The Gusties of Gustavus Adolphus College in St. Peter, MN reigned atop the Women’s D3 college hockey world, taking home their program’s first national title.
This marks the first time since the inception of the NCAA D3 Women’s hockey tournament in 2002, that the trophy has left with the championship team west of New York.
The Gusties avenged their title game loss from a season ago when they fell to the Middlebury Panthers by a score of 2 to 3 in overtime. This year’s OT thriller would have a different ending for the Gustavus women.
After finishing a 22-3 regular season, including going 15-1 in conference play in the MIAC, the Gusties won the MIAC tournament punching their ticket to the NCAA tournament. The drama was high from the beginning; edging out River Falls, who the Gusties split a regular season series with, 2-1 in the quarterfinals. Next up was 7x national champion Plattsburgh State. It would take 2 overtimes to decide the winner of that battle of the titans, with the Gusties ultimately coming out on top, sending them to their second consecutive national championship game. The Gusties opponent: no stranger to hoisting the national championship trophy either, and host of the tournament, Amherst College.
In a tightly fought battle, the Gusties lead the Mammouths 1-0 with just over a minute left in regulation when the game was tied, sending it to the first overtime period. From there neither team gave an inch. It would take 3 overtime periods to decide the winner, in by far the longest championship game in tournament history and longest in program history, when Lily Mortenson ended the contest scoring the game, and title, winning goal.
The Gustavus Gusties have worn Gemini since the 2014 season, and have since won 6 regular season MIAC titles, 2 MIAC tournament titles, and their recent National Championship. They have also collected an astounding 48-3-4 record in MIAC play over the past 4 seasons.
