Team White 9 Team Blue 6

The Boys are Back In Town

Intra-Squad Scrimmage
Saturday, January 5, 2008
Xcel Energy Center - St. Paul, Minnesota

The Minnesota Swarm finally arrived in town this weekend. Eight months of Vikings and Twins misery are over and today the fans got to see their favorite team scrimmage each other in the Swarm Blue-White game. The White team came back down 4-2 at halftime led by Travis Hill. T. Hill scored the first two of the second half to tie the game at 4 as the rout continued for the White.

Dean Hill got the game winning goal making the score at that time 7-5 White. Ryan Cousins scored the first two goals for Blue to lead the Blue, with a Sean Pollock goal sandwiched in, to a 2-1 lead early in the first. Chad Culp and Ryan Sharp upped the Blue lead 4-1 before T. Hill finished off the first half scoring to cut the lead in half at 4-2.

The second half was played four on four. After T. Hill scored the first two of the second half, D. Hill got the White their first lead at 5-4. Culp came back to tie it at 5, but the White scored three straight behind Mike Hominuck, D. Hill and T. Hill. Culp got his hat trick to make it 8-6. Ryan Ward finished out the scoring for the White and the game.

Kevin Croswell did a great job in net for the White team. Cousins scored on the first shot of the game but Croswell was more than game. Nick Patterson did well too especially a fantastic flurry of saves to begin the second half. The White team definitely took it to the Blue as the Blue had a lot of bad shots in the 2nd Half. T. Hill was flying all around the Xcel floor and no one could catch him. With only eleven on each side and the refereeing of Swarm Assistant Head Coach Derek Moffat (who celebrated his 38th birthday today), the game was more for the fans enjoyment but we got to see a lot of combinations that one normally wouldn't see in regular season action.

The fans showed up well for the scrimmage. After the scrimmage, the Swarm had an autograph signing but it ran so long because more fans showed up than they expected. The excess of fans put the Swarm players and coaches behind on their very busy schedule this weekend as they spread the word about the team throughout the Twin Cities metro at various locations.

The hometown report on Colin Achenbach is about a B. He was more noticeable in the first half with a couple breakaway attempts. His big play was midway through the first half when he intercepted a pass that Mark Miyashita practically had in his pocket. Quite a theft for Achenbach but he was turned away by Croswell.

The Swarm open the regular season next Friday, January 11th in Toronto against the Toronto Rock at 6:30 pm CST. The Rock opened their season tonight with a 11-9 victory over the Chicago Shamrox. The next day, the Swarm bring the Rock with them back to the Xcel Energy Center to open the home part of the regular season. The home opener on Saturday, January 12th begins at 7:00 pm CST. All games can be viewed on B2 Networks online with a broadband connection and seven dollars in American currency.

Next Wednesday, January 9th, the Minnesota Swarm will reveal their new website. To see the launching of the new site on Wednesday go to www.mnswarm.com.

Game Statistics