If Minnesota regards itself as the State of Hockey, the Twin Cities’ Professional Women’s Hockey League franchise will feature plenty of homegrown players, including Taylor Heise.
The 2022 women’s college hockey player of the year, who played for the Golden Gophers and grew up 75 miles from Minneapolis, is staying home after the yet-to-be-named Minnesota franchise used the No. 1 pick to select Heise in the newly launched league’s inaugural draft on Monday.
“It’s an unreal feeling,” the 23-year-old Heise said.
“It’s my home. Everyone I love is there. And it’s the State of Hockey,” she added. “I’m just honored that I’m going to be able to play and to show little girls that anything is possible if you keep working hard.”
Heise heard her name called by tennis legend Billie Jean King, a member of the league’s board of directors in opening the PWHL’s 15-round draft held in Toronto.
Heise joins a franchise whose general manager, former U.S. national team player Natalie Darwitz, is from Minnesota, and who had already signed fellow Minnesotans Kelly Pannek and Lee Stecklein in the pre-draft free agency period.
Rookie Connor Phillips pitched three-hit ball over seven innings for his first major league win, Will Benson drove in three runs and the Cincinnati Reds beat the Minnesota Twins 7-3 on Monday night in a game with postseason implications for both teams.
Cincinnati (79-73) won for the fifth time in seven games and trails Chicago (78-72) by .0003 for the NL’s final wild-card berth, both a half-game behind Arizona (79-72). Miami (78-73) dropped a half-game behind the Reds with a 2-1 loss to the New York Mets,
“It was a great start for our team,” Reds manager David Bell said. “We talked about how important these games are. That is a good-hitting team over there. It was an important game. To go deep in the game, it gave our bullpen a little break. In so many ways, it was a huge start.”
Minnesota (79-72), nearing its third division title in five years, maintained a seven-game lead over second-place Cleveland in the AL Central with 11 games left.
Spencer Steer had three hits and Joey Votto capped a three-run seventh with a two-run single off Dallas Keuchel.
Henry Boucha, a champion of Native American causes and member of the United States Hockey Hall of Fame, died Monday at 72.
Boucha led Warroad to the 1969 Minnesota State High School Hockey Championships and later went on to play in the NHL and earn a silver medal in the Olympics.
Owen Larson can be reached at lars6521@stthomas.edu.