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MN’s new pro hockey team ready to take the state’s biggest stage
Minnesota’s PWHL team still doesn’t have a name, but it has a lot of local talent and will play games at the Xcel Energy Center.
ST PAUL, Minn. — When the Professional Women’s Hockey League (PWHL) drops the puck on its inaugural season in January, Minnesota’s team will be playing on the biggest stage the State of Hockey has to offer.
Minnesota’s team, along with all of the original six teams in the PWHL, won’t take the ice with a flashy logo or team name. Instead, for the first season, the players will simply represent the state – and a purple “Minnesota” across their sweaters – and as the only team playing in a NHL venue, they’ll be hoping to see the state of hockey come out to support them in a big way.
“Hopefully a lot of people come watch us play, love it, come back, bring their friends and family,” said Lee Stecklein, one of eight Minnesota natives on the team’s preseason roster. “I’m just really excited for the opportunity to share women’s hockey with even more people.”
With just over a month before the season begins, players and coaches say everything feels fast-paced right now, both on and off the ice.
“It’s a super exciting time,” said coach Natalie Darwitz. “Ever since I’ve been hired in August it’s absolutely been a blur.”
Fortunately, Darwitz says many of the players are well acquainted.
“We have a lot of players on our roster who are from our backyard here,” she said. “We feel really strongly about a lot of homegrown talent.”
That was apparent during the very first PWHL draft in September, when the team selected former University of Minnesota center, Taylor Heise, as the league’s very first number-one pick.
“To be able to play in Minnesota, where I’m from, is a dream in itself,” Heise said.
The same could be said by at least eight homegrown players who have joined the team’s preseason roster in the weeks since.
Stecklein was among the initial group of signees. She has played for the University of Minnesota, the US Women’s National Team and the Minnesota White Caps. Though her time with the White Caps gives her experience in a professional league, she says PWHL is also a dream realized.
“There have been a lot of different leagues and associations all building to this moment,” she said. “It’s really exciting to have one league where all of the best talent is. It creates competitive, high-intensity practices and I know it’s going to lead to some really good games.”
The Minnesota players believe it will be appreciated by some really good crowds in Minnesota, who will gravitate towards so many local athletes competing on the highest level.
“You take all those communities and all those people that have supported you the whole time and, it’s just a community here no matter what,” Heise said.
They’ll also be excited to share a team name and logo with their fans, whenever that time comes.
“The product on the ice is most important,” Darwitz said. “As we go, I think maybe a team name will come with how we’re playing our identity. For now, purple is our color for year one, that may change for year two based off our name.”
“I feel like the Minnesota Purple Reign would be a fun name with Prince and everything,” Heise said. “But, you know, I don’t really care. I’d just rather play hockey.”
And they know that if they play well, they’ll make their state proud and the fans will follow.
“This is important for our future generations of females,” Darwitz said. “If you have a daughter or a sister, I think a lot of it is would you want this opportunity for them to grow up and have in the future. That’s what’s going to drive this, the support of the fanbase, the support of people coming out and getting behind this team.”
Minnesota’s PWHL season will begin on January 3 in Boston and their home opener will take place on January 6th. For more information on tickets and other team updates, click here.
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The crash happened when a Suburban pulling a trailer failed to stop at a stop sign, Minnesota State Patrol said.
WAUKENABO, Minn. — Two people from Minnetonka died in a crash Friday in Aitkin County while others, including children, were hurt.
According to Minnesota State Patrol, it happened at the intersection of Highway 169 and Grove Street/County Road 3 in Waukenabo Township at approximately 5:15 p.m.
A Suburban pulling a trailer was driving east on County Road 3 but did not stop at the stop sign at Highway 169, authorities said. The vehicle was struck by a northbound GMC Yukon. Two other vehicles were struck in the crash, but the people in those two cars were not injured.
In the Suburban, the driver sustained life-threatening injuries, according to State Patrol. Elizabeth Jane Baldwin, 61, of Minnetonka, and Marlo Dean Baldwin, 92, of Minnetonka, both died. Officials said the driver of the vehicle, a 61-year-old from Minnetonka, has life-threatening injuries.
There were six people in the Yukon when the crash occurred. The 44-year-old driver, as well as passengers ages 18, 14, and 11, sustained what officials described as life-threatening injuries. The other two passengers have non-life-threatening injuries.
Alcohol is not believed to be a factor in the crash, but officials said Elizabeth Jane Baldwin had not been wearing a seatbelt.
Among those at the start line this year will be Alex Vigil.
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Pixar’s second installment of the movie features characters we’ve already met — Joy, Sadness and Anger — and gives them a new roommate named Anxiety.
MINNEAPOLIS — Pixar’s “Inside Out 2” universe plays out inside the mind of the movie’s adolescent protagonist, Riley.
She plays a kid from Minnesota whose family uproots her life by moving to San Francisco. But did you know that what plays out in Riley’s mind actually comes from the mind of a real-life Minnesotan?
“You are one of us!” said Breaking the News anchor Jana Shortal.
“Yes, I am!” said Burnsville native and the movie’s creator and director, Kelsey Mann.
Mann was chosen for the role by ANOTHER Minnesotan — Pete Docter, the man behind the original movie, “Inside Out.”
“I don’t know if Pete asked me to do this movie because I was from Minnesota and he was from Minnesota … I just think it worked out that way,” Mann said.
How two guys from the south metro made a pair of Pixar movies that would change the game is a hell of a story that began with Docter in 2015.
“He [Docter] was just trying to tell a fun story — an emotional, fun story — and didn’t realize how much it would help give kids a vocabulary to talk about things they were feeling because they are feeling those emotions, but they’re really hard to talk about,” Mann said.
Some parents, counselors and teachers might even tell you it did more good for kids than just entertain them. It unlocked their emotions and begged for what Mann set out to create at the beginning of 2020.
“That part was fun, particularly fun,” he said. “I think the daunting part was following up a film that everyone really loved.”
But Mann knew what he wanted to do with the movie’s follow-up, “Inside Out 2.”
“Diving into Riley’s adolescence … that was just fun,” he said.
This time around, Riley is 13, hitting puberty and facing all of what, and who, comes with it. The franchise’s second installment features characters we’ve already met — Joy, Sadness and Anger — and gives them a new roommate named Anxiety.
“I think that’s what’s fun about the ‘Inside Out’ world: You can take something we all know and give it a face,” Mann said. “We can give anxiety a name and a face.”
The film follows Riley’s emotions fighting it out for control of her life. Joy wants Riley to stay young and hold on only to joy, while anxiety is hell-bent on taking over Riley over at the age of 13 because as a lot of us know, that’s when anxiety often moves in.
“I always pitched it as a takeover movie, like an emotional takeover,” Mann said. “Anxiety can kind of feel like that; it can take over and kind of shove your other emotions to the side and repress them.”
For a kids’ movie, it’s hard to watch this animation play out, even when an adult has the keys to decide.
“I’m making a movie about anxiety and I still have to remind myself to have my anxiety take a seat,” Mann said.
All of our individual anxieties have a place in this world.
“The whole movie honestly is about acceptance. Both acceptance of anxiety being there and also of your own flaws,” said Mann.
Even for our kids, we have to remember that this is life.
Anxiety will come for them; it does for us all.
The “Inside Out” world just shows them it’s so.
