After a heartbreaking loss in the championship to Viewmont a year before, the Park City Miners Hockey team was looking to finish what they started at the beginning of this season. 

After only losing two seniors from the past year, hockey knew that they had a shot at winning and championship and were ready to show that they belonged back in the championship.

“Losing in the championship last year really sparked a fire in the boys,” said Junior Wes Griffen. 

“When the season came around we had one goal which was to win the whole thing,” said Junior Tyler Fisher.

After starting the season with 14 straight wins including two against Farmington, Park City made sure to show every team who was the favorite to win it all. 

A late stumble in a 0-2 loss to UCI-North late in the season helped the Miners regain their focus and complete their goal. 

“It sucks to lose, but I feel like it helped us realize that we would lose if we didn’t stay focused,” said Fisher.

After the loss, Park City responded with winning the last three games of the regular season by an average of 8 goals giving them the #1 seed in the playoffs.

In the first round of the playoffs, the Miners went against Skyline and handily took care of them with an 11-0 victory. 

This allowed them to move on to the semi-finals against Brighton. In the regular season, Park City narrowly defeated Brighton 1-0 but for the semi-finals, the Miners came ready to play and beat them 5-2 advancing them to the finals against Farmington.

Playoffs for hockey are two game elimination meaning that in order for a team to win it all, they have to beat someone twice. Both Farmington and Park City were undefeated on the road to the finals.

“Our hardest competition was definitely Farmington. Their roster was pretty deep and they had some pretty good players,” said Griffen. 

The Miners took the first step towards a state title handing Farmington their first loss of the playoffs winning 4-0. 

“After beating Farmington and sending them to the losers bracket we knew this was the year,” said Griffen. 

Farmington dropped to the loser’s bracket and had to play Bingham in order to get a second shot at Park City.

After beating Bingham 5-4, Farmington was back in the finals against Park City looking for revenge.

Park City was looking to do something that they hadn’t done in 44 years. Win the hockey state championship. 

Park City got to business right away taking an early 2-0 lead at the end of the first period. After a scoreless second period, the Miners were 20 minutes away from history.

They finished the season by winning the third period 3-1 and the game 5-1 giving the team something that they had been so close to in past years. 

“With the community and students coming together for that championship game and supporting us, it really helped us win the title for the first time since 1976,” said Griffen.

Park City finished the season with a 21-1 record including 4-0 in the playoffs bringing home a state trophy that was long overdue.