University of St. Thomas - Minnesota Women's Ice Hockey

Palkowski will begin his 10th season as the Tommies' head coach in 2016-17. Palkowski, who coached his 200th game in 2014-15, has guided St. Thomas to a 66-percent win clip (147-70-24), including three rare 20-win seasons. He has coached athletes to eight All-America honors in the last nine years, including three in a row by goalie Alise Riedel. During 2013-2014, Palkowski guided the Tommies to the programs first NCAA Frozen Four berth in its 16-year varsity history. That was just their second NCAA playoff trip, and USTs 5-0 road victory over No. 5-ranked UW-Stevens Point was the programs first NCAA playoff victory. The Tommies lost 1-0 in overtime to eventual champion Plattsburgh State in the national semifinals, then finished fourth in the country after falling 5-3 to UW-River Falls in the third-place game. Despite playing most of her senior season with a torn ACL, Riedel set an NCAA Championships record with 63 saves in the 1-0 defeat to Plattsburgh State. The 2014-2015 team placed second in the MIAC and won the MIAC playoff title to advance to the NCAA playoffs for the second straight year. They lost to Plattsburgh State and ended the season tied for fifth place in the nation. In 2015-2016, the team won the MIAC conference title, and again advanced to the NCAA playoffs to share fifth-place nationally. Under Palkowski and predecessor Kevin Gorg, who coached UST its first nine varsity seasons, UST has posted 14 consecutive winning seasons and has become a consistent top-15 Division III program. St. Thomas has won more than 75 percent of its games against MIAC opponents over the last 12 years (158-39-19). A former Tommie men's hockey star player, Palkowski also has a 20-year resume as an hockey assistant coach. The Columbia Heights native previously served 11 seasons in the boys' programs at Columbia Heights, Totino-Grace and Mounds View high schools and served as Gorgs top assistant at UST. Palkowski played one season at Illinois-Chicago and then competed three seasons at St. Thomas, where he helped the Toms post a 50-13-1 record in his first two seasons with a pair of MIAC championships and two NCAA playoff berths. Despite playing just 93 games in three seasons, Palkowski still ranks seventh on the UST career scoring list with 168 points (71 goals, 97 assists). Five of the six players ahead of Palkowski played four seasons.   Tom Palkowski Year-By-Year Year---------Overall-------MIAC (Place) 2007-08-----21-6-0-------16-5-0 (2nd) 2008-09-----18-5-3-------15-3-2 (2nd) 2009-10-----14-9-3-------12-4-2 (3rd) 2010-11-----11-10-5------10-4-4 (2nd) 2011-12-----15-9-2-------11-6-1 (3rd) 2012-13-----14-8-2-------13-4-1 (2nd) 2013-14-----20-7-3-------14-2-2 (1st) 2014-15-----14-10-4------11-3-4 (2nd) 2015-16-----20-6-2-------12-4-2 (1st) Totals/147-70-24 (.657)---124-35-18 (.751) Tom Palkowski Year-By-Year