Gophers women's hockey coach Brad Frost received national coach of the year honors Thursday night, and the team's three Patty Kazmaier Award finalists -- Megan Bozek, Amanda Kessel and Noora Raty -- were named first-team All-Americans.
It was Frost's first Division I Women's Coach of the Year award and the fourth for Minnesota's program. Former Gophers coach Laura Halldorson won national coach of the year honors in 1998, 2002 and 2004.
And it was just the second time in program history that the Gophers have had three players named first-team All-Americans. The other was 2005 (Natalie Darwitz, Lyndsay Wall and Krissy Wendell.)
The Patty Kazmaier Award will be presented on Saturday morning. But first the Gophers (39-0) will face Boston College in the NCAA semifinals, with the face-off at 5 p.m.
Programming note: I'll be tweeting women's hockey updates from Ridder Arena this weekend @JoeCStrib. And the football team opens spring practice next Tuesday, so I'll have plenty of related content coming, starting Monday, after Jerry Kill's press conference.
