After beating St. Thomas last week, we didn't know what the outcome would be regarding national tournament seeding. We found out on Monday that we would end up playing River-Falls in a play-in game a week before the final four. I have to be honest that it was a little disappointing finding out the seeding results because there was a little glimmer of hope that we would host the tournament since we have been ranked #1 in the past few weeks. We were told by our coach that since only two teams from the west would make the top seven this year, it was likely we would have a play-in game because of the money issue. Even with this being said, I couldn't help but hope that all our hard work this season would pay off and we would get the chance to host. Anyway, now that we do have the play-in this week, we have spent a lot of time preparing for that game and getting ready to be at our top level. Hopefully everyone got a lot of sleep last night and is ready to go!

As far as practice went this week, we had a few really tough days on Sunday and Monday. We did quite a bit of skating in practice, but the attitude of everyone was awesome and it was great to see everyone working so hard. Wednesday night we had a film session to watch our regular season River Falls game. We tried to pick up on their strengths and things we could do to work to our advantage. Of course, sitting around in the living room watching the game provided for some good social time, laughing, and getting our hair french braided as we watched the tape. Sounds like a little girl sleepover, I know!

The past two years we have been disappoineted in this play-in game and I am bound and determined not to make this a trend of Gustavus hockey. I think each and every one of our players know what we have to do to make it happen and I am really confident that our team will come out working really hard.

Last night we had a pasta feed at my house. One of our senior parents and a junior parent put it on and it was absolutely delicious. The last time we put on a parent sponsored past feed, we beat River-Falls in the regular season. We are thinking it might be good luck for us, but we'll have to test that theory today.

I am very excited to play today! I actually had a tough time sleeping and I would keep waking up and looking at my alarm clock to see if I could get up yet. Hopefully we'll get some student fans to come over like they did last Wednesday. It's nice to see all that support from your school in such big games. Go GUSTIES! 

Last night was quite the exciting night for Gustie hockey. Not only did we have a great 3-0 win in the late afternoon against St. Thomas, but the boys team also took away their championship trophy with a 5-2 win over Hamline.

The rivalry we have with St. Thomas can't really be beat and it felt good to beat them in my final year as a Gustie. They always give us such good games. To be honest, I think much of our success last night is credited to our goaltenders, who have been so steady for us game in and game out.

I was talking to some other players on my team and we agreed that this was the most calm MIAC Championship game we'd ever been a part of. There had been years where we won narrowly by one goal or in overtime. This year it really felt like we played pretty steady throughout the game and were totally confident that we would pull through. When the final buzzer went off, it felt like just another game. We really came together to show that we could handle pressure well and keep our cool. I was pretty proud also to be a member of a group of seniors that had won the MIAC Championship four years in a row. Sharing that with my best friends and teammates was really special.

Two hours after our game ended, most members of our team attended the boys game. That game was probably the most full I have ever seen our Don Roberts Arena. It was a packed house! Watching the boys make a comeback and seal their game was a great way to end our night. There was a lot of Gustie pride throughout the whole hockey community at Gustavus. We were excited that both programs could pull off such great team victories in the same night.

Right now, we are a little uncertain of our future. We know we got an automatic bid with winning the confernce championship, but we don't know who we will play or when that will be yet. Since we are ranked number one in the country it would be really cool to host the end of the season tournament, however our coach warned us that it is not very likely at this point. We still have to wait to see how the east coast conference playoffs go this weekend. 

I have been going crazy with hockey this week. I haven't stopped thinking about it because this time of the season is so fun. I really can't wait for our next game! We got a nice day off today to rest our legs, but we will be practicing throughout the next week in preparation for whatever the tournament throws at us. 

We finally finished up MIAC play against Hamline, the same week we had a tough road game with Point. We ended up tying Stevens Point on their home ice 0-0. There was no scoring if you could believe it! Both goalies played well and though we weren't content with coming home with a tie, we all understood that it was just one game out of many in the season. I actually didn't ride the bus home with my team that night as I had job interviews the next day in Minneapolis. There was a terrible snow storm that same night and on our way back west my mom, dad and I had to get a motel off the freeway and stay until the weather cleared up. My teammates told me they ended up getting home at 4 a.m.! Long night for the Gusties! My interviews went well and it was great to get some practice doing that sort of thing. That practice will definitely come in handy with graduation right around the corner.

We finished out the regular conference season playing Hamline. We actually found out we clinched the conference on Friday night after our first series game against Hamline because St. Thomas had tied that same night. Hamline actually gave us a great game on Saturday and we were glad to end our regular season with a victory.

We have the first seed in the MIAC Playoffs and played St. Olaf in the semi-final on Saturday. We ended up winning the game 5-0 and I think that big win was a confidence booster for us going into the MIAC Championship game. 

We will host the Championship game on Wednesday at 4 p.m. This is kind of a weird time for us to have a game, but because the boys team also plays at home in their MIAC Championship game that same night (at 8), we had to find a way to schedule both games with adequate time between them. We will be playing St. Thomas in the late afternoon and I really look forward to it. Since I work in the sports information department at Gustavus, I learned today that this will be the sixth consecutive time that the St. Thomas and Gustavus women's hockey teams are meeting to play in the championship game. Not only that, but this will be the fourth consecutive year that we have hosted the championship game against the Tommies. We have quite the rivalry going and I have no doubt that Wednesday night will be a very exciting game to play in.

This year our hockey team decided to make up a Relay for Life team, and we will be walking the relay this spring. We are currently raising money for the cause and decided to set up a stand at our games for donations. We were impressed with how generous all of our fans are, not only with supporting our team during the games themselves, but for helping us support a cause like The American Cancer Society. I lost my grandpa to cancer when I was in high school so I think supporting such a cause is really important. It seems so many people are affected by it.

We were able to have Sunday off, but are going back to work on the ice today to prepare for the Tommies. I had an issue with my elbow in the last game, where it got hit at the spot where the nerve was and my whole forearm went numb. Luckily this was at the end of the game. It was pretty swollen afterwards, but thankfully it has gotten ten times better in the day that we had off. Injuries are always a concern especially as we have bigger and better games toward the end of the season. I hope that everyone stays healthy and is able to contribute and we get into these games.