The BSM boys’ hockey team is on a huge winning streak so far this season. They have yet to record a loss through their first 13 games, making them 12-0-1 going into their January 5 outing against St. Thomas Academy.  Among these twelve wins were their victories over two of the teams that pose the biggest challenge to them: Eden Prairie and Blaine.  The majority of this year’s team is made up of upperclassmen, including 13 seniors.

Pauly credits these upperclassmen with a lot of the success the team has seen so far.  “I think the fact that we have a team of mostly upperclassmen that get along is a huge plus thus far,” head coach Ken Pauly said.  

“I think that [the upperclassmen] lend [themselves] to the style of play we like to play, [mostly] a center passing game,” Pauly said.

The team’s success is also attributed to a revamped game strategy, as well as an exceptionally close team bond.  “The way we’ve played and our whole strategy is different, everyone’s been working really hard, and we’re having a lot of fun,” senior captain Auggie Moore said.

Even though the team has already beaten their two biggest rivals, the boys’ motivation certainly continues to be there.  “I don’t think motivation will be an issue at all, because our goal is to get to the state tournament and ultimately win it,” Moore said.

Both Moore and Pauly are adamant that motivation will not pose any issues throughout the remainder of the season.  “We aren’t drawing on teams we play for our motivation, we are drawing on [trying to] be the best we can,” Pauly said.

Their key wins over Eden Prairie and Blaine, who reside in the top ten of AA teams in the state along with BSM, helps the team emotionally as well.  “It’s a huge emotional boost when you beat teams of that caliber [Eden Prairie and Blaine],” Pauly said.

One thing the team tends to try to focus on is playing the game more than anything, finding it’s not worth it to worry about the team they are facing on any given night.  “We don’t really care who we are playing on any given night, we say a lot of the time, ‘We’re playing the game not playing the opponent,’” Moore said.

While the team follows a similar routine before each game pertaining to their pre-game warm-ups, they don’t really have any team-wide “superstitions” like the ladies on the girls soccer team do.  “Every guy has their own thing,” Moore said.

Even though this is true, however, the team tends to play the same warm-up games before the real on-ice warm-ups begin, however.  “We play ‘two-touch,’ it’s like a soccer game before everyone warms up.” Moore said.

The Red Knights, amid their undefeated start, sit at #1 in the State AA Rankings.  As far as the road ahead is concerned, BSM does have tough matchups looming, including in early February, when they will face Eden Prairie and Wayzata in consecutive games on the road.