BY JIMMY GILLIGAN | The Statesman Senior UMD goalie Karissa Grapp has found a new home in the most unexpected of places.
Growing up in Essexville, Michigan, a small town of just over 3,400, Grapp always dreamed of playing college hockey, but she never imagined playing in Minnesota.
Four years after playing at UMD and living in Duluth, Grapp doesn’t want to leave.
“I never would have thought that I would have ended up in Duluth,” Grapp said. “I want to stay here; I love Duluth. It’s actually like my home.”
She had plans to play college hockey and study chemical engineering at Wayne State University in Michigan, but those plans fell through when they cut their women’s hockey program the same day she graduated high school in 2011.
But giving up isn’t in her vocabulary.
Grapp continued playing in the Tier I Elite League for exposure, moving to Ohio the winter after high school in order to do so. After turning heads there, she accepted an offer to join the Bulldogs in the fall.
Following her graduation for UMD this spring, Grapp intends to find a chemical engineering job in the area so that she can continue to live in Duluth.
“My hometown is like one street with a post office that’s open three days a week. I lived kind of out in the middle of nowhere really,” Grapp said. “Parts of Duluth are the same, but I kind of like the big city feel. It’s nice for it to not be a huge city like Boston or Chicago.”
Even though Grapp intends to put down roots in Duluth after graduation, Essexville is still a special place for her. She will always consider herself a “Michigander.”
She’s just one of two Michigan natives on the Bulldog roster and part of a strong goaltending trio that has given up an average 2.75 goals per game.
“We trust all three of them in the net,” assistant coach Laura Bellamy said. “It’s a great environment for us. The three of them get along really well and help each other out. They want to be in the net, but if it’s not them they’re supportive.”
After fellow goalies Kayla Black and Maddie Rooney traded off starting the first 20 games of the season, Grapp figured she wouldn’t get much playing time this season.
Much to her surprise, she’s recently started two games for the Bulldogs, after coming in to relieve freshman Maddie Rooney against No. 2 Wisconsin on January 8.
“I never really thought it would happen this year. I was kind of okay with being in that supporting role, and to finally get the opportunity (to start), I was extremely happy,” Grapp said.
She’s only appeared in three games this season, but she leads the team in save percentage (.939) and goals against average (2.29).
“I think the biggest thing is she’s so competitive and she works so hard that she’s never going to give up on a puck until it’s a save or it’s in the back of the net,” Bellamy said.
This determination also spills over into the classroom. It’s what enables her to juggle being a chemical engineering student and a Division I athlete at the same time, although she admits it’s not easy.
“I actually just go to school, go to practice and then come home and do homework,” Grapp said. “I have like zero life.”
On the home stretch of her college career, Grapp avoids getting caught up in how many minutes she gets, or how difficult her last semester of classes are.
She just wants to enjoy the rest of the ride.
“You spend so much time thinking about ‘well am I going to play, am I not going to play, what do I need to do to play,’ and then you have all that extra pressure of school, and it makes things very stressful and very fast-paced,” Grap said.
“The last semester I have playing hockey I just want to enjoy it with my teammates. It’s the last time I’m going to be on the ice with them every day; it’s the last time I’m going to be a Bulldog.”