Minnesota high school boys hockey The Minnesota High School Boys Hockey program is a high school ice hockey program in the State of Minnesota . Based on tournament attendance , ice hockey is the most popular high school sport in the state . 156 high schools ( approximately 256 schools and over 6 , 500 participants in total due to cooperative team arrangements ) field sanctioned varsity teams competing in the Minnesota State High School League ( MSHSL ) . These teams are divided into two classes , AA and A . Each class is also divided into eight sections . History . High school hockey players throughout Minnesota participate in a maximum of 25 contests , excluding the section tournaments and the Minnesota State Boys ' High School Hockey Tournament . Teams currently play three 17 - minute periods to comprise a game . A lengthened period time was recently adopted by the Minnesota State High School League . Boys hockey concludes their season with a four day tournament in March that features sixteen teams competing for championships in both classes . From 1945 through 1991 the tournament consisted of a single class , eight team tournament instead of the present day two class ( AA and A ) tournament . Private schools were not allowed to play in the Tournament until the 1974 - 75 season . In 1992 - 93 , the tournament was composed of Tier I and II teams . This two - year experiment sent the top teams from each of the eight sections to the Tier I portion of the tournament and the remaining teams conducted a playoff to determine who would be included in the Tier II tournament . In 1994 , the dual class system was adopted and teams were placed into a class structure based on school enrollments . Attendance has been strong throughout the years with 22 tournaments eclipsing the 100 , 000 + barrier and in 2004 a record setting total of 120 , 114 ( both classes ) . In the 2006 State Tournament , the average attendance per game in the championship brackets was 18 , 000 people . The Minnesota State High School Hockey Tournament is currently the largest state sports tournament in the United States in terms of viewing and attendance , beating both the Texas and Florida ' s State High School Football Tournament and the Indiana State High School Basketball Tournament . Neal Broten , Herb Brooks , Phil Housley , Reed Larson , Tom Preissing , Doug Zmolek , John Mayasich , Craig Norwich , Mike Antonovich , Henry Boucha , Steve Janaszak , Brian Lee , John Pohl , Dave Spehar , Chris Locker Mark Parrish , TJ Oshie , and Blake Wheeler are among the many notable players that participated in Minnesota high school hockey . Since 1994 , the MSHSL ' s process to determine section assignments for boys ' hockey is based on school enrollments and activity classifications . The basic premise is to place the largest 64 schools into Class AA and the remaining high schools in Class A . Both Classes are then divided into 8 Sections each . Teams are placed into their section assignments with geographic location as a primary consideration . High schools initially placed in Class A have the option to play at the Class AA level . Beginning with the 2007 state tournament , the top four teams in each class will be seeded . Coaches of the participating schools will vote to determine the seeded teams the Sunday before the state tournament . The four teams are then bracketed so that if the seeded teams advance , the top seed will play the fourth seed while the second and third seeds will play each other . The quarterfinal opponents of the seeded teams will be determined by a blind draw .