The 2024 Chipotle-USA Hockey Youth and Girls National Championships are set for thrilling finishes throughout the country following Saturday’s semifinals action at 11 different host sites.

On Sunday, 23 teams will experience the thrill of winning a national title at the Chipotle-USA Hockey National Championships. Every game will live stream and be available on-demand, exclusively at USAHockeyTV.com. 

A full schedule for championship Sunday will be available here as matchups are set. 

Below is a preview of the eight 2024 Chipotle-USA Hockey Youth and Girls Tier I National Championship title games. 

PLYMOUTH, Mich. — Philadelphia Jr. Flyers (PA) and Little Caesars (MI) will face off on Sunday in the title game for the 2024 Chipotle-USA Hockey Youth Tier I 13O National Championship at USA Hockey Arena. 

The matchup in the championship game pits two powerhouses against each other, as these teams both come into the title game undefeated. 

The Flyers have been cruising through the tournament, as they’ve outscored opponents 33-6. That included a 5-2 win over The Minutemen Flames (MA) in today’s semifinal. 

Bo Christini has been propelling the Philadelphia attack, as his 14 points are the most in the tournament. 

The next five highest scorers in the tournament play for Little Caesars, with Samuel Tanguay and Jack Trupiano leading the way with 13 points apiece. 

Little Caesars has been lighting the lamp with ease on its way to the championship game, as the local team has scored an average of 7.6 goals per game this tournament. Little Caesars beat Buffalo Jr. Sabres (NY) 6-1 in the semifinals earlier today. 

The championship game will take place at 9:15 a.m. ET. Watch live on USAHockeyTV.com. 

To view the Youth Tier I 130 homepage, click here. 

Story from Red Line Editorial, Inc.

PLYMOUTH, Mich. — Rhode Island Saints (RI) and Shattuck-St. Mary’s (MN) will battle on Sunday in the title game of the 2024-Chipotle USA Hockey Tier I 14U National Championship at USA Hockey Arena.

The Saints continued their unbeaten run in the tournament today with a 6-1 win against Mid Fairfield (CT) in the semifinals. 

Stephen Cover tallied three points in the win, bringing his point total to 15 to lead all scorers in the tournament. 

Shattuck-St. Mary’s also comes into the championship game with an unblemished record, as the Minnesota team defeated Pittsburgh Penguins Elite (PA) 5-3 in the semifinals. 

After falling behind 4-1 in the second period, the Penguins scored two goals in a 21-second span in the third to make Shattuck sweat. However, Ethan Sung finished off a hat trick with an empty-net goal to secure the win for Shattuck. 

Sung’s three goals brought his team-leading point total to 13 for the tournament. 

The championship game will take place at 11:30 a.m. ET. Watch live on USAHockeyTV.com.

To view the Youth Tier I 14U homepage, click here.

Story from Red Line Editorial, Inc.

FARGO, N.D. -- The Long Island Gulls (LI) and Chicago Mission (IL) will face off at 11:00 a.m. ET on Sunday in the 2024 Chipotle-USA Hockey Tier I 15O National Championship title game at Scheels Arena. 

The Gulls advanced to the title game after beating Pittsburgh Penguins Elite (PA) 7-3 in the semifinals. Long Island found itself down 1-0 just 29 seconds into the game, a lead that Pittsburgh would take into the first intermission.

Long Island tied the game up at one apiece early in the second, but Pittsburgh answered shortly after to take a 2-1 lead. 

The Gulls stormed back via five unanswered second period goals. The comeback started with two tallies less than two minutes after Pittsburgh took the lead. Long Island then buried a shorthanded goal just 19 seconds into a penalty kill. The Gulls offense didn’t let up there, capitalizing twice more before the end of the middle frame, taking a 6-2 lead into the final stanza.

The Penguins scored to make it 6-3, but couldn’t mount a comeback, and Long Island added an empty-net goal in the closing minutes to account for the 7-3 final. 

Maxim Dube paces the Gulls in scoring with eight points, tallying three goals and five assists on the tournament. 

The Chicago Mission (IL) took down Shattuck-St. Mary’s (MN) 7-4 in the semifinals to advance to the championship game. The teams were even at one goal apiece after the opening frame, but Chicago found itself down 2-1 after Shattuck scored a go-ahead goal just 31 seconds into the second period.

The Mission mounted a comeback and went up 4-3 heading into the final stanza. Chicago added two more tallies in the third, and despite a late goal from Shattuck, the Mission buried an empty-netter in the final minute to seal a 7-4 win. 

Chicago’s Victor Plante has scored four goals and tallied six helpers for a team-leading 10 points. 

The championship game will take place at 11:00 a.m. ET and will live stream exclusively on USAHockeyTV.com. 

To view the Youth Tier I 15O homepage, click here.

LAS VEGAS – The Long Island Gulls and Los Angeles Jr. Kings will square off Sunday in the championship game of the 2024 Chipotle-USA Hockey Tier I 16U National Championship at City National Arena following overtime magic on Saturday afternoon.

Ethan Wyttenbach redirected a shot from Joseph Gugino 4:42 into overtime to send the Gulls to Sunday’s championship game with a 2-1 victory over Little Caesars. 

“It was a pretty bang-bang play,” Wyttenbach said. “I don’t even really remember the first part. We got a good breakout and got the puck in and funneled it up to the D and then just tried to get to the net, put a stick on it and it kind of trickled in and we are going to the championship. 

Wyttenbach, who opened the game’s scoring with a power-play goal in the second period, said he and his Gulls teammates, who lost to Little Caesars last year in the 15O quarterfinals, were certainly motivated to get revenge and are now ready to pursue a national title. 

“This is hardest tournament of the year,” Wyttenbach said. “Obviously, the preparation we had all year, we expected to be here late, but we didn’t know it would be the championship. Our preparation, practices and led into this. We were sitting on the bench during overtime, and we weren’t worried. We were confident. We knew we were going to win this game.”

Vinny Smith, head coach of the Long Island Gulls 16U team, commended his team for playing a strong defensive game against who he calls the strongest team in the nation. 

“We played them twice and I think they are the best team in the country,” Smith said. “We didn’t want to give them much. I thought we defended and managed the puck well and our top guys were elite.”

Ryan Smith made 24 saves in net for the Gull, who are 4-1 in five games in Vegas. 

Malachi McKinnon was a force again for Long Island once again on Saturday, picking up secondary assists on each of Wyttenbach’s goals. McKinnon’s nine points (3G-6A-9) is second-most in the Tier I 16U tournament.   

Sunday will be a rematch between the Gulls and the Kings. 

Long Island defeated Los Angeles 1-0 behind 25 saves from Smith and a goal from Brendan Defeo on Wednesday. 

Smith said the message is simple to his players for Championship Sunday.

“Finish,” he concluded. “You put your whole life into this season to finish. We are going to attack our film and attack tomorrow. We are going to give every ounce of ourselves to win a national championship.”

***

Many of the Gulls players quickly scurried across the hallways of City National Arena on Saturday to catch the end of the Jr. Kings and Saints Hockey game. 

The Kings and Saints went deeper into overtime than the Gulls until Hayden Russell threw a puck towards the net that bounced off a crashing Henry Kress for a 5-4 Kings victory. 

Kress actually thought Russell was going to split free on his own before deciding at the last minute that he should try to position himself in front of the net.

“I chipped the puck forward and Hayden Russell went down,” Kress said. “I thought he was going to go for a breakaway and he kind of pulled up a little bit. I was like, ‘I might as well go to the net,’ and he dished it across and it kind of hit my skate and went in.”

Russell’s four-point game (1G-3A) now has him tied for the team lead with six points in the Tier I 16U tournament. 

The Kings overcame a 3-1 deficit in a wild third period against the Saints.

Trace Frieden scored with 8:32 remaining to cut the Saints’ lead to 3-2 before the Kings scored twice in a 6-second span thanks to Russell to take a 4-3 lead with 2:28 to go. First, he ripped a shot into the upper left corner to make it a 3-3 game with 2:33 remaining. Russell then won the ensuing faceoff and fed the puck to Luke Norcross, who buried the puck into the back of the net to give L.A. the lead.

However, Konner Powell responded 32 seconds later for the Saints with his second goal of the game, to eventually force overtime. 

Brett Beebe, head coach of the Kings, said there was no panic from his team heading into overtime. Instead, the team was calm, cool and collected with a berth in the championship game on the line.

“All the kids were saying, ‘Hey we got this,’ and that is all you want as a coach,” Beebe said. “My philosophy for the last seven year since I have been doing this is if the kids have come together and bought in to everything. Whether it be the system or being a family, then we have done our job. Looking around when we are down 3-1 coming into the third period, every single guy in there was like, ‘We are good. We got this.’ 

“There was no quit no fear. Nothing. They have been a lot together as a group and we have been in a lot of those kind of games where we have come back down a couple of goals. They draw from that.”

Kyle Jones made 32 saves in goal for the Kings, who are also 4-1 this week.  

The group also won a Chipotle-USA Hockey National Championship a year ago at the 15O level.

That experience has them hungry for more, Kress said.

“We just bring each other up,” Kress concluded. “We just have that genuine love. We are a big family with brotherly love. If somebody has a bad shift or a bad play we just bring each other up and that is what helped us to win.” 

The championship game will take place 12 p.m. ET. Watch live on USAHockeyTV.com. To view the Youth Tier I 16U homepage, click here. 

--By: Justin Felisko

LAS VEGAS – Shattuck-St. Mary’s and the Yale Jr. Bulldogs are set to battle Sunday in the championship game of the 2024 Chipotle-USA Hockey Tier I 18U National Championship at City National Arena.

The Yale Jr. Bulldogs scored five or more goals for the third time in five games and cruised to Championship Sunday with a 5-0 victory over the Jr. Coyotes Saturday afternoon. 

Yale forward Charles Blanchard said he and his teammates are thrilled to finally get over the hump and reach a championship game after coming up short in previous Chipotle-USA Hockey National Championships. 

“We have a group of guys over the last three years, six or seven of us have been with us since 16s and the last two (years) we lost in the semis,” Blanchard said. “It feels good to finally get past this game. It feels like we have been a little snake bitten. This feels good, really good.”

Blanchard scored his team-leading fifth goal of the tournament in the second period on the power play and said it will take a similar team effort on Sunday for the Bulldogs to take home a national title. 

Yale had five different goal-scorers in Saturday’s victory over the Coyotes. 

“We are at our best when we have four lines going and most games we can do that, and this is why we had success so far at this tournament, but all fall too,” Blanchard said. “Hopefully we will be in good shape tomorrow if we can four going and seven D.”

Kyle Ozgun stopped all 17 shots he faced for the shutout. 

Shawn Conner, head coach of the Bulldogs, said the semifinals losses of past years was a reason why some players returned to the program this year. 

The desire to win a national championship has continued to grow because of their previous shortcomings. 

“That is what their goal was, that is why they all came back,” Conner said. “That is why they didn’t go to the USHL after prep school. They came back because they wanted this. They had this goal since the end of last season and we are 60 minutes away from doing that. 

They are hungry. They know they are good enough ot be there. They know they are good enough to win. Hockey is a weird game. Pucks bounce. Sometimes they bounce your way and other times they don’t. These kids want to win. It is an awesome group in there and they are all going forward together.”

Blanchard added the Bulldogs plan on continuing to bring a playoff intensity to City National Arena. 

“It is just comes down to being a team game,” he concluded. “You have to simplify everything and play some playoff hockey, but if we can do that and trust each other and play as a group we will be alright.”

 ***

Shattuck-St. Mary’s and William Zellers refused to be denied on Saturday evening.

Shattuck-St. Mary’s scored four unanswered goals to rally for a 5-4 overtime victory Saturday afternoon against the Long Island Gulls. 

William Zellers finished with four goals, including the overtime winner when he capped the come-from-behind victory with an absolute blister of a shot with 14:47 left in the extra frame.  

“I took a shot and it got blocked at first, then I saw he backed off a little bit, so I had some time to shoot. My two linemates, Aidan Park and Ryker Lee were in front with a good screen. I got my head up and saw a lot of net so I picked that corner and lucky enough it went in.”

Zellers notched a hat trick in regulation when he tied the game at 4-4 with 11:25 remaining in the third. Shattuck-St. Mary’s rallied from a 4-1 deficit late in the second period.

“We practice eight months out of the year doing the same thing over and over, practicing for these types of moments and these type of games,” Zellers said. “We were telling the boys stick to what we know and stick with what works. Play our game.”

Zellers has been a force in the Tier I 18U tournament. He leads all players with nine goals and ranks No. 1 in total points (14). 

Zellers and Shattuck-St. Mary’s head coach Tom Ward both agreed that the team has to not let the emotional comeback victory get to their heads. 

Shattuck-St. Mary’s is a perfect 5-0 in Las Vegas this week.

“We can’t dwell on this game,” Zellers said. “This is an emotional game, and we can’t dwell on the big overtime win and comeback. You have to focus on the future. We were here last year and won it last year. Stick to what we know, work hard, and come away with the win.”

Ward said, “You don’t win a championship in the semifinals. You can’t have that emotional game and you flop in the finals. You made a great memory, now make that memory even better by playing good tomorrow.”

Jack Hirshorn came into the game in the second period and stopped all nine shots he faced to help Shattuck-St. Mary’s rally for the win.

“It wasn’t (Jackson) Silverberg’s fault,” Ward said. “We just changed goalies to change momentum. It wasn’t Jackson’s fault. He was the guy that had to sit on the sword for us. We righted the ship shift by shift by shift. Our conditioning took over late in the game. We were able to wet blanket them the last 10 minutes and in overtime.”

Now Shattuck-St. Mary’s will attempt to win a second consecutive Tier I 18U national title on Sunday morning. 

“Win, lose, draw. Show up and play,” Ward concluded. “If we show up and play, we have a puncher’s chance. We are as good as everybody. If we come and play, and our guys show up, we will have a chance.”

The championship game will take place at 2 pm ET. Watch live on USAHockeyTV.com. To view the Youth Tier I 18U homepage, click here. 

--By: Justin Felisko

WESLEY CHAPEL, Fla. —  Chicago Mission (IL) and Assabet Valley (MA) will face off tomorrow (April 7) in the 2024 Chipotle-USA Hockey Girls Tier I 14U National Championship title game at Advent Health Center Ice at 9:00 a.m. ET. 

The Chicago Mission clinched a championship birth after defeating Boston Advantage at Lovell Academy (MA), 2-1, in overtime. Reese Warrington netted an early tally in the first period to give Chicago a 1-0 lead, but Boston responded midway through the second period. With the score knotted at 1-1 at the end of regulation, the game headed to overtime where Charlotte Prodoehl deflected a shot from Lyric Bessey past the goaltender to punch her team’s ticket to the title game.

Meanwhile, Assabet Valley skated to a 3-2 victory over Minnesota Walleye (MN) in the semifinals. Mia Daley put Assabet on the board in the first period and Zoe Smith extended the lead to 2-0 at the beginning of the third frame. Minnesota’s Genevieve Nelson responded less than a minute later, but Assabet took advantage of a power play opportunity and upped the score to 3-1. Cate Fischer put Minnesota within one with just 19 seconds remaining in regulation, the deficit waa too much to overcome, and Assabet Valley advanced to the championship game.

The title game will take place at 9:00 a.m. ET and will stream live exclusively on USAHockeyTV.com. 

To view the Girls Tier I 14U homepage, click here. 

WESLEY CHAPEL, Fla. — Rochester Youth Hockey at BK Selects (NY) and Shattuck-St. Mary’s (MN) will face each other on Sunday in the title game of the 2024 Chipotle-USA Hockey Girls Tier I 16U National Championship at AdventHealth Center Ice. 

Rochester Youth Hockey at BK Selects has been battle-tested on its way to the championship game, as the New York team had won three straight games by a score of 2-1. That includes a semifinal win against Assabet Valley (MA), which saw the Selects come back from a 1-0 deficit to win. 

Shayla Beaudette assisted the game-tying goal in the semifinals, giving her a team-high six points. 

Shattuck-St. Mary’s also had to comeback in its semifinal game, as it twice rebounded from a one-goal deficit to defeat Minnesota Magazine (MN) thanks to an overtime goal from Jilian Klein. 

Nina Rossi has been the main catalyst for Shattuck’s attack, as her eight points is tied for the tournament’s scoring lead. 

The championship game will take place at 9:30 a.m. ET. Watch live on USAHockeyTV.com. 

To view the Girls Tier I 16U homepage, click here.

Story from Red Line Editorial, Inc.

WESLEY CHAPEL, Fla. — Shattuck-St. Mary’s (MN) and Rochester Youth Hockey at BK Selects (NY) will face off Sunday at 11:30 a.m. ET in the 2024 Chipotle-USA Hockey Girls’ Tier I 19U National Championship title game at Advent Health Center Ice.

Greta Brezenski tallied a hat trick and Anabella Fanale added a pair of goals to lift Rochester past the East Coast Wizards (MA) in a 7-1 victory. The Wizards got on the score sheet in the third period with a goal from Hannah Weyerhaeuser but were unable to slow down the Rochester offense. 

Across the arena, Maggie Scannell notched a pair of goals and Ella Muralt found the back of the net to send defending champion Shattuck-St. Mary’s to the final in a 3-1 victory over the Philadelphia Jr. Flyers (PA). Philadelphia’s Ella Sennick added a late tally, but the Shattuck held on to a two-goal lead to seal the win.

The championship game will take place at 9:00 a.m. ET and will exclusively stream live on USAHockeyTV.com. 

To view the Girls Tier I 19U homepage, click here.