DULUTH — After playing four seasons for former Minnesota Duluth captain and assistant coach Brett Larson, St. Cloud State senior forward Dan Molenaar is transferring to the Bulldogs for his fifth season to play for Larson’s former boss at UMD, Scott Sandelin.
A native of Minnetonka, Joe Molenaar is the cousin of former UMD defenseman Dan Molenaar, who helped get the Bulldogs to the 2017 NCAA Frozen Four and national championship game in Chicago.
ADVERTISEMENT
Larson was an assistant coach under Sandelin on that 2016-17 team and became head coach of the Huskies after UMD won the 2018 NCAA title. Joe Molenaar said Larson was “really supportive” of the move.
“Duluth reached out and, obviously, it’s a program I know a lot about with my cousin playing there,” Joe Molenaar said. “I settled on this being the best spot for me with school and hockey. It checked all the boxes for me. I’m just really excited about it.”
Joe Molenaar, who turns 25 in October, is graduating from SCSU in the spring with a degree in biomedical sciences. He’s looking to start his Master of Business Administration and will be the veteran on next year’s UMD roster after accumulating 16 goals and 15 assists in 108 games with the Huskies from 2020-2024.
UMD is not bringing back any of its 2023-24 seniors for a fifth season, and Molenaar will be among the potential 10 to 12 newcomers on the roster, with Sandelin looking to bring in possibly eight to 10 freshmen.
A 6-foot-1, 190-pound winger who had eight goals — one against UMD — and four assists as an assistant captain for the Huskies in 2023-24, Joe Molenaar had a hat trick in November against Miami . He was one of 18 nominees for the Hockey Humanitarian Award for his work in the Twin Cities and St. Cloud with Special Olympics, Breath of Hope, the Miracle League and an adaptive golf league in Edina.
Molenaar also spent time this past season with the adaptive floor hockey team in St. Cloud, and said he grew close with the members and coaching staff.
“I hope to be able to stay in touch with them, and maybe being so close, be able to make it to a couple of their practices that I would attend all year to keep those people in my life and vice versa,” Joe Molenaar said.
ADVERTISEMENT
In his four seasons at St. Cloud State, Joe Molenaar helped the Huskies reach three straight NCAA tournaments from 2021-2023, including the 2021 NCAA championship game in Pittsburgh. He and SCSU won an NCHC Frozen Faceoff title in 2023.
Joe Molenaar led Minnetonka in goals his senior season of high school in 2017-18 when the Skippers won the Minnesota Class AA state title, posting 31 goals in 31 games. He also won the Herb Brooks Award that year at state.
The Trust Project
