Hawks Back on Top

NSO News Release

Patrick Andrews grew up in the Hermantown hockey program, starting when he was 4 years old and graduating in 1998. He didn’t win a state title as a player, but Andrews won his first state championship as Hermantown’s head coach Saturday.

Junior defenseman Ty Hanson gave the team’s traditional pink player-of-the-game bicycle helmet to his coach after Hermantown’s 3-2 victory over Warroad for the Class 1A boys’ hockey state championship at Xcel Energy Center.

Hermantown (29-2-0) won its fourth state title in 18 trips to the state tournament and a dozen Class 1A finals. The Hawks last won in 2016 and 2017, the final seasons for longtime Hermantown head coach Bruce Plante.

Saturday, two of Plante’s grandsons took the ice for the top-seeded Hawks: junior Zam Plante and sophomore Max Plante, brothers who sat in the Xcel Energy Center seats for years watching the Hawks finish as the runner-up.

The duo skates on a line together and led their team in scoring this season. Zam scored a pair of goals in the title game, although defense was the name of the game for Hermantown.

Before the defense took over, goal scoring came in bunches. Warroad struck first with Garrett Hennum’s fourth of the season in the first period. But Hermantown senior Dominic Thomas answered 1 minute, 31 seconds later with a wraparound goal.

Zam Plante gave Hermantown the lead 55 seconds into the second period before Warroad tied it 1:45 later on Griffin Marvin’s third of the season. Three minutes into the second period, Zam Plante scored the eventual game-winner.

Hermantown’s defense stifled the Warriors from there, holding them to 10 shots across the final two periods and only three in the third.

Hermantown shut down Warroad (26-4-1) by limiting its chances, said Warroad coach Jay Hardwick.