And
she did it while absorbing an event whose brevity in duration masks the
lengthy, painstaking toil that goes into perfecting its presentation.
The
venue: What is Fisht Olympic Stadium in Sochi?
The
occasion: What were the opening and closing ceremonies at the 2014 Winter Games?
Were
he furnishing the clue, Alex Trebek would have to technically accept those as
correct responses. But the fresher, more frequent two-part answer is the
HopeDay Festival at TCF Bank Stadium in Minneapolis.
Sure,
that gap year between her freshman and sophomore campaign at the University of
Minnesota let Stecklein absorb a few tear-jerking beauties overseas. The active
effort to animate the concept of global harmony around an assortment of
athletic affairs was anything but old to the youngest member of the 2014 U.S.
women’s team.
But
barely 18 months later, her return to reality yielded its own fields of
fulfillment. Her HopeDay experiences have let her witness local pediatric
hospital patients in their own escape from everyday life.
“There
was kind of a dance party at my team’s station,” Stecklein recalled in a phone
interview with Pucks and Recreation. “So we kind of joined the dance party, and
to see all of the kids kind of ignore their troubles and dance away, it made a
few of my teammates cry just watching it.”
The
spontaneous rave reached a new level when Stecklein and company watched as a
wheelchair user “just took over the dance floor.”
In
that display, Stecklein saw a grateful beneficiary accepting a spotlight she
had devoted the better part of her summer to illuminating.
The
Gophers senior blueliner admits she entered college with little community
service to speak of. She had a foundation for working with children, chiefly by
way of hockey instructional clinics.
Those
experiences, along with visiting children’s hospitals, made her service segue
way. Beyond that, outreach beyond the rink remained largely uncharted
territory.
Still,
by the time she was crossing into the university’s upperclassmen range, she was
raring to set a tone in the athletic department’s signature philanthropy
program.
The
result: HopeDay’s first installment to take place entirely at the campus football
venue, with Stecklein as one of the select student-athletes spearheading the
operation. Opposite tennis player Tereza Brichacova and rower Vanessa Johnston,
she had interned with the university athletic department’s MAGIC (Maroon and
Gold Impacting the Community) program the preceding summer.
Each
autumn since 2006, MAGIC has conducted the annual HopeDay carnival for Twin
Cities-area children facing cancer and other adverse health problems. Its 10th
installment — conducted on Sept. 14, 2015 — cracked a new plateau by hosting
more than 1,000 visitors and by setting up all of its stations at the stadium.
For
Stecklein, size tells all in both that breakthrough edition and its follow-up
earlier this academic year.
“To
have it at TCF Bank Stadium for the first time allowed it to be the biggest
event ever,” she said, “and I’m glad it’s going to be there from now on.”
‘…feel like a very
normal person’
The
way Merriam-Webster prioritizes its definitions of “champion” make a ladder of
Stecklein’s growth from sheer sports celebrity to community collaborator. At
No. 4 out of four, the dictionary offers, “a winner of first prize or first
place in competition” and “one who shows marked superiority.”
The
South St. Paul native caught Gopher bench boss Brad Frost’s attention by
fitting those descriptions well enough. She keyed Roseville Area High School to
a state playoff crown in 2010, then a close bid for another title in 2012. In
between, her emergence as a two-way connoisseur earned her a host of USA Hockey
action within her age group at the time.
Crossing
the Mississippi River and entering the state’s signature campus elicited —
albeit in the most metaphorical terms — what Merriam-Webster may dub
Stecklein’s inner “one that does battle for another’s rights” (ranked third on
the definition scroll) and “militant advocate or defender” (second).
“I
think just being a D-I athlete, you get exposed to a lot of great causes,” she
mused.
Stecklein’s
college trophy case and list of favorite charitable causes mismatch with her
unsatisfied, unassuming demeanor. She has won an NCAA title in each of her
first three seasons with the Gophers, then cherried each of those runs by
helping Team USA to gold at the IIHF World Championship.
If
Minnesota three-peats as the national champions this March, Stecklein will be
the first U.S. college hockey player of either gender to garner four rings. Per
her public LinkedIn profile, she already has a quartet of philanthropic
interests in animal welfare, children, the environment and human rights.
The
latter is a testament to her all-around evolution since coming to Frost’s
capstone class with intent to build on a winning tradition. Through the MAGIC
initiative, she found another guru to emulate in student-athlete development
director Anissa Lightner.
Lightner
is a 17-year veteran of the university, specializing in preparing all Gophers
for life beyond sports and overseeing every community service endeavor. Stecklein proclaims her “one of the
friendliest people you’ll ever meet.”
In
an August 2010 YouTube spot, Lightner underscored her personal principle of
exemplary leadership, stating, “I try to give back in my own personal life
through volunteering and different opportunities, and sometimes I’ll see our
athletes and they’re, like, ‘What are you doing out here?’ And I’m, like, ‘It’s
really hard for me to encourage you to give back if I’m not giving back
myself.’”
Stecklein
saw that paradigm up close on a daily basis through her internship in the
summer of 2015. The definition of that year’s internship corresponded with the ambition
and grind that went into mutating HopeDay as everyone knew it.
For
the interns, it instilled the same sort of realization a latter-day George Plimpton might reach upon joining a full-fledged workout with Stecklein’s
skating sorority. But Stecklein proved to be no mere for-a-day Plimptonian in
MAGIC. A craving for self-rewarding virtue took sway and refreshed itself each
time she looked at Lightner after a full work day.
“It’s
amazing that she has the energy to still have a smile on her face,” Stecklein
observed. “It really opened my eyes to that. You feel like a very normal
person.”
New goals, new
places
Delving
into her final semester at Minnesota, Stecklein is staring at an unprecedented
long-term venture outside of the Twin Cities. The NWHL’s Buffalo Beauts made
her their top draft choice last spring, and she is a viable candidate for the
2017-18 national team leading up to next February’s Olympics.
Save
for the 2013-14 tour in preparation for Sochi, she has only experienced
fleeting glimpses of other localities for hockey. But as part of her studies in
the university’s Carlson School, where she is majoring in entrepreneurial
management, she selected Australia for her required journey abroad.
After
hanging up her second variety pack of an NCAA trophy and IIHF gold medal, she
joined two teammates on a two-week, strictly academic excursion in May 2015.
“Just
to see another country that way and thinking about getting involved abroad with
a cause is something I would definitely consider in the future,” she said.
Her
travel bag has also accrued stickers from Canada, the Czech Republic, Sweden
and, most recently, Finland. All of those were the sites of short-term
tournaments, including America’s victory at this past November’s Four Nations
Cup.
But
not unlike the glowering gold-medal Olympic omission, Stecklein’s itch to size
up her outside interests in other nations remains unattended.
“It’s
hard,” she conceded. “When we are traveling, we see a very small part of each
country; not a lot of time for sightseeing. I would like to go to those
countries to get a broader perspective.”
Barring
an unexpected twist, Stecklein has a passport to Pyeongchang in the works for
February 2018. That would add South Korea to her list of first-hand glimpses at
other countries while delaying her arrival in Buffalo by a year.
“I’m
not quite sure where I’ll end up or what I’ll end up doing,” she said. “But
wherever I am, my time at ‘the U’ has made me realize how important it is to
get involved in my community.”
