Submitted photo MACHA Tournament Director Kevin Gregory presents Dordt Defenders senior Noah Wilmes with the tournament MVP award following Dordt’s double-OT win over Missouri State on Monday at the Maryville Hockey Center in Chesterfield, Missouri.

SIOUX CENTER, Iowa — With less than a day to decompress after scoring the biggest goal of his hockey career so far, senior Dordt Defender Noah Wilmes and his teammates are still riding high from Monday’s double-overtime win over Missouri State in the MACHA Silver Division Championship.

Wilmes, a former New Ulm Eagles hockey player and 2021 New Ulm Cathedral grad, had the biggest moment of his collegiate career Monday afternoon as his goal gave his team a 5-4 win in that second overtime period at the Maryville Hockey Center in Chesterfield, Missouri.

The MACHA (Mid-American Collegiate Hockey Association) title win was Dordt’s first in 15 years. They opened the MACHA tourney with a 5-2 win over Washington on Feb. 21 before shutting out the hosts of the tourney Maryville University 7-0 on Feb. 22.

It took the Defenders a little longer to get the job done Monday, but Wilmes came through for his team when he skated in wide of the net and slipped the puck past the left pad of Missouri State goalie Espen Reager to seal the deal with 4:01 gone in the second overtime.

“I remember the whistle before [the goal] I kind of skated by the bench and coach [Tyler Morgan] gave me a smile and I smiled at him back,” Wilmes said. “He was going to tell me to do that exact move right before I got on the ice but he decided not to, just to let me play and then it kind of just happened.

“The D man chipped the puck out and it went through on of our player’s skates and then one of their player’s skates and I’d been doing that drive to the net the whole game and it hadn’t worked. I decided to switch it up a little bit and kind of bring it wider towards the net and the goalie tried poke-checking and missed and I watched it go in the net and life kind of froze for a second.”

Wilmes ended up finishing as the MACHA tourney MVP also as he had three goals and four assists during the tournament. The win was extra impressive for the Defenders as they battled back after trailing 3-0 with 19:44 left in regulation.

“It means a lot,” Wilmes said. “I’m one of the remaining ones from my freshman class. … I’m a true senior now, but we actually added on a few other seniors throughout my four years. But it just feels good, it feels right and kind of playing the whole tournament, we all had [thought] as a team, ‘We don’t feel there’s a loss in front of us these next few games.’ We all were really confident. Even when Missouri State scored that third goal, we’re all like, ‘We’re not losing this game.'”

After tying it up to force overtime and a scoreless first overtime, both teams went to their locker rooms again to strategize and get some energy back.

“In the locker room between the first and second overtime, I was just telling players, ‘Hey, out of all the teams in the tournament, we’re the team that deserves it the most,’ and our coach really highlighted that, too,” Wilmes said. “He had full confidence in us as well, he didn’t have a worry at all that we were ever going to lose, which also helped boost our confidence in the locker room.”

Wilmes and the Defenders have come a long way since Wilmes’ freshman season. They went 13-9 that 2021-22 campaign and missed the MACHA Tournament all together. The next year, they finished 16-6-1 and fell 3-2 in the MACHA Tournament Semifinals to the University of Nebraska.

Last season Dordt went 19-4 and saw the season end in the MACHA Tournament Quarterfinals when the Arkansas Razorbacks won 3-2 in overtime.

While Wilmes has been the textbook definition of a senior leader in more ways than one this season, he knows how important it is to be able to make an impact right away as a freshman also. That’s something Wilmes did in his first season with Dordt when he finished with 18 goals and five assists and it’s something Dordt’s current freshmen have done this season, especially in the new year.

“It was all of [the freshmen],” Wilmes said. “Every single one of them kind of realized that they all had more roles on the team.”

One of Dordt freshmen in particular that ignited Dordt’s comeback in this year’s conference title game was defenseman Levi Loken, who scored Dordt’s first and last regulation goals to help force overtime.

With the conference title win, the Defenders advance to the 16-team ACHA Division 3 National Championship tourney, which begins March 18 in Chesterfield, Missouri.

“We all love it, we’re not ready to be done yet,” Wilmes said. “That was the biggest goal of the year, to get to the National Tournament and that’s what we did. Everyone followed through with their goals.”

The tournament will be seeded March 2.