Faribault Falcon Girls Hockey Tops Big Nine

The latest Let's Play Hockey girls high school rankings are out and the Faribault Falcons are nowhere to be found.

Northfield and Red Wing are in the Class A poll, yet the Falcons are sitting atop the Big Nine conference with a 3-0 mark.

The Falcons will play one of the toughest teams in the league Saturday when they travel to Mankato to face Mankato West in a game to be broadcast on KDHL Radio.

They drop the puck at 5:30PM. Our coverage will start at 5:15 Saturday afternoon from Mankato.

I get the feeling head coach Ali Miller prefers it this way.

Faribault handed Rochester Century their first conference loss Thursday night in Rochester in a 3-2 overtime thriller. They have a shutout of Winona and victory over Mayo.

The Falcons have had just one home game since the season began. They tied state-ranked New Ulm in New Ulm and also tied the St. Paul Blades on the road.

Mankato West is 1-0 in the Big Nine (7-1 over Albert Lea) and 3-2 overall.

The Let's Play Hockey rankings have Red Wing rated ninth and Northfield 18th in Class A girls.

Northfield is 2-0 in the Big Nine and 3-2 overall.

Miller has her team moving the puck well and moving their feet, particularly on defense.  Mankato West can score goals, so this will be the stiffest test of the season thus far for Faribault.

Scarlet sophomore Courtney Bloemke has 12 goals and seven assists in five games to lead the offense, and Faribault is very balanced by design.

Miller wants the puck to move, and the athletes are heeding the advice as evidenced by their statistics after five games.

Sophomore Payton Putrah leads the team with four goals and fiveassists. Senior Megan Johnstad has three goals and two assists, and three other Falcons have two goals while three others a lone goal on the season.

Eight Faribault players have at least one assist.

Both goalies have save percentages around 95 percent and goals against averages under two goals a game.

By the way, the top-ranked Class A girls hockey team is Blake; Breck and Thief River Falls come next with each of them receiving first-place votes. Red Wing is ninth and Northfield 18th in the top 20. New Prague is 10th.

In Class AA, Hill-Murray is on top and Minnetonka second followed by Edina, Wayzata and Eden Prairie in the top five.

Lakeville South is eighth and Lakeville North 11th. Dodge County is 14th.

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