PWHL champion Taylor Heise to meet fans, sign autographs at Dodge County Ice Arena
KASSON — It doesn't seem all that long that Taylor Heise was running captains practices in late October at Prairie Island Arena in Red Wing, helping her Wingers girls hockey team prepare for the high school season.
That was actually seven years, a Patty Kazmaier Award, a PWHL championship and a PWHL Playoffs MVP award ago for Heise, a Lake City native and one of the best women's hockey players in the world.
She's never forgotten her roots, though.
And much like when she was a Winger, in a few days, she'll be back at a southeastern Minnesota rink, skates on, going through a captains' practice with a team that has its sights on a state championship.
For a second straight year, Heise will come to Kasson, to the Dodge County Ice Arena, to run a captains practice for the Dodge County Wildcats girls hockey team. Heise will be in Kasson this Tuesday, Oct. 22, and she will stick around to sign autographs and take pictures with fans after the practice.
The Wildcats — who were the Class 1A state runners-up last season — practice from 4-5 p.m.
Heise will hold a meet and greet with fans — it's open to the public, at no cost — from 5-6 p.m.
Before she meets with fans, though, she'll offer a glimpse of what her future hold. Though her playing career has many years — potentially more PWHL titles and certainly appearances on the U.S. Olympic team, the one giant bullet point she badly wants to add to her hockey resume — remaining, Heise has hinted in the past that she may want to venture into coaching when she's done as a player.
When she visited Dodge County a year ago, she ran a sharp, crisp practice, putting the Wildcats through a number of drills she uses when practicing on her own, as well as drills that helped her at the University of Minnesota and with the Minnesota Frost of the PWHL, a team she led to the inaugural Walter Cup championship last spring. The PWHL announced this week that the 2024-25 season is set to begin Nov. 30, with the final game of the Walter Cup Finals scheduled for May 3, 2025.
Heise, 24, is a 5-foot-10 right-shot center. She had 4 goals and 13 points in 19 regular season games for PWHL Minnesota last season. She also had an outstanding postseason, recording 5 goals and 8 points in 10 playoff games as Minnesota won the inaugural league championship series.
In her five-year career with the Gophers, Heise scored 96 goals and had 225 total points. She was named the Patty Kazmaier Award winner in 2022 as a senior, the honor given to the best women's college hockey player in the country each year, when she had 29 goals and 66 points. She returned to Minnesota for a fifth year in 2022-23 and nearly matched her senior year's numbers, scoring 29 goals and 65 points.
Heise has also played in three Women's World Championships with Team USA, winning a gold medal in 2023 and silver in 2022 and 2024.
Girls hockey teams can begin holding official practices (high school coaches are not allowed in the building during captains practices) for the 2024-25 season on Monday, Oct. 28.
Dodge County went 23-5-0 last season, won its first-ever Section 1, Class 1A championship, then made it to the Class 1A state championship game, where it fell to powerhouse Warroad.
