Advertisement

Rochester native Taylor Stewart chasing a national title with Grandpa Chub in her heart

jason feldman, post-bulletin, rochester, minn.
·4 min read

Mar. 15—MINNEAPOLIS — Taylor Stewart developed a habit during her years in the Rochester Youth Hockey Association.

At some point before or during a game or practice, she'd find her grandpa in the crowd.

She usually didn't have to look too hard.

"He was our biggest supporter," Stewart said of her grandpa,

Chub Stewart, who died on March 1

at age 93. "He drove us to a lot of our practices and games. He would always stand up against the glass and knock and wave. He'd always be there and he was always into the game.

"He was very passionate about his grandkids and hockey."

Chub Stewart spent plenty of time in hockey rinks, watching grandsons Scott and Charlie Thauwald play for Mayo High School, then watching Taylor and her brother Zach as they came up through RYHA. Zach played three years of varsity hockey at Mayo, while Taylor left home at age 15 to play at Shattuck St. Mary's in Faribault, where she helped the Sabres win two USA Hockey national championships.

But there may not have been a more enjoyable hockey season for her grandpa than this one. Chub Stewart was a hearty University of Minnesota Gophers fan.

So when Taylor announced last spring that she planned to use her fifth year of college hockey eligibility — an extra year granted by the NCAA to all athletes who were rostered by an NCAA team during the COVID-shortened season of 2020-21 — to transfer from the University of Minnesota Duluth to the Gophers, no one was more ecstatic than her grandpa.

"He's a U of M grad. I think he always, deep down, wanted me to play for the Gophers," Stewart, a 5-foot-10, lock-down defender, said. "I'm happy I was able to live out that dream for him and he was able to see me play here."

Taylor's grandpa will be on her mind often this weekend, when the Gophers travel to upstate New York with hopes of earning a trip to the NCAA Division I Women's Frozen Four. No. 5-ranked and seeded Minnesota (27-9-2) will face No. 4 Clarkson (32-4-2) at 1 p.m. CDT Saturday in a national quarterfinal game. The game will be live-streamed on ESPN Plus.

Saturday's winner advances to the Frozen Four in Durham, N.H., March 22 and 24.

While Clarkson is relatively unfamiliar to the Gophers — the teams haven't met head-to-head in the college careers of any player on either team's roster — Stewart has had first-hand experience against the Knights. A defender who scored six total goals in her four seasons at Minnesota Duluth, she scored both goals when the Bulldogs beat Clarkson 2-0 in a first-round NCAA Tournament game a year ago.

"We know they're an incredibly strong defensive team," Stewart said. "They lead the NCAA in goals against (1.18 goals allowed per game). They're very structured. A lot of it is their goaltending and their 'D.' We'll have to match that and try to find their weaknesses."

That Stewart is at the U of M this season has as much to do with her academic and professional goals as it does her hockey goals — and make no mistake, helping the Gophers win their seventh national championship, and first since 2016, is right at the top of her list over the next 10 days.

"It was a variety of reasons," she said when asked why she chose to finish her playing career with the Gophers. "The U of M has great academic resources. For my graduate year, I wanted to go to a school with academic opportunities. The University of Minnesota definitely has that. I'm excited to pursue something different academically and play for one of the top programs in the country.

"It's every Minnesota girl's dream to play for the Gophers."

Stewart, a two-time WCHA Scholar Athlete and two-time member of the WCHA All-Academic Team, is in the prestigious Carlson School of Business this school year, building up a business background as she prepares for her future career.

She learned in December that she has been accepted into dental school at the U of M — she was actually accepted into seven dental schools, but chose to stay close to home — and hopes to return to Rochester to start her career in a few years.

She's also not ready to hang up the skates for good. She said she'd love to stay around the game, which could include coaching, once she finishes dental school.

"Hockey is a huge part of me," said Stewart, who has 2 goals and 6 assists this season, and ranks third on the Gophers with 42 blocked shots. "Unfortunately, I'm hanging up my skates for my playing career, as much as I would like to continue playing. I want to focus on my dental career and I'm planning to move back to Rochester upon graduating. I would love to get back into the game then."