BSM girls hockey is starting to prepare for their upcoming season. With an older and more experienced team from last year, they should be more prepared for the trials and tribulations of the season. 

With five captains they will not lack any leadership. The captains are juniors Liv Haag, Abby Hancock, Anna Podein, Maya Jones and senior Rose Beeman. “I am feeling great about the season, I am excited because we have an older team with more experience and good younger girls coming up,” Hancock said.

The talent is there without a doubt with five girls committed to play Division 1 hockey and one to Division 3. Also, there will be youth sprinkled into this veteran team. The captains hope the mixture of experience and youth can help them achieve their goals. “Winning our conference again is definitely one of our goals,” Hancock said.

Even though the girls’ section is seen as the hardest in the state, they hope to battle through their section and make it to the state tournament. With two of the top teams in the state Edina and Blake in their section, it will be tough, but the captains think if they put their hearts to it, it can happen. “Biggest goal is to make State, but our section is tough, so we hope to beat more top 10 teams,” Podein said.

One thing that will help the girls beat top 10 teams is their chemistry.  The core of the team has played together since freshman year, so they have developed a lot of knowledge on how each other plays. This will allow the team to mesh together more quickly into the season together. Chemistry between linemates will help because it won’t take a couple games for them to know where each other is and how the others play like it normally does. “There will be a lot of returners from last season, so our chemistry will be better,” Podein said. 

However, the team has taken a big hit. This summer, to-be-senior-captain Grace Melin decided not to play. She had been the girl who the team looked up to and respected as a leader. With none of the current captains having a leadership role before, losing Melin could present new problems, they didn’t expect at first. “Hockey was not one of my passions anymore, and I wanted to get a job before college started,” Melin said. 

Team defense is expected to be the focal point of the squad. With the team heavily relying on goaltenders senior Rose Beeman and junior Carly Greene. Defenseman junior Abby Hancock, junior Anna Podein, sophomore Emma Peschel and junior Maya Jones should be very strong as they are all varsity returners as well. “Sophomore Mary Zavoral, junior Liv Haag, sophomore Lily Mortenson and sophomore Emma Hoen are all ready for big seasons at forward,” Podein said