The final weekend for this year's U.S. Pond Hockey Championships, scheduled to be held at Lake Nokomis, were canceled Thursday because of poor ice conditions.

"This winter season has been like no other we can remember," the organization that runs the annual event posted on Facebook. "Three weeks ago, there was open water on Lake Nokomis. With an extreme cold spell, sufficient ice grew and Opening Weekend was held with some of the best ice we've ever had. Unfortunately, that cold weather moved on and a heat wave took its place. As such, we have made the difficult decision to cancel the upcoming U.S. Pond Hockey Championships Golden Weekend Jan 26-28.

"We're as gutted about this as all of you are. This event sometimes teeters between a couple of degrees, and we've had good luck, and we've had bad luck. Last weekend was good luck, this weekend is bad luck. We were hoping that the temps would get at least a few degrees lower to freeze overnight. That doesn't appear to be the case. We hoped that humidity would be lower to help evaporate the water, it's at 95%. We hoped the daytime temps would stay in the mid or low 30s. They are in their upper 30s. And forecasts this week have gone from potentially good, to not good, with each passing day."

The event, which was to feature 300 teams, began last weekend, when temperatures in Minneapolis were in single digits. But the temperature climbed above freezing this week. "Unfortunately, the one thing we can't control has rendered the surface ice unplayable as of today," the Facebook post read.

In most years, Lake Nokomis is frozen over by Dec. 1, but with the warmest December on record this winter, open water remained on the lake until just after New Year's Day.