“A champion is afraid of losing, everyone else is afraid of winning”

The old adage popularized by Billie Jean King is one that can come to be metaphorical when people will look back on the 2017-18 Saint Ignatius ice hockey team.

The Wildcats have entered the completely unknown and have played the toughest competition the program has ever faced. The team has taken risks in moving up to a higher level of play against top Prep and U18 teams. The Wildcats, the newbies to most of these areas, cannot afford to look bad. Despite all of this hype, the Wildcats continue to go out and play their best hockey, and try to win at any and all costs.

“We didn’t come here to make the game look close on paper, we came here to win hockey games. I don’t care if we lose, I just want to see your best effort,” said Head Coach Pat O’Rourke '90 following Friday’s 5-1 loss.

The Wildcats trailed The Hill Academy due late in the third period, as Hill had played a near-perfect game, and led by three after three great opportunities turn into goals.

A five-minute power play resulted in a Joey Trobenter goal, to bring things within two with nearly five minutes to play.

That would be as close as the Cats would come. An empty netter and a late breakaway goal would lead to a 5-1 defeat.

Coach Pat O’Rourke preached after the contest that the Wildcats, while a great team, needed to come back and play a near perfect game the next day.

O’Rourke preached that the team came here to win and not try and just make the score look close, their full intention was to come back the next day and prove that despite a four goal setback, they could win and prove themselves as they have done all season.

The Wildcats, entering Saturday afternoon’s contest, had not lost back to back games in regulation in 1,883 days, or in the year 2012.

This trend would continue.

Early on in the contest, Joey Trobenter would continue his birthday weekend scoring streak by adding his second goal of the weekend when he lifted on over Marcel.

After nine minutes of scoreless play, junior Charlie Klenkar broke the puck out himself, made his way through the offensive zone, walked a defender on the circle, and whipped a shot, got his own rebound, and multiplied the Wildcat lead by two.

Benny Savarino played well only allowing two goals, off a penalty kill breakaway and a tipped shot.

The Wildcat defense stood tall in the third period with great efforts out of Santino Pignatiello, Greg Langermeier, Clay Gazdak, and Charlie Erbs.

Michael Boehm made one of the most acrobatic plays I’ve ever seen as he jumped and knocked a backhanded shot into the net with a minute to play, leading to a 3-2 victory.

The Cats head to the MIHL Showcase to face #3 Orchard Lake St. Mary’s and #1 Detroit Central Catholic.