HERMANTAWN – When Hermantown made its way through the state tournament last year, the scoring sheets were full of familiar names: Zam Plante, Ty Hanson, Max Plante and Beau Janzig, to name a few.
This season, the Hawks’ top line will look very different after each of those four players leave the program, accounting for more than 200 points of offensive production coach Pat Andrews will have to figure out how to replace him.
If you add in the departures of second-line forwards Dominic Thomas and Gavin Blomdahl, the number swells to more than half Hermantown’s total points scored in 2021-22. Zam Plant and Hanson are spending the season in the United States Hockey League and Max Plant – Hermantown’s point leader with 72 – left for the US Hockey National Development Team program.
Janzig, Thomas, and Blomdahl all graduated and Janzig is spending the season with the Minnesota Wilderness of the North American Hockey League in Cloquet.
“Obviously everybody looks at what you lose, you lose X amount of points, amount of ice time,” Andrews said. “You lose three-fifths of your strength, you lose 85% of your targets, and that’s part of it, but what you’re really losing there is they’re just massive human beings. Beau has been an incredible leader for us, and Zam, Ty and Max are obviously great players, but they’re amazing human beings.” They compete hard and raise that bar. That’s what you lose and you don’t replace that.”
Sure, you don’t trade in a group of six players that includes three Minnesota-Duluth recruits—one of whom was a fifth-round draft pick for the Pittsburgh Penguins—but that’s Hermantown.
The treasury is not bare.
Much like college football giants Georgia and Ohio State, rebuilding Hermantown feels a lot like Reloading.
The Hawks’ season will depend on the team’s top captains: Cade Kohanski, Wyatt Carlson, and George Peterson. In addition, Penn State junior recruit Dallas View will be part of the Hawks’ offense as well.
Kohanski is the only player to come back from the first line, but he was an important contributor last season. His 22 goals came behind only Zam Plante and his total of 62 points was good enough to finish third on the team.
“He wasn’t the third wheel on that line—Cady Kohanski made that line go,” Andrews said. “I think what people will see if Cady is so darn it all by himself, because he’s going to make that top line go this year.”
Carlsson spent nearly a month last season on the top line when Zam Plant was sidelined with a shoulder injury. He made the most of his chances last season with 18 goals and 12 assists.
He knows it will be a challenge without Janszig, Hanson or Zam Plant, but those players faced a similar task last season.
“Obviously we’ve lost a bunch of quality players, but we’ll have new guys coming in who have to fill the roles,” Carlsson said. “A group of new people who are coming in this year, they’re going to have to rise a lot. It was the same with the returnees last year, they’ve had to step into roles they haven’t come in yet and overcome all the adversities we’ve had.”
While Andrews was unable to work with the team until November 14 due to state rules, Kohanski, Carlson and Peterson were running the captain’s practices to help get everyone ready for the pre-season.
“In these captains’ practices, we’re just trying to up the tempo and trying to get up to the speed of the game,” Peterson said. “We want to create that chemistry because we have a lot of question marks and a lot of new players who are going to step up to play big roles.”
Andrews knows the team will be very different from last season and Hermantown has talent, but the team will take time to get into shape.
“I think we’re going to be incredibly strong defensively and we’re not going to give up so much and then be opportunistic in attack and find our way as we go,” Andrews said. “Hopefully by Christmas we’ll know what we’ve got. It’s a slightly different team – I think we’ll be good, it’s only a matter of time.”
Good Carlson / Superior Telegram