On Thursday, the Minnetonka boys soccer team booked its second trip in a row to the Class 3A tournament, beating Edina 1-0 in the Section 2 final. But coach Mike Rogers remembers 2010, when their 1-13-3 season ended differently.
That year, Edina shut down Minnetonka to start the section playoffs, and Hornets coach Dave Jensen walked over to the dejected Skippers and talked to them like he would his own squad.
”They were some young players, and we had a really experienced team,” said Jensen, who earned his 500th career win with Edina this year. “It was just trying to help them understand that it’s just a game … that they played well.”
Over the past decade, the two Lake Conference teams have turned their matchups from a regular Hornets win into a back-and-forth rivalry, each team winning five section tournaments in the past 11 years.
So in September, when Minnetonka (16-1-1) lost for the only time in an otherwise undefeated season to No. 6 Edina (12-3-3), the 3-2 result wasn’t expected. It became fuel for the No. 2-ranked Skippers.
”We were staring at the sectional final,” said midfielder Eli Ryan, one of 16 seniors on the roster. “Redemption, in our eyes.”
A windy game at Prior Lake stayed deadlocked until Ryan converted a game-winning penalty shot with 20 minutes remaining.
Edina senior goalkeeper Tyler Baker — who otherwise played an errorless, confident game and came up with an improbable second-half kick save for the Hornets — came out to challenge Minnetonka midfielder Noah Izquierdo on a breakaway created by a pass from Hudson Benites.
