Ryan Ladika/MDN Mackenzie Heide skates with the puck in the offensive zone during Minot State's 3-2 victory over McKendree March 19.

An unique opportunity and experience almost three months in the making has officially arrived in the Magic City.

Minot’s Maysa Arena will play host for the 2021 ACHA Women’s Division I National Tournament this weekend, and the city’s own Minot State Beavers are in the midst of preparations to become the first team to compete in the national tournament in its hometown.

“It’s a huge opportunity. Having it here in Minot, to win in front of your home crowd, that’s something we all want and hope we’re going to be able to do. It’s just better motivation for us,” team captain Sami Jo Henry said. “It’s really special for us to get to do that in our own rink. Knowing we have our own rink, our own locker room is going to be a big advantage for us.”

The opportunity to host and take part in the national tournament comes as an added bonus following a very strong showing throughout the regular season for Minot State. The team began the season Nov. 14, kicking off a two-game series against the Dakota College at Bottineau Jacks.

The Beavers easily dispatched of the Jacks over the two games by a 14-0 combined score to set the tone for the remainder of the campaign. Minot State would win seven of its first eight contests, half of which were on the road against Midland, before hitting a speed bump against Lindenwood University.

The Lions swept Minot State by 3-1 and 3-2 final scores, which understandably left a sour taste in the mouths of the Beavers. The squad bounced back quickly and won its next five contests, the last of which was a 4-1 victory over Lindenwood in the opener of the Women’s Midwest College Hockey Conference Tournament.

Minot State would later fall to Liberty University in the conference championship game by a slim 2-1 tally in overtime, but again showed admirable resiliency following a tough defeat. The Beavers ended the regular season the same way it began, with two shutout victories over the Jacks the first weekend in April.

Their motivation entering the tournament, aside from the desire to perform well for their home city, is to exact their revenge over the top-seeded Liberty as they did against Lindenwood.

“A bad bounce, their player had a good rush into our zone and just snuck it in, and those types of things happen,” head coach Ryan Miner said of the conference title game. “It’s a tough loss, especially when it’s a championship game where there’s a trophy at the end of it, but it’ll be good preparation going into this national tournament. We’ve only faced them twice in our history and we’re still looking for our first win against them. It would be sweet to get there at the end of the road of this national tournament and see them again, except we would be the ones holding that trophy.”

First things first, though. Minot State, entering the tournament as the second overall seed, must battle its way through a round robin-style period of pool play before advancing to the bracket segment next week.

To begin the pool play, Minot State was placed in a group with Midland and McKendree University, and will face the two schools Friday and Saturday afternoon, respectively, after taking on Adrian College Thursday afternoon with a 1 p.m. puck drop.

Unlike Liberty, the program has a history of success against their first three opponents on its side. The Beavers split their only two-game set against Adrian earlier this season and won all eight games they played against Midland and McKendree.

“Starting that first period, that first game, we talked about it last weekend, we need to take each game a period at a time,” Henry said of the upcoming pool play. “If we just focus on winning each period, I think that’s going to help us get to that next level. We do have three games before the semifinals, so we just have to focus on winning those games and hope that we can get to that endpoint but not look too far ahead.”

As it embarks on the culmination of a strong regular season, the team hopes for the same level of support that has been steadily growing the last few years as it attempts to make the most of its exciting opportunity on home ice.

“We’ve been growing every year here for the last few years,” Miner added. “Every year we’ve gained more of the community’s support, more recognition and more people showing up to the rink to watch us play. The opportunity to host at home and get the community involved is going to be huge for us. Hopefully that’ll give the girls the motivation to succeed each game. We’re winning it for ourselves, but we’re also winning it for the school and for the community, and that’s our goal going into it.”