St. Cloud State women's hockey coach Brian Idalski named USCHO coach of year

After leading the St. Cloud State women’s hockey team to its first season above .500 since 2010, coach Brian Idalski has been named the U.S. College Hockey Organization’s coach of the year.

The Huskies went 18-18-1 this year and 11-16-1 in the Western Collegiate Hockey Association, enough to finish fifth in the conference. Their 18 wins tie a program record set in 2008 and were ranked in USCHO and USA Today polls for the first time since that season.

Idalski, who was hired before this season after a stint coaching the Chinese women’s Olympic team, said he didn’t think too much about personal accolades during the season, so the USCHO coach of the year award came as a surprise.

“The character and the ability and desire to want to work hard and improve is going to be a big part of our program,” he said when asked about the direction of the team.

After starting the season unranked, SCSU was ranked in 10 of the 11 weeks to close the year, ending the season in the polls for the first time in program history at No. 11 by the USCHO and No. 13 by USA Today.

Idalski credited his players’ hard work and “hunger for a change” for the team’s success. SCSU went 9-23-3 last season under coach Steve Macdonald, who was with the team for three seasons and coached the Huskies to a 21-59-9 record.

“I think as the year progressed and we saw how well we were doing, we started to allow ourselves to kind of start discussing the next steps and what those look like: playing in the (WHCA) Final Face-Off, we were on the bubble for the NC tournament, those things were possible for us coming down the stretch.”

But, St. Cloud State’s season ended with two losses Feb 24 and 25 on the road to then-No. 7 Minnesota Duluth (26-10-3) in the quarterfinals of the WCHA tournament.

Idalski said one of the high points in the season came November 7 against then-No. 1 Minnesota in the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame Museum Women's Face-off Classic. The decisive 4-1 dub over the rival Gophers was the final win in a five-game undefeated streak.

“They were No. 1 in the country at the time and it wasn't like we're hanging on at the end, you know, getting barraged,” he said. “We had built a pretty good lead, defended well throughout most of the game and won in a controlled fashion.”

In early February the Huskies also got a big win over then-No. 8 Wisconsin on the road. Over 14,000 fans attended the top-15 matchup for the Badgers’ “Fill the Bowl” night. Idalski called winning in front of the second-highest NCAA women’s hockey single-game turnout “surreal.”

SCSU led the NCAA and set a new program record with 576 blocked shots while holding opponents to 2.59 goals – the Huskies’ second-best mark ever.

Junior goalies JoJo Chobak and Sanni Ahola combined for a save percentage of .920 and the Huskies posted a program-record six shutouts. Chobak had five shutouts, a program record.

Sophomore defenders Dayle Ross and Grace Wolfe finished with 104 and 83 blocks, ranking first and third at the school for single-season blocks.

Idalski said he has been busy with recruiting, so he hasn’t been able to celebrate the personal accolades too much since his coach of the year award was announced March 30.

“I think we're poised to take another step,” he said. “We returned five or six leading scorers and both of our goaltenders from last year, so (I’m) super encouraged by some of the pieces coming back. And we feel pretty good about recruiting, not only our younger players coming in as true freshmen, but the transfer portal as well. It's an opportunity for us to plug some holes and to add a little more depth and maturity to the roster overall.”

This article originally appeared on St. Cloud Times: Idalski named coach of year