Bulldog Insider Podcast: Committing the perfect crime with Gabby Krause

DULUTH — This week on the Duluth News Tribune's Bulldog Insider Podcast — a show that some would say is about hockey — we discussed the top cop movies of all time, what constitutes a cop movie and learned how to commit the perfect crime.

How did we stumble upon these topics? Our guest this week is senior forward Gabby Krause of the Minnesota Duluth women's hockey program. Krause is a criminology/psychology major at UMD who is pursuing a career in law enforcement as a K9 officer.

To live out her dream as a cop, Krause had to medically retire from hockey this fall due to neurological problems caused by herniated disks in her spine.

Krause spoke with the DNT's Matt Wellens and Zach Schneider of My 9 Sports about what she's been going through since her sophomore year, what her role is now with the Bulldogs women's hockey program and what she hopes to do in the future as a police officer.

Top television cop shows also comes up.

Below are edited excerpts from this week's episode.

Bulldog Insider: What have you been dealing with the last couple years?

Krause: I'll make it short because it can be long. Sophomore year I wasn't feeling the greatest, was having leg tingliness and I knew that wasn't right. I got an MRI and it showed I had a herniation between my L4 and L5 (vertebrae).

Going into my junior year is when it got pretty bad. I was having more neurological symptoms, leg going numb, all that stuff. I had three cortisone injections, I was on a bunch of meds, nothing was working. It got to a point where I was only practicing non-contact the day before games, and then playing in the games. I wouldn't touch the ice again until the day before gameday.

That just isn't something I wanted to go through. I couldn't even do my laundry, I couldn't put my shoes on, I couldn't walk.

My appointments with my neurologist, he said, 'Long-term rest is what is going to be best for you.' That was in December. I said, 'Well I can't do that. I have to finish out the season.' Last season I had to decide to get surgery or to quit playing. I chose surgery, because the goal was for me to play this year.

I got surgery, was feeling better than I ever had before. I still feel great. My bad days now are like a really good day I would have had before surgery. I got cleared for high intensity stuff and my neurological symptoms came back. This was when I was still non-contact in practice. My leg was going numb 2-3 minutes into on ice conditioning. I couldn't do any conditioning in the workout room because it was bothering me.

My leg was getting really fatigued during high-intensity practice and I was still non-contact. That was a red flag for me. Throw in playing in the WCHA — it's so fast, so physical — you're going to get beat up, thrown around. It would have been a repeat of last year and that's just not what I wanted to go through. I don't think I physically could.

BI: You're going to be pursuing a career in law enforcement. You medically retiring has something to do with that, right? This keeps your options open in law enforcement?

Krause: Yeah. So from my understanding, if I were to play, there's a bigger chance that my symptoms don't go away. I still can't feel half my leg. I can't feel my calf or half my foot. I just can't imagine if I were to keep playing, like what other symptoms would be permanent for me? Will that keep me out of the police academy and all of that stuff? I've been wanting to be a police officer since I was young. I didn't want to go anywhere after college to play hockey. For me, it was a good quality of life, ideally, and then obviously like my career. That's why I chose my retire as well.

BI: The physical aspect of it, the expectation or hope is that your injury will recover to a point where you can go through the academy and go about your day-to-day life then as a police officer?

Krause: Yep. So right now my rehab, instead of it being swayed toward getting back onto the ice, we've skewed it to now help me for the police academy, which I'm very grateful that my trainers even thought about that.

BI: Matt and I and the people listening to the podcast, we're not Division I athletes. Matt and I didn't go to the police academy. What are the differences in the rehab or the training versus trying to get ready to play the Gophers this weekend or trying to prepare yourself for what you might face in the academy?

Krause: After my appointment, it was very much start from (scratch) right after surgery — walking and all that stuff. Instead of being in the weight room, just trying to substitute what things I can't do in the workout room to make me more explosive and more sturdy on the ice.

Now I'm really focusing on like the testing portion. It's the pushups, the situps. I haven't ran since sophomore year, so I'm running on the water treadmill before I get on the off-ice treadmill.

BI: That's the UMD training staff that's helping you with that, they're the ones that thought to switch up your training?

Krause: Yeah, I didn't even think about it. My trainer came to me was like, 'Hey, do you have the requirements for the police academy? We want to make your rehab later on to be more towards the police academy.'