Minnesota High School Hockey Captain Scores After Losing His Father

Just one day after losing his father, Tom, to kidney cancer, White Bear Lake’s senior captain started for the Bears and scored the season’s first goal on his only shift of the game. It turned out to be the difference in his team’s 6-0 season-opening win over Park of Cottage Grove on Saturday night at the Vadnais Heights Sports Center.

The building burst with emotion just 24 seconds into the contest when Johnson received teammate Tommy Giller’s cross-ice feed and blasted a one-timer from the bottom of the right circle into the Park net. Johnson was mobbed by his teammates as they celebrated amid a shower of teddy bears raining down on the ice as fans participated in the team’s annual Teddy Bear Toss benefiting Toys for Tots.

The same teddy bears Johnson’s late father ordered long ago as one of his captain’s parent duties.

“It was truly amazing how things worked out,” said family friend Jon Anderson, who parlayed a stellar high school career at White Bear Lake into playing four years for Doug Woog at the University of Minnesota (1986-90). “We couldn’t have asked for a better start to the season for the kids and also for Michael and the family. There wasn’t a dry eye in the house.”