New look Ultimate Tournaments returns

By Jim den Hollander
Editor/Publisher
Saukhockey.info
Ultimate Tournaments has been a part of the regular hockey season in Sauk County for more than a decade. This year the tournament series will return with its regular dates, including some massive events on Martin Luther King Weekend in January and President’s Day weekend in February.

The tournament offers a unique hockey experience for the teams that attend, with deals offered in the community’s top waterpark resorts, offering a great family weekend with parents and children provided with an exciting experience on and off the ice.

Ultimate Tournaments owner, John Schwarz and Tournament Director Johnny Schwarz also provide weekend jobs for dozens of referees, scorekeeper/timekeepers and directors in more than one location.

The Lake Delton Ice Arena is generally the primary arena on tournament weekends, but Reedsburg Area Community Arena (RACA), Pierce Park Pavilion in Baraboo and the Sauk Prairie Area Recreation Center (SPARC) frequently host games as well. Ice time rentals in Reedsburg, Baraboo and Sauk Prairie directly benefit the youth hockey organizations in all three communities.

Old School hospitality and updates is combined with modern era methods in making the players, parents and coaches up to date on all that is happening. In the arenas, Paper schedule/standings sheets are updated within minutes of the completion of every game and updates are also available online at http://www.ultimatetournaments.com thanks to John Schwarz who uses a home office in Chicago to keep everyone posted, often to events in more than one location on the same weekend. Schwarz’s office is jokingly referred to as ‘Toronto,’ as it serves a similar function to the NHL’s replay center in the Canadian city.

Players have become familiar with the ‘goodies’ provided to team managers at the start of each event, providing some hockey related items to welcome the players to the Dells. Also provided is an information book outlining the many activities available in the Dells and the cloth bag the items come in is a handy piece of equipment the manager can use for the remainder of the season.
While the Dells is the original home for Ultimate Tournaments, Schwarz now runs similar events in St. Louis, Chicago and as of this season, South Bend, Indiana.
The tournaments have some new names and a new look this season. The Dells tournaments will start in with the ‘Northwoods Showdown ‘21 Nov. 12-14 followed a week later by ‘Bucks And Pucks.’

The Martin Luther King Weekend event is once again a double tournament now known as the Glacier King Championship. With an extra day available, this has traditionally seen several Friday to Sunday Divisions along with some that begin Saturday and wrap up on the holiday Monday. This year the events will be run together Jan. 14-16 and Jan. 15-17.
A week after, the Cheddar Cheese Classic will be held Jan. 21-23, 2022 and the Dairyland Classic will also debut in 2022.

Lake Delton attracting big events on ice

By Jim den Hollander

Editor/Publisher

Saukhockey.info

The Lake Delton Ice Arena was busy last season as Dane County had no ice available through most of the year, due to COVID restrictions.

Due to the visits from other teams, Lake Delton Ice owner Aaron Kirby said in a video interview (see below) teams were impressed with the facility and even more impressed with the hourly rental price.

As a result, the local rink has seen some big action in recent days.

This past weekend saw four ’10 peewee teams hitting the ice for a round robin tournament. Included in the event was the Madison Capitols, Green Bay Gamblers, Chicago Fury and St. Louis Jr. Blues.

Also, the Madison Capitols and Green Bay Gamblers ’10 Peewee squads also squared off in a meeting Saturday afternoon.

This coming weekend, the 18U WEHL SouthCentral team which includes three Sauk County players, will hit the ice for a pair of games against the Northeast/NorthCentral squad with games at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m.

WEHL South Central 18U at Lake Delton Sunday

The Wisconsin Elite Hockey League Girls 14U team has been using the Lake Delton Ice Arena as a home base but several other local girls will get a chance to play a true home game in Lake Delton Sunday.

The 18U SouthCentral squad has held a practice or two in the local rink, but on Sunday the team, which includes Signe Begalske and Mallory Ruhland, teammates on the Badger Lightning varsity team and Katelyn Allen who has played for the Sauk Prairie Flyers, Sauk Prairie Monkeys and Badger Lightning.

The team will hit the ice on Sunday (October 3) for a pair of games against the NorthCentral/Northeast 18U squad, playing at 10 a.m. and again at 1 p.m. on an otherwise quiet day at the local rink.

A long day on the ice could continue as the Badger Lightning will be holding a Captain’s Practice at the Sauk Prairie Area Recreation Center (SPARC) at 8 p.m.

This marks the second weekend the Lake Delton Ice Arena will hold some high level events at the local rink. Last weekend, the barn was the host of a four-team Minor (2010) Peewee AAA event which included the Madison Capitols, Green Bay Gamblers, Chicago Fury and St. Louis Jr. Blues. While they played a round robin event both Saturday and Sunday, the Major Peewees (’09) also held a game Saturday afternoon with the Capitols and Gamblers tangling.

Eagles prepare for tough Badger West

By Jim den Hollander

Editor/Publisher

Saukhockey.info

A few weeks after the start of Captains practices for the RWD Cheavers and Baraboo/Portage Thunderbirds, the Sauk Prairie Eagles recently took to the ice at the Sauk Prairie Area Recreation Center.

The Eagles have enjoyed a great deal of success in recent seasons including back to back seasons that saw Riley Jelinek wrap up the season as the state’s leading scorer and last season, a shortened campaign due to COVID restrictions, the Eagles dropped just one game out of 14 in the regular season.

Unfortunately, there is little to show for that success as there was no Badger Conference title last season and the Waunakee Warriors denied them despite an awesome 19-4-1 regular season record.

The playoff road ended both times against the Verona Wildcats who went on both times to the state championship game.

A couple Eagles players have prepared for the regular season with on some elite competition clubs, both senior Erik Peterson and junior Luke Mast playing for the Team Wisconsin 18U and 16U teams respectively.

For Mast, the association with the team allowed him to travel to compete at a tournament in Pittsburgh this past weekend run in conjunction with the season opening Showcase for the United States Hockey League, the only Tier 1 league in the USA. In other words, there were likely as many scouts in the stands from junior, college and professional teams as there was fans and parents.

Wilcox and Team Red clinch TW ’09 Combine title

By Jim den Hollander

Editor/Publisher

Saukhockey.info.

Ethan Wilcox, a player in the RWD organization played two more games with the still perfect ‘Red’ Squad in TW Peewee Combine league play this past weekend.

With two games remaining, the Red team has already clinched top spot among the three teams as a 3-1 win against Team Black and a 4-3 decision against Team White pushed the Team Red squad to 4-0 in the short series with just two games to play.

Wilcox didn’t collect a point in the two games, but still played a key role for the team.

Those two games along with a 3-2 edge for Team White against Team Black were all played at the South Wood County Recreation Center in Wisconsin Rapids.

The series will wrap up on Sunday at Appleton Family Ice Center. Team Red will play Team White at noon and stick around to play Team Black at 1:15 p.m.

Uminski, Kirk and Jolicoeur help TW Black at Combine

By Jim den Hollander

Editor/Publisher

Saukhockey.info

Alexander Kirk from the Sauk Prairie Flyers and Landen Uminski from RWD both contributed but and helped the Team Wisconsin ‘Black’ squad collect 12 goals on its way to a weekend draw and win..

Uminski, Kirk and Michael Jolicoeur, also from the Flyers’ organization, play together on Team Black, one of four clubs in the Team Wisconsin Peewee Combine League.

In their first game, Black battled Team Red to a 4-4 draw and collect an 8-4 win against Team White in action at the Blue Line Family Ice Center in Fond du Lac.

Team Black 4 Team Red 4

In the opener, Trevor Szkodzinski scored the first goal for Team Black and Kirk added another about two minutes later, but Team Red pulled one back before the end of the opening period and after a scoreless middle period, tied the game near the middle of the final frame.

Kirk’s second of the game put Black in front once again, but Red scored two goals about three minutes apart to grab its first lead of the contest.

Knox Cleland pulled Team Black even with 2:24 to go on a feed from Kirk.

Team White 8 Team Black 4

A game summary was unavailable for the second game, but scoring details were.

Uminski picked up a goal for Black and Kirk set up one. Greyson Welsh paced the offense with three goals and Cleland fired a pair with single for Szkodzinski and Carson Schroeder.

The weekend results boosted Team Black to 2-1-1 on the season so far, behind only the 3-1 Team White.

Teams will split up this weekend as Team Black returns to Fond du Lac to play two games, both against Team Grey, at 1 p.m. and 3:45 p.m. Teams Red and White will square off in McFarland in a pair of games