Boys Soccer Playoffs Set To Begin

Oct 10, 2012

Dwight Cadwell-NSO

With the Section 7A boys’ soccer tournament set to begin on Thursday across the northland, there are several teams vying for a trip to the state boys’ soccer tournament. The section’s top seed Duluth Marshall along with Grand Rapids the third seed and Duluth Denfeld the second seed will all have byes in the first round of the section tournament.

Cloquet-Esko-Carlton, the defending champion of section 7A will open the section playoffs with a match against Hermantown at Cloquet’s Rol Bromberg field at 4pm. CEC defeated Hermantown twice this fall, knocking off the Hawks 4-2 in the beginning of September in Cloquet and by a 1-0 score at the end of September in Hermantown.

CEC earned the number six seed in the sectional tournament while Hermantown came in with the eleventh seed. The winner of the match between Hermantown and CEC will face Grand Rapids on Saturday at Grand Rapids. The Thunderhawks defeated both Hermantown and CEC during the regular season.

The Proctor Rails earned the fifth seed in the section Playoffs and they will host Princeton on Thursday at 4pm at Terry Egerdahl Field in Proctor. The Rails and the Tigers did not meet in the regular season, but the Rails should be heavily favored as the Tigers have not won a game all season and enter with a 0-14 record.

Top seed Duluth Marshall will face the winner of the Becker and Eveleth-Gilbert. The Golden Bears will face Becker at Becker on Thursday night. Chisago Lakes is the fourth seed and they open up against Two Harbors in the section playoffs. The Wildcats or the Agates winner will face the winner between Proctor and Princeton.

Duluth Denfeld the only team that didn’t lose a section matchup and will face the winner of Hibbing and North Branch on Saturday. Duluth Marshall, who was the number one seed a season ago and lost in the section finals last year to Cloquet-Esko-Carlton in overtime at Public Schools Stadium in Duluth.

Dwight Cadwell can be reached at dwight@northlandsportsonline.com