Minnesota’s famed boys hockey state tournament was nearing a crescendo last March, and Moorhead had a problem. So did Stillwater. Two teams playing for a championship had scores of fans who couldn’t get tickets, including some of the Moorhead players’ parents.

A system designed to ensure that family members and prioritized fans have access to tickets had failed.

“There were a lot of people panicking,” said Josh Arnold, whose son George played in the tournament for Moorhead. “Some moms were actually getting pretty emotional because they didn’t think they were going to be able to watch their sons play.”

Stillwater didn’t have an issue with player parents, but many of the team’s devoted fans hit major roadblocks trying to buy tickets.

“We had issues with all the games,” Stillwater fan Arianna Valena-Nelson said in a Facebook message. “We’d try to order tickets and have them in our cart and the system would glitch and then the tickets would be gone. It was really frustrating.”

Moorhead, led by Mason Kraft’s four goals, eventually defeated Stillwater 7-6 in an all-time classic title game. The attendance of 20,491 set a tournament record at what was then called Xcel Energy Center, now Grand Casino Arena.

With another boys state hockey tournament coming March 4-7 to St. Paul, and Moorhead again among the heavy favorites, the potential for another ticket snafu remains.

Moorhead had never won the tournament despite reaching the championship game eight previous times. Once the celebration ended, longtime Spuds fan Tim Zoerner went looking for answers. He called the school and wrote a letter to Gov. Tim Walz, sending copies to other politicians and news outlets.

“I got a thing from the governor that just said they received the letter, but I never heard back,” Zoerner said.

The NHL’s Minnesota Wild, who play home games at Grand Casino Arena, deferred the Star Tribune’s questions to the Minnesota State High School League, and the MSHSL declined multiple interview requests for this story. A Ticketmaster spokesperson said the company didn’t hear from any fans who had issues attending the event.

‘Like wildfire’

The face value for state tournament tickets is $20 for adults and $13 for students. There is a waiting list to join the tournament season tickets group. Once in the group, fans can purchase two season tickets apiece and renew them each year. The MSHSL says the estimated wait to join the season tickets group is 12 years.

It’s hard to know how many of those tickets are available for sale on the secondary market. During the boys hockey tournament, some upper-deck seats were listed on ticketsonsale.com for $475, with lower-level seats at $570.

The overwhelming demand puts pressure on athletic directors from schools that advance to the tournament to make sure their allotment of tickets ends up in the right hands.

Each participating team receives about 1,200 tickets for the quarterfinals and semifinals, and about 2,000 for the championship game.

In Moorhead’s case, the ticket priority list goes: varsity and JV parents, coaches, students, hockey alumni, youth hockey families and the general Moorhead community.

Ticketmaster uses a pre-sale passcode system to help schools serve the people on that list. At the designated time, the school emails a passcode to priority fans and later posts that passcode on the school website.

“People get the code and maybe they give it to a friend,” Moorhead activities director Dean Haugo said. “They think it’s just going there, and the next thing you know, it goes like wildfire.”

Access denied

Zoerner, 71, went to several Moorhead games last season, home and road. He has been on the state tournament season ticket waiting list for seven years. He had attended the state tournament several other times but not since 2007. March 2025 was his first time using the pre-sale passcode system.

Previously, fans would stand in line at Moorhead High School two days before the tournament began for quarterfinal tickets. If the Spuds won, fans would stand in line again at St. Paul’s arena for tickets to the next game.

With the passcode system, they didn’t have to stand in line. A passcode was sent to their inbox or was viewable on the school website to buy tickets through Ticketmaster.

For the quarterfinals, the system worked “flawlessly,” Zoerner said. But once Moorhead won that game, it became increasingly difficult for Spuds fans to get their tickets.

For the semifinals, Moorhead fans were told to be on the website at 1 p.m. to retrieve the passcode. But when the time came, there was no link or code. Zoerner and his granddaughter kept trying. It finally appeared 15 minutes later.

“When I clicked the link, it was sold out,” Zoerner said.

He and his granddaughter had to watch the semifinals at a Cowboy Jack’s in Bloomington.

Huge ticket demand

Josh Arnold, whose youngest son, Will, joined the Moorhead varsity team this season, has theories about what happened to those tickets last March.

“I’m guessing someone hacked the code and then bought them all up and then tried to resell them for a higher amount,” he said.

Moorhead continued its electrifying ride with a last-minute goal from Zac Zimmerman in the semifinals to knock out Edina 4-3. Then came the scramble for championship tickets, with both schools trying to make history.

Stillwater was aiming for its first boys hockey state championship as well.

Ponies activities director Nate Cox had a plan. At the designated time, he would release the code to the coaches and hockey families. Then, he would release the code to students and staff, then to Stillwater’s greater community in 10-minute intervals.

“By the time that the code was emailed to students and staff and to our community, the tickets were already gone,” Cox said. “I don’t want to throw my community under the bus, but when you make it to the state tournament for the first time in eight years, we just went nuts over it.”

Haugo told Fargo TV station WDAY that the Spuds “got smoked” by the ticket process and said the grade for his performance would be an F.

“The day of our state championship game was a tough day,” Haugo told the Star Tribune. “We were working late into the afternoon. But we had some parents who were incredibly active making sure we had tickets for each of our senior parents.”

The passcode didn’t work for Zoerner again, but this time he and his granddaughter secured standing-room tickets at least.

Lessons learned

What would they do differently?

“I don’t believe the code system is going to change,” Haugo said. “So from our perspective, if we are in this position again, we simply have to manage the human side of it as much as we can.”

Cox said, “I think if I had to do it again [in 2026], I would of course take care of the coaches and the players and their families first, and then after that, no holds barred.”

Community members contacted Cox and Stillwater superintendent Dr. Michael Funk, wondering whether people had bought up Stillwater’s tickets to resell on the secondary market.

Cox investigated it and said, “I saw very few tickets on [the secondary market] that looked like the allotment of tickets that I was given,” Cox said. “It’s very possible that somebody bought a couple of tickets and then turned around just to jack up [the price] and make some money.

“It’s maybe Pollyannaish, but I think for the most part, our Stillwater community got the tickets that were given to us.”

Haugo and Cox both said the passcode system is workable; their schools will be better prepared to handle it now that they have used it. Both said they are grateful for digital ticketing, knowing how difficult things could be in the paper-ticket era.

Zoerner is weighing a return trip for the tournament this March. He’s a Hibbing High School grad, so he cheers for both Moorhead and Hibbing in hockey.

Moorhead has been ranked No. 1 or No. 2 in Class 2A all season, and Hibbing is a favorite in Class 1A. So there could be much for him to see in St. Paul.

“It’s a long drive, and we’re spending tons of money on hotels and everything,” Zoerner said. “To treat us like this, it’s just inexcusable. … If I’ve got to hassle with these tickets like that, I’m not going to go.”