Loud words from senior leaders snapped the Edina boys' hockey team into focus after two flat periods of play in the Class 2A state championship game.
Senior wing Peter Colby also heard from team manager Jack Goetzman, quiet encouragement that Colby would be the one to come through.
Two Colby goals, including the game-winner in overtime, fueled Edina's 3-2 victory over Eden Prairie on Saturday night at Xcel Energy Center. The Hornets won their 13th state championship; no program in 75 years of state tournament play comes close.
Colby scored his eighth and ninth goals of the season, the second coming 2 minutes, 31 seconds into the fourth period.
His efforts capped a night when none of the three Mr. Hockey Award finalists on the ice were trophy goal scorers and unlikely stars took turns lifting their teams.
Goals for top-seeded Edina (27-2-1) came not off the sticks of seniors Jett Jungels and Mason Nevers but from its second and third lines. No. 3 seed Eden Prairie (19-10-2) got offense courtesy of a sophomore and a member of its third defenseman pair rather than senior Jack Jensen.
Snow, worry of tougher driving conditions and even some apathy perhaps toward a fourth meeting of two familiar high school athletics superpowers left large chunks of arena seats vacated. The hustling and hard-hitting hockey on the ice was worthy of a full house.
Saturday provided a solid fourth chapter considering the scores of Edina's victories in the Lake Conference rivals' previous three meetings this season: 6-1, 5-2 and 7-2.