The Hastings Raiders raced out to a two goal lead, then were marred by penalties as Lakeville North scored 5 straight goals to pull away and beat the Raiders Tuesday night 5-2.
Hastings got the scoring started at 4:30 of the 1st period, when Mark DeNoyer punched it in past the netmidner from Connor Zgoda and Austin Shanks to give the Raiders a 1-0 lead. Lakeville North owned offensive zone pressure for much of the period, but when Hastings got on the power play late in the 1st, the Raiders capitalized. Eddie Peine fed Blake Vandeheof who then passed it to Brody Larsen to give Hastings a huge 2-0 lead into the first intermission.
Hastings nearly made it 3-0 early in the 3rd, but then after going to the penalty kill, Lakeville North stole momentum with a goal and did not look back, scoring 3 in the 2nd and 2 in the 3rd to pull away and win 5-2.
The loss drops the Raiders to 12-6-1 on the year, and they will likely remain in the top half of the section. Should Lakeville North beat Rochester Mayo on Thursday night, Hastings likely ends up with the 3 seed, but a Mayo victory makes things interesting. Mayo tied Owatonna on Tuesday 2-2, Hastings having tied Mayo and ebaten Owatonna. The Raiders do not have a bad loss and that will help them in section seedings.
In other Raider sports, Girls Hockey fell 3-1 to Farmington with Madelyn Schuster scoring an unassisted goal in the third period. Boys Swim and Dive beat Cretin-Derham Hall 91-74, and girls hoops took down Northfield 59-37 thanks to 17 points from Hailey Strain, 13 from Lindsey Wagner and 9 from Keagan McVicker.
