This year’s Amherst College women’s hockey team is littered with talent. 

Junior goalie Natalie Stott has posted eyebrow-raising numbers in between the pipes for the Mammoths this season (11 shutouts chief among them) and remains as one of the best netminders in the country since arriving in Amherst in 2022. Freshmen Ayla Abban and Bea Flynn have been impact players and then some for the Mammoths, scoring a combined 27 goals, while juniors Maeve Reynolds (Amherst’s scoring leader at 23 points) and Emily Hohmann (team-high 66 blocks) have been consistent contributors on and off the scoresheet for the Mammoths.

However, junior Gretchen Dann may hold the honor as Amherst’s most impressive development of the 2024-25 season. Dann took home the 2025 NESCAC Defensive Player of the Year Award in large part due to the Hanover, New Hampshire native’s outburst on offense this winter.

Dann, a defender, is tied for third on the Mammoths in goals with nine and recently reached 20 points on the season with an assist in the Mammoths NCAA Tournament quarterfinal round victory against Colby on March 22.

“This year my main focus was to truly enjoy the game, relax and just have so much fun with it,” Dann said. “Whatever happens happens, if I can help my team, I can, in whatever way, it just happened to come out this way. Obviously glad that it did, but I think the most important part is I’ve been able to help my team more than I have in the past and it’s been really exciting.”

Dann’s contributions in the offensive zone have gone a long way in helping Amherst back to the Frozen Four for the first time since 2023. The Mammoth, who play Middlebury on Friday in the national semifinal round, have benefited from Dann’s career year tremendously.

“Anytime you get someone on [defense] putting up points like that, that’s kind of like a bonus,” Amherst head coach Jeff Matthews said. “That fits into our style of play too when it comes to the o-zone. Gretchen is a force on defense, there’s no question about that, but she’s also got some nice offensive attributes. I’m not surprised she’s done what she did this year offensively.”

The former Kimball Union Academy product totaled just three goals in her first two years with the Mammoths. Earlier this season at Oswego State, Dann equaled that two-year output with her first career collegiate hat trick on Jan. 21.

Looking purely at Dann’s stats from 2023-24, one could chalk it up to a sophomore slump. While that’s partially true as the 5-foot-9 blueliner didn’t score any goals, after registering three as a freshman, it’s not the entire story.

Dann suffered an injury to her knee during the offseason prior to her sophomore year and despite only missing two games last season, Dann never got into a groove.

“Last year I was so frustrated,” Dann said. “I wanted to try to be the best of the best and that was all I was focusing on. This year I was focusing on how could I be the best teammate possible and what I could do to help my team.”

“I think her being healthy going into last summer and training the way she does and preparing the way she does for this year was a big springboard to the season that she had this season for sure,” Matthews said. 

Now back to full strength as an upperclassman, Dann unearthed another facet to her game to go along with her trademark aggressive, in-your-face style of defense in the D-zone.

“She loves the game, she has a great energy to her as a person and she’s a big-time competitor,” Matthews said. “She plays with a lot of passion every game, every practice, she brings it. That’s what great players do, they treat everything like it’s a national championship.”

Dann highlights a D-corps that leads the NESCAC in fewest goals-allowed (24).

“We work in layers, protecting every layer, allowing us to still be aggressive in the D-zone and put pressure on while still protecting our different layers,” Dann said. “Our wingers are very engaged with our D-zone, they come down and help support the house. So just supporting each other in the D-zone, understanding what the layers are and a huge part is positioning, understanding where you are on the ice.

“Obviously we have Natalie Stott in net, our brick-wall beauty, so we’re very fortunate to have her,” Dann added.

This year’s Frozen Four is in River Falls, Wisconsin, more than 1,200 miles away from Orr Rink, the Mammoths’ home rink and site of the 2023 national championship. As a member of that national runner-up team two seasons ago as a freshman, Dann has experience playing for the ultimate prize and has noticed commonalities between that group and this one.

“Everyone wants it so much,” Dann said. “That drive is really what sticks out to me compared to freshman year. We have so much skill, we have so much depth on our lines, all four lines go, all three sets of D go, all our goalies [are good.] In practice we always talk about iron sharpens iron, pushing each other and we really focused on that this year. On Monday, after the weekend, how can you prepare for the coming games and how can we help each other, push each other to be better on the ice, in practice, we helps us have so much success in games.”

Friday’s contest will count as the Mammoths’ fourth meeting with the Panthers this season. The season series sits even 1-1-1 between both teams, so it’s only fitting that the national semifinal will decide which NESCAC power gets to advance to the NCAA title game.

Puck drop on Friday is scheduled for 4 p.m.