TORONTO, ON — There's a reason Minnesota is called the State of Hockey.
Two of the state's best were inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame Monday night in Toronto as part of the 2024 class, which was announced back in June.
Minnesota legends Natalie Darwitz and Krissy Wendell-Pohl joined former NHLers Shea Weber, Pavel Datsyuk and Jeremy Roenick as the headliners in this year's class.
Darwitz, a native of St. Paul, and Wendell, of Brooklyn Park, were teammates at the University of Minnesota and helped the United States capture two medals at the 2002 and 2006 Olympic Games.
“The greatest thing about hockey was not winning championships or medals,” said Wendell, who helped the Gophers win back-to-back national championships in 2004 and 2005. “But the people that I got to meet along the way.”
She was also the Patty Kazmaier Award, which is given to the top collegiate women's hockey player in the nation.
Darwitz, a three-time All-American, set the NCAA single-season scoring record in 2005 and was named the Bob Allen Women's Player of the Year that same season.
“I wasn’t your everyday little girl and somehow my mom was on to me,” Darwitz said. “On my fifth birthday, my blonde French braids strolled into the hockey rink.”
Following her playing career, Darwitz helped pioneer the country's first Professional Women's Hockey League (PWHL), in which she coached PWHL Minnesota to the first-ever Walter Cup.
