United keep improving

While Memorial weekend is a time of leisure for most people, the players and coaches of the Hi-Line United U19 team were plenty busy as they traveled to Great Falls for a pair of games last Saturday.

The United, who have been playing well of late, put together another solid performance in the Electric City, as they fell to a Great Falls select team by the score of 3-0 and a select team from Livingston by the score of 3-1.

"We did a lot better than we thought we were going to do," United head coach John Harkins said. "Because of Mother's Day and Memorial weekend, we have been having to play a lot of select teams, which by definition is a team that is out of our league. So for us to be that competitive and to have a chance in both of those games was good to see."

In the first game against Great Falls, the United could not muster much offensively, but hung around thanks to a stingy defense and the stellar goaltending of Alec Drew, who Harkins said has been averaging around 10-12 saves per game for the United.

And while the second game of the doubleheader against Livingston went much the same way, Trey Schofield, the United's top scorer, got his team on the board with a goal, which was his fourth in his last four games.

"Trey is a really good player," Harkins said. "And we also played really well defensively and the fact that we are competing against teams that beat us much worse earlier in the season just goes to show how far these kids have come.

"Obviously, I would love to score some more goals and win against a select team," He added. "But, that is very hard to do. We just want to try and stay with them as long as we can. We have been able to stay competitive with them, which is difficult to do, but it let's the kids know they can play against tough competition."

The United will be back in action against two more select teams this Saturday in Helena, where they will take on both Helena and Butte. The U19 team will then travel to Sidney on June 6 for games against Sidney and Miles City, before heading to Livingston on June 13 for the Montana Cup Classic to finish out the season.