Cathedral Upsets #1 Hermantown To Capture Class A Boys’ Hockey Title

(KNSI) – Cathedral Head Coach Robbie Stocker finally gets his ring with the school.

Stocker was a player for the Crusaders. As a senior in 2009-10, he tied for fourth on the team in points playing forward. He worked up the coaching ranks, being part of the Cathedral staff until he took a job with Delano in 2018. Stocker missed out on the 2019 Crusader state championship team.

The Crusaders followed that up with a third-place finish and then fell into disarray. Stocker was brought in to rebuild the squad. It took him only three years to bring Cathedral back to the promised land in Class A.

Cathedral dispatched Northfield with an impressive offensive outburst in the quarterfinals. They followed that up with a nail-biter, come-from-behind win to best Warroad in overtime.

On Saturday, it was an incredible effort from goaltender Nick Hansen that helped the team lead nearly wire-to-wire in a title triumph over Hermantown. Andrew Dwinnel scored at 3:48 of the first period and got a second at 8:45 of the third. He also had an assist on Joey Gillespie’s goal in the third that put Cathedral up 3-0 and would prove to be the game winner.

The Hawks’ only goal came late in the third with an extra attacker. Hansen turned away 28 shots, including several Grade-A chances between the dots. He was the star as the team completed upsets of the #2 and #1 seeds in Class A in about 24 hours.

Hansen was one of four players to be named to the All-Tournament Team. He was joined by Andrew Dwinnell, Griffin Sturm, and John Hirschfeld.

Cathedral ends the year at 26-4-1. There is a lot of returning talent for the team, which has them in the conversation as favorites to celebrate again at the Xcel Energy Center again in 2025.

It is the third state championship for Cathedral this year. The others were dance and girls cross country.

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