Posted: 12/11/02

Rangers will skate with team of youngsters

Berk Brown
Sports Editor

They may be the Forest Lake Rangers, but be careful not to call the girls hockey team the Forest Lake Senior High Rangers.

Not when only six of your 19 players attend the high school. The other 13 are in seventh, eighth or ninth grade.

Meaning, if the Rangers are to reach their fourth consecutive section final this year, they will need to rely heavily on skaters who were in grade school when they began their section-final streak.

In the past three years, Forest Lake has been to three section finals and one state tournament.
The youthfulness of the team isnít a concern to second-year coach John Yunker, who said it wouldnít be wise to equate grade levels with ability levels.

A majority of the younger skaters have been on the very successful youth girls hockey teams of recent years in Forest Lake.

ìItís not as big of a challenge (coaching a young team) as some people might think,î Yunker said. ìWeíre a younger team, but for the most part, a lot of them have played together at some point, so they know each other.

ìItís a hard-working team. Their (youth) coaches obviously taught them how to work hard and taught them a lot about the game. They have the talent, this year it will be just a matter of them catching up to the pace of play and how fast things happen at this level.î

Although the Rangers have a vast amount of young talent, it will be a core group of four seniors which will mostly determine how well the squad does this season.

Senior goalie Kelsie Bakken returns with two years experience as a starter, which includes a start in the state tournament in the 2000-01 season.

ìKelsie was real solid for us last year and itís nice to have her back,î Yunker said.

Yunker also will count on seniors Jaisa Bernklau, Kathy Busch and Nicky Souter to provide leadership and a veteran presence on the team.

Busch and Souter join eighth-grader Keeta Koalska on the Rangersí first line.

Yunker said this far he has been impressed with the way his seniors have helped the younger skaters feel comfortable.

ìTheyíve been doing a great job keeping the younger girls involved,î he said. ìThereís a big age difference there, but they really do get along. When we get into tough situations, theyíre going to need to help make things positive.î

Forest Lakeís second line early this year may have skaters with unfamiliar names, but that wonít last long.

Eighth-graders Kate Haglund, Alexa Nelson and Paige Patchin form the second line and will have the five years together to do nothing but get better.

Defensively, Yunker has been using the tandems of sophomore Alicia Melbostad and freshman Anne Woods as well as eighth-graders Stephanie Haider and Kelly Lewis.

Seventh-grader Kim Fredricks is backing up Bakken at goaltender and will get occasional action to rest the Forest Lake senior.

Noticeably missing from the Rangersí line-up this season are a pair of all-conference caliber juniors who opted to play elsewhere this year.

Sam Hough would have been Forest Lakeís top skater this season but instead decided to play club hockey this winter. Jamie Cincotta, one of the top goal scorers in the past for Forest Lake, transferred to Centennial.

While Cincotta and Hough would have made the Rangers a much better team, Yunker said he and the team arenít losing any sleep over it.

ìThey are two good hockey players and they would be nice to have, but we donít,î Yunker said. ìItís giving other girls the opportunity to play. And, like I told them at the start of the year, weíre not going to play the what-if game. Weíll do what weíre capable of doing and go from there.î
What the Rangers know how to do for sure is skate hard all the time, Yunker said, so thatís something he will stress.

ìWeíre going to try to make sure the girls are working hard all the time,î he said. ìItís not hard to tell when a girl is going hard or not.

ìIf weíre working hard all of the time, then weíre getting stronger mentally, too.î

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