Picture perfect. Or, perhaps more accurately, practice perfect. Because the goal was the result plenty of practice repetitions.

"We have this drill," DeMars said. "It's a two-on-one continuous and ... we do it a lot."

The idea is to pluck the puck off the boards, escape the defense and create a rush toward the opponent's goal. Sophomore defenseman Bauer Murphy was the one who got this puck off the boards and past the Eden Prairie defense. DeMars called it "a perfect chip."

"We won the battle at the rail," Chiodo said. "We made a beautiful play and slipped (the puck) out, and then we were on our horses. We work on that all the time in practice. We did it earlier in the game and almost capitalized on it. This time, we capitalized."

Forward Garett Drotts took the puck from Murphy and put a pass where DeMars could let his slap shot fly. And, this time, there was no post, no defender's stick, no bad luck at all for the Thunderhawks senior who coach Chiodo called "snakebitten" in his efforts to score goals this season.

"He's a natural goal-scorer and just hasn't gotten the goals yet," Chiodo said of DeMars. "So it's big for him, for his confidence moving forward."

DeMars, after scoring his third goal of the season, admitted to feeling a little frustrated but said his faith in his coach's advice has been rewarded.

"Coach keeps saying to keep going and doing all the little things right and (the goals) will come to you," DeMars said. "Tonight they did."

Samuel Sterle, Hayden Davis and Joey DelGreco scored in regulation for Grand Rapids. DelGreco's unassisted goal with 8:37 to play in regulation tied the game at 3-3 and gave the Thunderhawks the opportunity to win in overtime. He now has 10 goals and 13 assists for the Thunderhawks.

Jake Luloff (two goals and an assist) and Ryan Andor (one goal, one assist) provided the scoring for Eden Prairie, as they have for most of the first part of this season. Luloff now has seven goals and six assists in the Eagles' seven games. Andor has four goals and nine assists.

Eden Prairie, the defending Class 2A state champion which opened the season with back-to-back losses before winning three in a row, fell to 3-3.