UW-River Falls women’s hockey team Assistant Coach Amanda Ryder, second from right, a hockey standout from 2008-13 at the university, conducts drills with players during practice Wednesday in Hunt Arena in preparation to compete in the NCAA Division III Women’s Ice Hockey Championship Friday through Sunday at UW-River Falls.

 

Flying high: UW-River Falls women’s hockey team hosts, plays for national championship

 

Undefeated team cites focus, teamwork for its unprecedented success

March 14, 2024 – As the final seconds ticked off the clock during Saturday’s women’s hockey game in Hunt Arena in the Falcon Center between the University of Wisconsin-River Falls and longtime rival Gustavus Adolphus College, Joe Cranston felt a mix of redemption and celebration. 

For the third consecutive year the two teams squared off to determine which would advance to the Final Four seeking a national championship, with Gustavus Adolphus – last year’s NCAA Division III national champion – having won the previous two matchups. UW-River Falls entered this game 28-0 and ranked No. 1 in the nation. But Cranston knew better than to feel secure his team would win, despite having already topped the highly ranked Gusties three times this season. Experience had taught him that.

When the tightly-contested game ended, the Falcons on top 2-1, the boisterous crowd that packed Hunt Arena past capacity erupted. Cranston watched his players shout with joy in celebration. He saw the victory’s emotion etched on the faces of his assistant coaches, Jim Walsh and Amanda Ryder, who are, like him, UW-River Falls alums. Then he felt the satisfaction of the win.

“It does feel good,” Cranston, head coach of the UW-River Falls team for the entirety of its 25-year existence, said during an interview this week as his Falcons, now 29-0, prepared to play in the NCAA Division III Women’s Ice Hockey Championship Friday through Sunday at UW-River Falls. “It was nice to get the monkey off our back. It felt like a huge accomplishment.”

The highly successful UW-River Falls women’s hockey program is making its sixth appearance in the Frozen Four and its first since 2016. Friday’s semifinals at Hunt Arena will feature Middlebury College (Vermont) against Elmira College (New York) at 3 p.m., followed by UW-River Falls against Adrian College (Mich.) at 7 p.m. The winners play for the national championship at 3 p.m. Sunday. 

The women’s national hockey championship is the second national title event that UW-River Falls has hosted; the other was the men’s national hockey championship in 1996. The significance of the championship playing out at the university is not lost on Cranston, Walsh, and Ryder, given their ties to the school. Walsh graduated from UW-River Falls in 1985, Cranston in 1990 and Ryder in 2014. 

“To have our team make it to this level and to have the championship at our school on our home ice, it does feel special,” Walsh said. “It’s special for us to be playing for the championship in front of our fans.”

Watching the Falcon women play for a national championship has special meaning to Ryder. She was a standout hockey player at UW-River Falls and was elected to the school’s Athletics Hall of Fame last fall. During her freshman season in 2008-09, UW-River Falls advanced to the Frozen Four, but Ryder was injured in the playoffs and was unable to play for the championship. Teams she was a member of didn’t advance to the Frozen Four again during her playing career.

“To see this team get back to the championship again this year, to see them go undefeated and be able to play for the championship here at UW-River Falls, it’s an amazing feeling,” Ryder said. 

‘Team so focused’

Falcon players said they’re honored to play for the championship, especially in front of their home fans. While the championship will bring a larger-than-normal spotlight, team members said they’re doing their best to appreciate this opportunity but treat it just like they have other games during the rest of this season. 

“It’s a feeling of excitement more than anything,” senior defender Braelyn Sathers, a health and human performance/exercise and sports science major from Proctor, Minn., said when asked what it’s like to play in a national tournament before a home crowd. “We’re using that excitement to fuel us to win. To be in this kind of an atmosphere is unreal. But we will stay focused on being in the moment and taking it game by game, just like we have all year.”

Alex Hantge, a senior forward from Hutchinson, Minn., majoring in business administration/marketing sales, credits her team’s focus and camaraderie, along with high-level coaching, with its unprecedented undefeated, untied season. Hantge is the team’s co-captain along with fellow standout Maddie McCollins.

That sense of focus separates this team from those of the past, Cranston said. This year’s senior class developed beyond expectations and set the tone for their teammates, he said. Besides Hantge, Sathers, and McCollins, other seniors include Holly Eckers, Aubrey Nelvin, and Jordan O’Connor. 

“We’ve never had a team so focused,” Cranston said. “The buy-in level with this team is so high. Everyone has bought into what we are doing.”

The team and Cranston frequently take part in a rehearsed conversation to stay in the moment and focus on the next game. Cranston asks, “What is your record?” Team members respond, “Zero and zero!” Cranston then asks them “How many games do you have left?” The team responds “One!” 

“Yeah, we do that,” Hantge laughed when asked about those interactions. “Coach does that to keep us focused and humble. And it works.”

As the Falcons won game after game – sometimes coming from behind to record victories – this season, Hantge and Sathers said they and their teammates began to realize just how good they could be. The hard-working team ramped up its efforts even more as team members envisioned playing in the Frozen Four after winning the WIAC O’Brien Cup championship. 

“We all dialed it in a little bit more,” Hantge said. “We realized we have something special here and we want to capitalize on it.” 

Cranston, Walsh, and Ryder hope their team can do just that. Their approach of taking one game at a time, of not focusing on their undefeated record but instead on only the next game, just might result in a national championship, the coaches said. 

“This team seems like it has that something special,” Cranston said. “They have a lot of individual talent, but why they’re so good is they blend those talents into one really good team. They play with such focus and for each other. And when you have that, good things can happen.”