Sauk Prairie co-op hockey team earned a split in a pair of Badger North Conference games last week. Following a 2-0 loss at home against Waunakee on Jan. 7 and a 5-0 victory at the DeForest co-op last Friday, the Eagles aspirations of a conference championship took a major hit. Sauk Prairie (8-2 overall, 3-2 Badger North)  now trails league-leading Waunakee by two games with five games left to play in the conference race But Sauk Prairie coach David Lohrei found plenty of positives to build on. “That was our best game of the year,” Lohrei said after the Eagles held Waunakee to just 18 shots. “As I told our team in a group text on Wednesday after practice, ‘Last night’s game and today’s practice made us a better team. Good job boys.’ ” It didn’t take Sauk Prairie long to get back on the winning track three days later against the DeForest co-op, which includes the communities of Poynette, Lodi, Columbus and Fall River. Sauk Prairie got two goals from senior wing Riley Jelinek, and senior goaltender Jordan O’Connor finished with 12 saves in recording her third shutout of the season. “(DeForest) is better than people think. They are,” Lohrei said. “Against Beaver Dam, they had five two-on-ones. They scored on two of them and we can’t afford to give up those. So we changed our forecheck to more a 1-2-2 offensive zone high trap type of thing and they turned the puck over to us all night. They couldn’t get through. “When we got it in the neutral zone, we could play our puck control game once we got the puck. We wanted to keep the puck away from them and they only had one odd-man rush all night.”  Jelinek scored the only goal the Eagles would need at the 9 minute mark of the opening period on assists from junior Caeben Schomber and senior Augie Begalske. Freshman Luke Mast extended the lead to 2-0 in the second period on an assist from senior Lance Bauernhuber at 10:14. Jelinek made it 3-0 at 5:29 of the third period on the power-play with assists from Luke Mast and sophomore Hakon Peterson. Sophomore Nick Mast and Schomber added insurance goals in the final period to cap the scoring. “There’s always that point in the season where you’ve got to kind of wake up and go ‘okay, what do we have to do to get better?’ ” Lohrei said. “I identified five things after that game and then on Wednesday, I just had the varsity on the ice and, we did station work on those five things. “We worked on things like backdoor plays, and then we battled for like an hour and then (Friday) night we got to battle against (DeForest).”  Waunakee 2, Sauk Prairie co-op 0 — The Warriors, ranked third in Division 2, scored twice in a 13-second span early in the second period and held on to blank the host Eagles. Sophomore Isaac Nett had a goal and an assist for Waunakee (9-3-0, 5-0-0 Badger North), while senior Ben Luebke recorded a shutout with 18 saves. Jordan O’Connor had 16 saves for Sauk Prairie (7-2-0, 2-2-0), which was held to a season-low 18 shots on goal. Sauk Prairie was also 0-of-5 on power-plays. Lohrei said while Waunakee is in the driver’s seat for the conference title, he is more concerned about the Eagles’ sectional ranking. “We were seeded fourth of 13 teams going into the Waunakee game,” he said. “Waunakee is the No. 3 team in the state in Division 2. We’ll see how much ground we’ll lose with the 2-0 loss. “So at the end of the day, I was disappointed but it wasn’t one of those heartbreaking losses because I knew we were going to get better from the experience.”  On deck: The Sauk Prairie co-op hosts Reedsburg in a Badger North Conference game at the Sauk Prairie Area Recreation Center Ice Arena on Thursday at 7 p.m.  The Eagles then host La Crosse Aquinas/Holmen on Saturday at 1 p.m. Sauk Prairie returns to conference play at Baraboo on Tuesday, Jan. 21 at 7 p.m.    Jan. 7 Waunakee 2,  Sauk Prairie co-op 0 Waunakee ……........ 0 2 0 — 2 Sauk Prairie ....……. 0 0 0 — 0 Second period: W – Isaac Nett (Drew Christiansen), 0:32; Danny Reis (Alex Dull, Nett), 0:45. Saves: W 18 (Ben Luebke); SP 16 (Jordan O’Connor). Penalties-minutes: W 6-12; SP 3-6.   Jan. 10 Sauk Prairie co-op 5, DeForest co-op 0 DeForest …......….... 0 0 0 — 0 Sauk Prairie .......….. 1 1 3 — 5 First period: Riley Jelinek (Caeben Schomber, Augie Begalske), 9:00. Second period: Luke Mast (Lance Bauernhuber), 10:14. Third period: Jelinek (L. Mast, Hakon Peterson), 5:29 (pp); Nick Mast (Jay Liedtke), 10:53; Schomber (Bauernhuber, Dylan Andrews), 15:47. Saves: D 40 (Joseph Brethouwer); SP 12 (Jordan O’Connor). Penalties-minutes: D 7-14; SP 1-2.