Since my Brewers got eliminated...do it, Fridley!

Come and complete the greatest moment in MAHL history...

I'm expecting Eveleth to prevail...but my heart is rooting for Fridley to complete the miracle run.

It is sad when your state is the “State of Hockey” but your teams have never won a Stanley Cup

Some facts on the 1956 Mavericks and the 1976 Foxes...

The Austin Mavericks finished 2nd in the Valley League in 1956 and were seeded 12th in a 24-team field with no regional play.
The Fridley Foxes finished 3rd in the East Metro League in 1976, were not in the top 20 going into the playoffs, and were seeded 13th in the 16-team Twin Cities regional bracket.

Austin was favoured to beat 21st-ranked South St. Paul in the Knockout Round in 1956, then upset 8th-ranked Bemidji, top-ranked St. Cloud (who won the Granite League that year), 6th-ranked Thunder Bay (who won the Lake Superior League that year) and 2nd-ranked West St. Paul (who won the Twin Cities League that year), in that order, en route to the Kellogg Cup.

Fridley has not gone into any of their six playoff games as the favourites - they upset the #11 Millers and #13 Minnetonka (the 1976 West Metro champions) en route to the Super Series, where they have also upset #7 Edina, #6 Winnipeg and the #1-ranked Twin Cities Vulcans (the 1976 Twin Cities champions), and now, they just have to upset #3 Eveleth (the 1976 Iron Range champions) and then they can hoist Senator Kellogg's Cup.

If you ask me, I think that both runs have been equally as impressive. Fridley has upset five top-20 teams (two of them league champions) and only have to beat a sixth (also a league champion) to win the Cup, while Austin went into the first round in 1956 as the favourites over a non-top 20 team (mind you this was before power rankings were even a thing) then proceeded to upset four top-10 teams (three of them league champions) en route to the Cup. (Fridley has three upsets over top-10 teams so far, all in the Super Series.)

And, finally, Fridley is the first of the 21 1972 expansion teams to make it to the Kellogg Cup Final - a few of their expansion brethren have also made it to the Super Series, but none of them have made it this far until now. (1956 was Austin's seventh year in the MAHL, and they were not born out of a mass expansion [3 teams joined the MAHL in 1950], but they did help form the Valley League.)

In closing...
DO IT, FRIDLEY! MAKE MINNESOTA PROUD!

Rugrat wrote:

Thehealthiestscratch wrote:

Rugrat wrote:

It is sad when your state is the “State of Hockey” but your teams have never won a Stanley Cup

 
I’m not sure if this is just a one off comment, but the number of Stanley Cups a state has doesn’t validate their tier of hockey. The entirety of Canada has not won a Stanley Cup for almost 30 years, but I wouldn’t say the USA has taken the title of “The Hockey Nation”. The NHL actually does very little to reflect what a region is worth to the sport. I mean the St. Louis Blues had a handful of Americans during their cup run and 1 was miraculously from St. Louis, but by no means is that a hockey state. Will say the St. Louis Jr. Blues are an impressive youth organization though, despite a lot of their kids being scouted to play from other places.

Yes, the US may have more recent champions but that doesn't mean Canada sucks at hockey 
 

This doesn't seem to apply to Section 30's MAHL, and may be better suited for the General Discussion section of the boards to discuss.