A tight, physical game was scoreless at the end of regulation. But 6:39 into overtime, Allie Thunstrom gave her team a 1-0 victory and a trip to Boston for the championship game scheduled for the next week.

“Their D pinched and I was able to chip it around and then we ended up on that odd-man rush,” Thunstrom said. “I passed it across to Jonna (Curtis) and then she made a nice play back. And it was something we’ve been looking for all game, and there it was in overtime.”

Of course, that next game never happened because of the pandemic. The National Women’s Hockey League returned to play January in Lake Placid for a bubble-type situation. But positive COVID-19 tests ended play early. The NWHL is back this weekend at the Boston Pride’s home rink for two semifinal games and a championship to finally crown an Isobel Cup champion.

The Whitecaps are the No. 2 seed and will face the 3-seed Connecticut Whale Friday night following the 1-seed Toronto v. 4-seed Boston game at 4 p.m. Central time with the winners meeting at 6 p.m. Central Saturday night.

The games this weekend will be broadcast on NBCSN, marking the first women’s professional hockey league championship games that will air on a major national network in the United States.

Playing in front of a national television audience is an incredible opportunity, Whitecaps captain Winny Brodt Brown acknowledged.

“Just because when I started playing hockey when I was 4 with all the boys, and then growing up playing until I was 17 years old, I never thought that playing on national TV would ever even be a possibility,” said 43-year-old Brodt Brown.  

The Whitecaps practiced regularly for the past couple of weeks. In addition, the coaching staff told the players to keep in shape on their own with individual workouts.

They’re confident everyone is healthy and ready to go. But they’ll also be without two of their top four defensemen on the trip: Sydney Baldwin (1-2—3 in Lake Placid) and Emma Stauber. Amanda Boulier is added to the roster, however.

Stauber will be occupied with another hockey game this weekend. She’s the head coach of the Proctor/Hermantown girls’ hockey team that qualified for the Class 1A girls’ state high school hockey tournament at Xcel Energy Center with quarterfinals Friday and Saturday.

The Whitecaps went 3-1 in the bubble games this winter, losing to the league’s new team this year, Toronto. The Whale and Whitecaps did not face each other, although a game was originally scheduled but wasn’t played because of COVID-19 cases.

Speedster Allie Thunstrom looks to lead the Whitecaps to another NWHL title this weekend in Boston. (MHM Photo / Rick Olson)

Brodt Brown finds it more exciting to play a new opponent.

“Because you just go out there and you just play and you don’t overthink it,” Brodt Brown said. “I think as a player, it’s kind of fun playing an opponent you haven’t played before. Everyone’s going to be playing their best, and it’s going to be an intense game.”

One of the newcomers who showed off her skills this year was defenseman Maddie Rowe. She leads the team, and it’s not close, this season with 19 blocked shots.

“She just is always very positive, brings a lot of energy to our team and gets everyone around her pumped up,” Brodt Brown said.

Nina Rodgers leads the team with 6 points, which includes a pair of power-play goals and four assists. Audra Richards (1-3—4) and Meghan Lorence (0-4—4) follow with four points each. Newcomer Haley Mack left a mark as a rookie in Lake Placid, scored a pair of goals and an assist.

Getting some scoring from a few new names was helpful for the Whitecaps. The pair of Curtis and Thunstrom have been the team’s go-to top scorers since the team joined the NWHL in 2018-19. Thunstrom led the league in goals last season with 24 and was the league’s co-MVP. But this year, Curtis had one goal in four games while Thunstrom hasn’t registered a point.

Whitecaps coach Jack Brodt called it surprising that the team received scoring from all over the roster while top goal scorers Curtis and Thunstrom were shut down in that category.

“But their presence on the ice and the hard work that they do in the defensive zone is very important,” Brodt said. “If we get into a run-and-gun game, we’re probably going to lose that game. We’ve had more success where we’ve kept the scores down rather than elevating the scores.”

Two other goal scorers for the Whitecaps this season? Brooke White-Lancette and Brodt Brown, who have been Whitecaps players from the very beginning.

In goal, Amanda Leveille will take her usual spot with her calm and collective demeanor.

Brodt Brown often refers to Leveille as a “gamer,” and this week called her the team MVP since she’s a competitor in every game.

“With her back there, we’re confident,” Brodt Brown said. “We’ve just got to help her out as much as we can and let her do her thing.”

The post Whitecaps prepare for Whale of a game appeared first on Minnesota Hockey Magazine.

Former Gophers shine in NWHL with Whitecaps  

After a college career with the Gophers women’s hockey team, Nicole Schammel is no stranger to playing weekend series against opponents. But the schedule she’s playing this season as a rookie in the National Women’s Hockey League as a forward for the Minnesota Whitecaps isn’t quite the same.

There are 24 regular-season games compared to 38- or 39-game seasons she played with the Gophers.

“I think there’s definitely pros and cons to going every couple weekends,” Schammel said. “You feel fresh, but you also kind of feel like you aren’t in game shape.”

Nicole Schammel (MHM Photo / Rick Olson)

Whatever the schedule, Schammel is finding her way as one of the top players for the Whitecaps this season. She’s one of seven former Gophers on the team, four of whom are playing their NWHL rookies seasons this year.

A lot of the Whitecaps players work as coaches. For instance, Schammel is an assistant coach for the Breck girls’ high school team.

“So that actually helps with not playing as much,” Schammel said. “That you’re still around the game, and watching a game can be really advantageous.”

Schammel plays alongside center Haylea Schmid and fellow Gopher Meghan Lorence on the right wing.

Lorence said she and Schammel have similar vision on the ice. Lorence graduated from Minnesota in 2015 after 102 points in 148 games across four years with the Gophers.  She and Schammel didn’t overlap, as Schammel finished up her redshirt-senior season last year.

“Just finding each other and making those plays,” Lorence said. “It helps coming from the same system from college.”

The Whitecaps are second in the five-team NWHL standings at 7-3-2 behind an undefeated Boston team (13-0-0). Along with Schammel and Lorence, defenseman Sydney Baldwin, Kelsey Cline, goaltender Amanda Leveille, Winny Brown and Chelsey Rosenthal are all former Gophers.  

“I think, in general, a lot of us are from Minnesota,” Baldwin said. “So we were familiar with playing with each other in summer leagues or in the offseason, so we do have a little bit of that familiarity.”

Meghan Lorence (MHM Photo / Rick Olson)

With the regular season halfway in the books for 2019-20, Schammel ranks second on the team in goals (7), points (14) and is a plus-7 in 12 games. She’s also won 32-of-33 faceoffs and leads the team with 92 shots. Baldwin is on the top defensive pair with Amanda Boulier. Baldwin has 5 goals and 11 points in 10 games with a plus-8. Lorence has five goals and eight points in 12 games. Schammel and Lorence are tied with two others for the team lead with two power-play goals each.

When the Whitecaps returned to TRIA Rink for their second home series of the season Dec. 14-15 v. the Metropolitan Riveters, they split with a 3-2 shootout loss and 5-2 win. In the loss, the two goals came from the third line, from Audra Richards and Allie Thunstrom to tie the game each time. Thunstrom, Schammel and Schmid all came up empty in the shootout. Minnesota rebounded the next afternoon with a 5-2 win with goals from Schammel, Baldwin, two from Richards and Stephanie Anderson.

The Whitecaps followed that up the next weekend with a sweep in Connecticut in a 3-0 shutout and 2-1 victory. This road series happened to line up with the Minnesota Wild’s fourth annual Girls’ Hockey Weekend with festivities held at Xcel Energy Center. Proceeds from the Wild game magazine sales and the “Split the Pot Raffle” for the Wild’s Dec. 21 game against the Winnipeg Jets went to the Whitecaps. The Wild also hosted dryland training and on-ice clinics for girls on 12U, 10U, and 8U teams that Saturday.

Though the Whitecaps weren’t in town for girls’ hockey weekend, they still got in on the action at Xcel Energy Center when they hosted a free skating event for the public ahead of their practice held on the NHL ice surface on Thursday.

Sydney Baldwin (MHM Photo / Rick Olson)

It’s yet another chance for young girls to interact with female professional hockey players. Both Whitecaps and Riveters players also participated in the Girls Outdoor Classic on Dec. 14 at the Roseville Oval. Whitecaps players were there as referees and dropped pucks for some of the 4-on-4 games going on, according to Lorence, though they “were mostly just there to socialize with the girls, and cheer them on,” Lorence said.

It’s another good opportunity to grow the game, according to Baldwin.

“Everyone’s happy being outside, and it was halfway decent weather, playing a little pond hockey,” Baldwin said.

There’s no shortage of role models, and players like Schammel, who wanted to be a Whitecaps player since she was little, are enjoying their time in the NWHL.

“I think post-grad, there’s not a ton of opportunities to play, and I’m just grateful for the opportunity to continue to dress,” Baldwin said. “I’m at a point where I’m still very competitive and like to be able to get in the lineup and play a good game.”

The Whitecaps return to action in St. Paul for three straight weekends of hockey in January, starting with a couple games against Buffalo on Jan. 11. They’ll finish the regular season with another home series against Connecticut on Feb. 29 and March 1. 

The post Close To Home appeared first on Minnesota Hockey Magazine.

Record-setting senior class looks to go out on top

Friends in high school, hockey standouts Rachel Ramsey and Meghan Lorence joked about winning four national titles with the Gopher women’s hockey team.

“Sky’s the limit,” Ramsey said. “It was always in a joking manner.”

Lorence agreed, saying that feat was “kind of unrealistic.”

“Once we got here, we realized how special of a program it is, and the special teams that we’ve had,” she said. “It’s been kind of a surprise that we’ve had so much success. But it’s been a lot of fun.”

Four years later, it’s not really a joke. They’re in a position where there’s potential for winning three out of four NCAA titles.

The gals have come close to their in-jest prediction so far, winning two NCAA Championships and finishing as the runner-up once in compiling a 145-10-7 overall record. Ramsey and Lorence, along with senior teammates Rachel Bona and Shyler Sletta, will go down as the most decorated class in Gopher women’s hockey history.

“It’s been a wild ride,” Ramsey said. “Crazy to think this is the end of it all.”

And they’re not quite done yet.

The top-seeded Gophers face Wisconsin at 5 p.m. Friday at Ridder Arena in the semifinals of the Frozen Four. The winner will move on to the national title game Sunday afternoon.

Just take a look at their success in the past four seasons. Back-to-back NCAA Champs in 2011-12 and 2012-13, along with a runner-up finish last year. WCHA Final Faceoff Champions the past three years. Two WCHA crowns. An undefeated 41-0-0 season in 2012-13 which was part of a 62-game win streak.

Going into this weekend, the Gophers are 32-3-4 this season. The class of 2015 has a total of 145 wins, breaking the record for most wins by a class (139 set by the class of 2014).

With all the history and success, wrapping their minds around what they’ve done might be harder than one would think.

“I don’t think people really realize what we’re accomplishing as a group,” Bona said, who has 14 goals and 22 assists this season.

Though it’s tough to pinpoint one exact moment from the past four years, Bona knows that “winning at home here two years ago and completing that perfect season” was pretty special.

“It really hasn’t set in yet,” Ramsey said. The co-captain from Chanhassen is a 6’0” defenseman with nine goals, 24 assists and a plus-45 in 39 games this season. She finished last year ranked second in the nation and first in the league in scoring among defensemen.

It hasn’t hit Lorence yet either, she said.

“I’m just trying to enjoy every single moment,” Lorence said. “I’m looking forward to see what we can do this weekend.”

So what’s made this class of Gophers so successful? It’s a combination of a lot of things, according to Ramsey. She pointed to coach Brad Frost striving to bring in character over talent when it comes to his players, plus there’s just a strong bond on the team.

“Just having fun while working hard at the same time has been huge for us,” Lorence said, an assistant captain from Mounds View with 17 goals and 16 assists this year.

Sletta is a backup goalie from Elko New Market who’s played in five games this season, notching a .973 save percentage and one goal allowed. She earned a complete game shutout in a 4-0 win against St. Cloud State in January, making 18 saves. Her teammates called her a great role model and “real backbone” for the other goalies on the team.

Looking ahead to their final game lacing up the skates for the Gophers, the women know it will be emotional for them. Ramsey said she wants to be “full of smiles and not tears.”

“We have a lot to be proud of,” Bona said. “I don’t think these four years could have gone any better than they have.”

And that’s no joke.

The post A lasting legacy appeared first on Minnesota Hockey Magazine.