Ending the state tournament undefeated, Frisco hockey’s varsity gold team team beat rival McKinney 2-1 to become state champs and have a shot at nationals in Cleveland.

“The most exciting thing about winning is that McKinney is our rival team,” head coach Ryan McLean said. “We’ve battled them the last two years, so this was revenge for us this year and it was a great game and McKinney is kinda who we wanted to play this year so we got our wish.”

After a successful 13-1 season that included a 12-game winning streak to finish, the hockey team was able to defeat Mckinney with a game winning goal in the third period.

“We have a saying in our locker room ‘stick to the plan’ and we stuck to the plan like we have all year,” McLean said. “They have a really good goalie and our guys kept chipping away at him to score and did our job all throughout the game.”

In his first year on the team, senior Skylar Boughner is ready to make a run in the national tournament.

“I was really great just seeing my entire team just go out there and play their hearts out and winning state,” Boughner said. “I feel like we are going to do really well at nationals if we play with our hearts, and keep our minds clear.”

Hockey is a different beast compared to other school sports, as the team is made up of players from schools throughout the district.

“At first it was hard to bond a bit but we all came together really fast because we love the game,” senior Chase Nies said. “Making that bond is great and we use that to play hockey.”

The chemistry that the players have on the ice plays a big part in the team’s success.

“We worked as a team really well during state, everyone decided to show up which was good,” Nies said. “We played really well against McKinney and they were a really tough team for us.”

Taking their second trip to nationals, the team hopes to make it past the quarterfinals where they fell last season, and possibly win it all.

“We are confident going in and we have good goaltending, we have a lot of guys who can score goals,” McLean said. “Nothing’s easy but we’re going there with a positive outlook and we’re doing everything we can to do some damage and hopefully win.