Resiliency Continues to Show During Playoff Run for Minnesota Wilderness

The Wilderness will head back to Alaska to now face the Anchorage Wolverines, a team they took two of three from during the regular season.

CLOQUET, Minn. – Back in December, the Minnesota Wilderness dropped nine games in a row. And just when they were written off by the rest of the league, they rallied in the second half of the season to clinch a playoff spot.

Last week, the Wilderness lost the first two games of their series against division champs Fairbanks. And when they got written off again, they won the final three games of the series to move on in the playoffs. Moral of the story is that these guys aren’t going away anytime soon.

“Yeah it’s really exciting. We’re a really good group. After these past couple weekends, we’ve really come together. We’re really good on home ice so we were confident in ourselves. We tweaked a few things in practice. We struggled with our PK in Alaska, but we fixed some things and we got the job done,” said forward Niko Rexine.

The Wilderness will head back to Alaska to now face the Anchorage Wolverines, a team they took two of three from during the regular season.

“They’re the most intense team we’ve played all year. They’re physical. They’re hard. So we’re going to have to match their intensity and I believe if we do that, we should be in good shape. Everybody’s contributing and we’ve played smart. We’re moving the puck. Guys are using their teammates and we’re not turning pucks over in the neutral zone and things like that, which we’ve done in the past which leads to trouble,” head coach/general manager Dave Boitz said.

Game 1 of the Midwest Division Finals will take place Friday night in Anchorage. If the Wilderness drop the first two games of the series, Game 3 will be in Cloquet next Friday.