Celebration of life held for Mack Motzko in St. Cloud

ST. CLOUD, Minn. (FOX 9) - A sea of red filled North Cathedral High School in St. Cloud Monday in a celebration of life service for Mack Motzko. 

Family and friends gathered to remember the young man after he died in a crash last week in Orono. Motzko graduated from St. Cloud's Cathedral High School last year and was preparing to move to Canada in the fall to play junior hockey.

Motzko’s older sister Ella was among several people to speak during the service.

"I find peace in knowing all the words said about you in the last week were said to you and about you throughout all your 20 years. The world did not wait to love you and tell you how special you are. I will spend the rest of my life striving to be more like you, but I have a pretty tough act to follow," she said.

Many of those in attendance wore red or a golf polo in Motzko's memory. As the son of University of Minnesota men's hockey coach Bob Motzko, Mack was well known in the hockey community.

Those who knew him say he always went out of his way to positively impact all those he met.

"To know Mack was to truly understand the meaning of kindness," said Drake Lundeen, a longtime family friend. "We were all given an incredible gift to have Mack in our life at all, no matter how short. There's a hole in all of us now that he's gone."