West Q&A: Different schools but best friends

Cecelia Samson and Quinn Mathewson are teammates on the Minneapolis Novas, the cooperative girls' hockey team for the Minneapolis City Conference.

And, despite going to different high schools -- Samson attends Southwest while Mathewson goes to Washburn -- the duo are best friends.

Together, they are team captains, a role they each also holds on their other high school teams in soccer and lacrosse, which is also a cooperative sport in Minneapolis.

They have been BFFs since the fourth grade, when they showed up for the same youth volleyball program.

Staff writer Jim Paulsen spoke with Samson and Mathewson about competing together yet going to different schools.

Q: Best friends, different schools. What's that like?

Cecelia: It's hard, but it works. One of the best things is that I know I can tell her things and she's not going to run off and tell someone in the school.

Quinn: We've never gone to the same school, but she's been my best friend since fourth grade. We hit it off instantly.

Q: You still manage to play on many of the same sports teams. How important is that?

Quinn: In summer sports, we've always made it a point to sign up for the same teams.

Cecelia: We know each other so well that it's kind of weird playing on different soccer teams.

Q: How different is it to see the other one wearing a different uniform?

Quinn: During soccer, we hate playing against each other. I know how she plays so well and she knows me so well that we never get anything done.

Cecelia: One time, she went around me and made some comment and I started laughing so hard that I couldn't catch her.

Q: Quinn scored a game-tying goal against Mahtomedi Saturday. How big was that?

Quinn: I was joking in the locker room that it was actually skill and not luck. Cecelia -- I call her Ceals -- won the faceoff and got the puck right on my stick. I just brought it in the zone and shot it and it went in on the top left.

Q: Quinn said her goal Saturday was lucky. Was it?

Cecelia: No. She has really good stickhandling and shooting skills. She just got moved up to forward last year after playing defense before that. She thinks she can't play forward, but she can. She's really good at it.

Q: What's your favorite memory about playing with your best friend?

Quinn: One time when we were playing U-12 hockey, her skate blade broke off in the middle of the game but she didn't realize her blade was gone. She fell like 15 times trying to get off of the ice. We finally had to come out and help her off. It was so funny.

Cecelia: We used to play defense together and we had this secret move together where one of us would drop the puck to the other one and no one would know who had the puck. One time it didn't work and we both went down the middle and smacked into each other. It hurt, but but it was hilarious because it failed miserably. We both just laid there laughing.