Holy Family, the private Catholic high school located in Victoria, has vacated it’s co-op with Waconia and is going it alone this year. The catalyst behind this move is Head Coach Randy Keoppl who has done a nice job since he took over the program just last season. You might know Randy’s name from his glory days at Bloomington Jefferson where he was the starting goalie on back-to-back State Championship teams in the 1990’s.
Holy Family has 23 girls on the roster. I presume some will swing between JV and Varsity. But of those 23 girls six of them are 8th graders, ten of them are 9th graders, and three are 10th graders. That means there are only 5 upperclassmen on the team.
The strength of the team starts in net with sophomore goalie, captain, and Harvard commit Alex Pellicci. Alex played her youth hockey in Prior Lake before starting at Holy Family as a 9th grader. Alex was stellar this fall as one of the two goalies of the 16U Grey Elite team in the High School Elite League. Holy Family’s back up goalie is 8th grader Sedona Blair. Sedona played her youth hockey in Eden Prairie before joining the Holy Family team as a 7th grader.
Junior captains Lauren Hickey and Caitlin Rock will provide some much needed leadership among this young group. They’ve got some young studs in 8th grade forward Taylor Koeppl and 8th grade D Olivia Paidosh. I expect Sadie Long and Sydney Paulsen to contribute offensively. Sydney Linn comes over from Breck which means her little sister Josie will most likely make the move over next year. Josie is a first year on Minnetonka’s 12UA team.
Holy Family started the year with an impressive 4-1 victory over Owatonna outshooting their opponent 34-13. Taylor Koeppl led the way with 2 goals. Although Holy Family is a Class AA school and will play in Section 2AA’s post season they play a predominately Class A schedule which will allow the youngsters to grow and gain confidence. With that being said they will face Blake in the Schwan’s Cup over Winter Break!
Keep an eye on this bunch over the years to come. They will make some noise for sure.
Sota Girls Hockey 