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Jul. 2—In the dimly lit media room tucked under the seats at Grand Casino Arena in St. Paul, Bailey Rupp, Millie Knott and Megan Berg were asked one of the toughest questions they've had to answer as Bemidji High School hockey players.
"What did this experience mean to you?"
It was a loaded question, being that it took the Lumberjacks 19 years to get back to the state tournament since their first trip in 2007. It's also a question that would come with a different answer when asked at a different time.
The Jacks were less than 30 minutes removed from a
gut-wrenching 6-4 loss against Edina
in the Class AA state quarterfinals. For juniors Rupp and Knott, and Berg, a senior, it deflated a years-long effort to get over the hump.
Rupp, typically bubbly but measured, paused and cleared her throat. Tears pooled in her eyes before she gave a response that perfectly articulated her emotions in the moment.
"The coolest part was just doing it with half our town here," she said. "The support we had was amazing. We went up top before the game and there was just Bemidji people all around. It's pretty special to have the support here and from all the people back home. It hurts that we weren't able to do it for them. We let them down, but it really meant a lot to us to have all of that and just skating around the rink and seeing all of that, it's really special."
Knott echoed Rupp's sentiment, fighting back her own emotions before passing the metaphorical baton to Berg, who just played one of her last hockey games for BHS. After thanking the supporters from Bemidji, the senior captain spoke about the impact this team had on girls participants in the Bemidji Youth Hockey Association.
"We showed them we can do it," Berg said. "Yeah, we fell short, but it was so fun. Taking that time during warmups, looking up and seeing everybody and all the faces from school and family members, it was just so cool."
In that moment, Rupp, Knott, Berg were so much more than just hockey players. Sitting at the elevated table in full gear — save for helmets, sticks and gloves — still wearing their jerseys, they spoke about being Bemidjians. They understood that what they accomplished wasn't just for them, but for the future of girls hockey in Bemidji.
The BHS girls hockey team's historic season comes with one more accolade. The Lumberjacks are the seventh recipient of the Pioneer's annual Team of the Year honor.
First introduced in 2020, the Pioneer Team of the Year award is meant to annually recognize the accomplishments of one area team from the preceding school year that most impressed fans and media alike. BHS girls hockey beat out other worthy candidates — Bemidji High School boys cross country and softball, Northome/Kelliher girls basketball and Bemidji State women's soccer, among them.
Bemidji's 2022-23 season was a breath of fresh air, with a new-look group of fresh faces breaking onto the varsity scene. The Lumberjacks went 4-20-2 the year before, so a 12-9-4 regular-season finish and hosting their first Section 8AA Tournament game since 2015 was the sign of a promising future.
Ultimately, the Jacks lost to fifth-seeded Brainerd in the absence of goaltender Payton Weidemann, who was out with an injury.
Weidemann returned for her senior season in 2023-24 as a veteran of a team with a young core — not only including Rupp, Knott and Berg, but also Naomi Johnson, Taylor Bjerke, Mali McLean, Emma Greiner and more. The Jacks won a postseason game for the first time in nine years in a 3-0 road triumph over fourth-seeded Alexandria, then fell to Moorhead in the section semifinals.
The Lumberjacks gained experience through tough playoff losses. To close the 2024-25 season, they suffered a 3-2 semifinal defeat in overtime against No. 2 Roseau. They were on the outside looking in on the section championship game for the 15th year in a row.
As players like Berg and Bjerke geared up for their senior seasons, and with
standout junior goaltender Lily Lauer
moving to the area, the 2025-26 season was as good a time as any to reach the grandest stage that Minnesota high school hockey has to offer.
Bemidji won its first seven games to start the 2025-26 campaign, outscoring opponents 30-7. It led to a matchup against top-ranked Holy Family Catholic at the Bemidji Community Arena on Dec. 12. While the Fire rode its early 2-0 lead to a 4-2 win, the Lumberjacks fought back and skated with one of the best teams in the state.
"Once we recognized (Holy Family's speed) and challenged them, we played stride-for-stride with them,"
said head coach Mike Johnson after the loss,
who realized BHS was turning a competitive corner. Two weeks earlier, the Jacks
knocked off Benilde-St. Margaret's
on the road, 3-1, and also
beat Warroad,
Roseau
and
Grand Rapids/Greenway
in their unbeaten start.
Bemidji roped off six more wins to move to 13-1, then went on a 3-4 stretch that coincided with the absence of Rupp. The team's leading scorer was in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, playing for the
U.S. under-18 team in the World Championships.
Amid that stretch was a
4-1 loss at home against Moorhead,
the reigning section champion. Bemidji also
tied Alexandria 1-1
in the penultimate game of the regular season. Despite going 0-1-1 against the other two-thirds of the top trio in the section, the Jacks were awarded the top seed and the right to host each of their games at the BCA.
After a first-round bye, Bemidji
throttled Roseau 7-1 in the section semifinals
. Not only was it the Lumberjacks' third win over the Rams in one season, but they also clinched a spot in the section championship for the first time since 2010.
Just three years earlier, Bemidji players and coaches marveled in the accomplishment of hosting a singular playoff game. Johnson, who took over as head coach eight years ago, vocalized his goal of turning the BHS girls hockey program into a perennial contender.
He powered through four straight seasons below .500 until the 2022-23 team came along. He called those years "lean, but important" in terms of developing the culture it takes to win.
On Feb. 11, those same Bemidji players and coaches believed the shock-and-awe of a larger home playoff crowd had worn off.
But as they exited the locker room, they saw patrons stuffed into every conceivable viewpoint the BCA had to offer.
"There wasn't a single seat open," Berg said on Feb. 11. "I didn't think I'd ever see the bleachers that filled for one of our games. It was surreal to skate onto the ice in front of this crowd. It made us want to do this for the community.
"Let's get these people a section championship."
The challenge posed from the visitor's end was the Spuds, who three weeks earlier handed BHS its fifth loss on the same sheet of ice.
"The last thing I said before we came out for the game was, 'Hey, let's plant our flag at the top of the Section 8AA mountain and put Bemidji girls hockey back on the map,'" Johnson said.
The Jacks jumped all over Moorhead in the opening 17 minutes. By the time the two schools went to their respective dressing rooms, Bemidji had a 3-0 lead thanks to a pair of goals from Rupp and one from Greiner.
Moorhead got a goal back in the second period, but Knott believed she put the game on ice in 113 seconds to go. Her empty-net tally gave BHS a commanding 4-1 lead, but the Spuds had punches left in them.
Shortly after Knott's goal, Moorhead cashed in on two power plays to make it a one-goal game. Bemidji used its timeout to regroup for the final 54.5 seconds.
"I just kept thinking about how there's no way this is happening," Berg said. "We had to cool down. We had to take it one second at a time."
The Lumberjacks recorded blocked shots, key faceoff wins and sorely-needed saves in the final minute. Despite its chaotic — but fitting — end, the
big game finally went Bemidji's way,
and it came with a trip to Minnesota's capital city.
"I wanted it so bad," Bjerke said. "You can't describe a feeling like this. I believed in us all along that we'd make it. I could feel it; I could feel it in the beginning of the game. We were all confident and worked hard. It just feels good."
Berg, the other senior, said: "All the emotions are coming out of me. I can't explain this feeling. This group of people is just, you can't ask for anything better than them. They work so hard, they're upbeat, they're caring. Everybody on this team is so amazing."
Unknowingly for them and the rest of the Jacks, it was also
Johnson's last game at the BCA.
Four days after the section championship, he became a grandpa. The father of four will be a grandfather of two in the fall. Bemidji's
consolation championship loss
at the state tournament
was his final game behind Bemidji's bench.
"My wife said, with 100% certainty, that this would be my last season before it started. Well, I was at about 90%," Johnson said to the Pioneer after the season, jokingly. "We'll be married 39 years this June. I'd like to keep being married."
While BHS will reload for a section title defense, leaning on seniors like Rupp, Knott, Greiner, Lauer and McLean, the lasting impact of the 2025-26 season is already noticeable.
In replacing Johnson,
new head coach Chris Hennum is moving up
from the girls youth ranks. He coached his daughters through BYHA at various levels, and he even booked his trip to the Class AA state tournament before the section tournament started.
Hennum is adamant that the efforts of BHS this season will spark enthusiasm and participation for girls hockey players in Bemidji. For his sake — taking over a program that, even in a year it made it to state, struggles with fielding a full junior varsity team — the future looks as bright as ever.
Next year could bring a return trip to St. Paul, more hardware in Bemidji's trophy case and even a Ms. Hockey nomination, but 2025-26 will be remembered as the year Bemidji girls hockey said it was here to stay.
Previous Pioneer Teams of the Year
2025: Bemidji High School boys soccer
2024: Bemidji High School girls wrestling
2023: Bemidji State women's soccer
2022: Bemidji State football
2021: Bemidji High School boys tennis
2020: Bemidji State men's hockey
Continue reading...
"What did this experience mean to you?"
It was a loaded question, being that it took the Lumberjacks 19 years to get back to the state tournament since their first trip in 2007. It's also a question that would come with a different answer when asked at a different time.
The Jacks were less than 30 minutes removed from a
gut-wrenching 6-4 loss against Edina
in the Class AA state quarterfinals. For juniors Rupp and Knott, and Berg, a senior, it deflated a years-long effort to get over the hump.
Rupp, typically bubbly but measured, paused and cleared her throat. Tears pooled in her eyes before she gave a response that perfectly articulated her emotions in the moment.
"The coolest part was just doing it with half our town here," she said. "The support we had was amazing. We went up top before the game and there was just Bemidji people all around. It's pretty special to have the support here and from all the people back home. It hurts that we weren't able to do it for them. We let them down, but it really meant a lot to us to have all of that and just skating around the rink and seeing all of that, it's really special."
Knott echoed Rupp's sentiment, fighting back her own emotions before passing the metaphorical baton to Berg, who just played one of her last hockey games for BHS. After thanking the supporters from Bemidji, the senior captain spoke about the impact this team had on girls participants in the Bemidji Youth Hockey Association.
"We showed them we can do it," Berg said. "Yeah, we fell short, but it was so fun. Taking that time during warmups, looking up and seeing everybody and all the faces from school and family members, it was just so cool."
In that moment, Rupp, Knott, Berg were so much more than just hockey players. Sitting at the elevated table in full gear — save for helmets, sticks and gloves — still wearing their jerseys, they spoke about being Bemidjians. They understood that what they accomplished wasn't just for them, but for the future of girls hockey in Bemidji.
The BHS girls hockey team's historic season comes with one more accolade. The Lumberjacks are the seventh recipient of the Pioneer's annual Team of the Year honor.
First introduced in 2020, the Pioneer Team of the Year award is meant to annually recognize the accomplishments of one area team from the preceding school year that most impressed fans and media alike. BHS girls hockey beat out other worthy candidates — Bemidji High School boys cross country and softball, Northome/Kelliher girls basketball and Bemidji State women's soccer, among them.
Bemidji's 2022-23 season was a breath of fresh air, with a new-look group of fresh faces breaking onto the varsity scene. The Lumberjacks went 4-20-2 the year before, so a 12-9-4 regular-season finish and hosting their first Section 8AA Tournament game since 2015 was the sign of a promising future.
Ultimately, the Jacks lost to fifth-seeded Brainerd in the absence of goaltender Payton Weidemann, who was out with an injury.
Weidemann returned for her senior season in 2023-24 as a veteran of a team with a young core — not only including Rupp, Knott and Berg, but also Naomi Johnson, Taylor Bjerke, Mali McLean, Emma Greiner and more. The Jacks won a postseason game for the first time in nine years in a 3-0 road triumph over fourth-seeded Alexandria, then fell to Moorhead in the section semifinals.
The Lumberjacks gained experience through tough playoff losses. To close the 2024-25 season, they suffered a 3-2 semifinal defeat in overtime against No. 2 Roseau. They were on the outside looking in on the section championship game for the 15th year in a row.
As players like Berg and Bjerke geared up for their senior seasons, and with
standout junior goaltender Lily Lauer
moving to the area, the 2025-26 season was as good a time as any to reach the grandest stage that Minnesota high school hockey has to offer.
Bemidji won its first seven games to start the 2025-26 campaign, outscoring opponents 30-7. It led to a matchup against top-ranked Holy Family Catholic at the Bemidji Community Arena on Dec. 12. While the Fire rode its early 2-0 lead to a 4-2 win, the Lumberjacks fought back and skated with one of the best teams in the state.
"Once we recognized (Holy Family's speed) and challenged them, we played stride-for-stride with them,"
said head coach Mike Johnson after the loss,
who realized BHS was turning a competitive corner. Two weeks earlier, the Jacks
knocked off Benilde-St. Margaret's
on the road, 3-1, and also
beat Warroad,
Roseau
and
Grand Rapids/Greenway
in their unbeaten start.
Bemidji roped off six more wins to move to 13-1, then went on a 3-4 stretch that coincided with the absence of Rupp. The team's leading scorer was in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, playing for the
U.S. under-18 team in the World Championships.
Amid that stretch was a
4-1 loss at home against Moorhead,
the reigning section champion. Bemidji also
tied Alexandria 1-1
in the penultimate game of the regular season. Despite going 0-1-1 against the other two-thirds of the top trio in the section, the Jacks were awarded the top seed and the right to host each of their games at the BCA.
After a first-round bye, Bemidji
throttled Roseau 7-1 in the section semifinals
. Not only was it the Lumberjacks' third win over the Rams in one season, but they also clinched a spot in the section championship for the first time since 2010.
Just three years earlier, Bemidji players and coaches marveled in the accomplishment of hosting a singular playoff game. Johnson, who took over as head coach eight years ago, vocalized his goal of turning the BHS girls hockey program into a perennial contender.
He powered through four straight seasons below .500 until the 2022-23 team came along. He called those years "lean, but important" in terms of developing the culture it takes to win.
On Feb. 11, those same Bemidji players and coaches believed the shock-and-awe of a larger home playoff crowd had worn off.
But as they exited the locker room, they saw patrons stuffed into every conceivable viewpoint the BCA had to offer.
"There wasn't a single seat open," Berg said on Feb. 11. "I didn't think I'd ever see the bleachers that filled for one of our games. It was surreal to skate onto the ice in front of this crowd. It made us want to do this for the community.
"Let's get these people a section championship."
The challenge posed from the visitor's end was the Spuds, who three weeks earlier handed BHS its fifth loss on the same sheet of ice.
"The last thing I said before we came out for the game was, 'Hey, let's plant our flag at the top of the Section 8AA mountain and put Bemidji girls hockey back on the map,'" Johnson said.
The Jacks jumped all over Moorhead in the opening 17 minutes. By the time the two schools went to their respective dressing rooms, Bemidji had a 3-0 lead thanks to a pair of goals from Rupp and one from Greiner.
Moorhead got a goal back in the second period, but Knott believed she put the game on ice in 113 seconds to go. Her empty-net tally gave BHS a commanding 4-1 lead, but the Spuds had punches left in them.
Shortly after Knott's goal, Moorhead cashed in on two power plays to make it a one-goal game. Bemidji used its timeout to regroup for the final 54.5 seconds.
"I just kept thinking about how there's no way this is happening," Berg said. "We had to cool down. We had to take it one second at a time."
The Lumberjacks recorded blocked shots, key faceoff wins and sorely-needed saves in the final minute. Despite its chaotic — but fitting — end, the
big game finally went Bemidji's way,
and it came with a trip to Minnesota's capital city.
"I wanted it so bad," Bjerke said. "You can't describe a feeling like this. I believed in us all along that we'd make it. I could feel it; I could feel it in the beginning of the game. We were all confident and worked hard. It just feels good."
Berg, the other senior, said: "All the emotions are coming out of me. I can't explain this feeling. This group of people is just, you can't ask for anything better than them. They work so hard, they're upbeat, they're caring. Everybody on this team is so amazing."
Unknowingly for them and the rest of the Jacks, it was also
Johnson's last game at the BCA.
Four days after the section championship, he became a grandpa. The father of four will be a grandfather of two in the fall. Bemidji's
consolation championship loss
at the state tournament
was his final game behind Bemidji's bench.
"My wife said, with 100% certainty, that this would be my last season before it started. Well, I was at about 90%," Johnson said to the Pioneer after the season, jokingly. "We'll be married 39 years this June. I'd like to keep being married."
While BHS will reload for a section title defense, leaning on seniors like Rupp, Knott, Greiner, Lauer and McLean, the lasting impact of the 2025-26 season is already noticeable.
In replacing Johnson,
new head coach Chris Hennum is moving up
from the girls youth ranks. He coached his daughters through BYHA at various levels, and he even booked his trip to the Class AA state tournament before the section tournament started.
Hennum is adamant that the efforts of BHS this season will spark enthusiasm and participation for girls hockey players in Bemidji. For his sake — taking over a program that, even in a year it made it to state, struggles with fielding a full junior varsity team — the future looks as bright as ever.
Next year could bring a return trip to St. Paul, more hardware in Bemidji's trophy case and even a Ms. Hockey nomination, but 2025-26 will be remembered as the year Bemidji girls hockey said it was here to stay.
Previous Pioneer Teams of the Year
2025: Bemidji High School boys soccer
2024: Bemidji High School girls wrestling
2023: Bemidji State women's soccer
2022: Bemidji State football
2021: Bemidji High School boys tennis
2020: Bemidji State men's hockey
Continue reading...
