From the Saskatchewan slough to hockey stardom

For ice hockey legend Hayley Wickenheiser, the path to greatness begins with the great outdoors.

Growing up in Shaunavon in rural Saskatchewan, Wickenheiser happily wiled away many winter hours zooming along a backyard rink constructed by her dad and several others in the neighbourhood, and skating across the slough on her grandfather’s farm.

“I would flood a path from my back door across the back alley to the rink and play shinny whenever it froze to whenever it started to melt,” she recalls.
“We would sometimes even skate to school if the gutters beside the sidewalks were frozen.”

When she wasn’t outside carving up the ice, Wickenheiser watched her favourite players on television, following their stride and dreaming of the day when she, too, would join their ranks.

“I have vivid memories of watching Hockey Night in Canada and in between periods, lacing up the skates and skating across the backyard right onto the outdoor rink, jumping on the ice and back again. Thousands of hours doing that; and many memories of backing one of the pickup trucks up to the slough with some hot chocolate or warm tea and putting our skates on in the back of the truck and skating down the side of the hill, right onto the slough,” she shares.

Wickenheiser didn’t have any female players to look up to at the time, so she became the role model she needed. Playing the sport she loved outdoors without judgment, in the frigid prairie winters, helped her develop stamina, skating and stickhandling skills, and her own style.

“I a thousand-per-cent think pond hockey/outdoor hockey contributed to my development as an athlete differently than typical arena time. I spent thousands of hours unsupervised, unprompted, dreaming and visualizing playing in the NHL and winning a Stanley Cup for the Edmonton Oilers with literally the starlight or moonlight illuminating the rink,” says Wickenheiser.

“No one was telling me what to do and I could try things that I saw on TV (by) my favourite players—NHL players—because I didn’t have any female hockey players to look up to…I would try different things, put obstacles on the ice, create different games with the neighbourhood kids that I played with,” she adds.

“And still to this day, whenever I struggle both in hockey or in life, I go play on the outdoor rink and I always feel better.”

That early determination, passion and persistence set her on the path to a record-breaking career. In 1993, at age 15, Wickenheiser became the youngest player to represent Canada at the International Ice Hockey Federation’s (IIHF) Women’s World Championship and 10 years later, she became the first woman to score a goal in a men’s professional league while playing for Kirkkonummen Salamat in the second division of the Finnish Elite League.

Today, the four-time Olympic gold medallist, two-time Olympic MVP and Hockey Hall of Famer, with 13 World Championships under her belt, is considered one of the greatest female hockey players in the world.

In 2017, Wickenheiser officially hung up her skates as Canada’s leading scorer in women’s hockey, but she hasn’t strayed far from her beloved sport. Besides being a mom and a medical doctor, she’s also an assistant general manager, player development, for the Toronto Maple Leafs.

She’s come a long way from that young girl skating in the slough around Shaunavon, shooting for and eventually achieving goals that once seemed out of reach. These days, the sportsplex in her hometown (the Veren Wickenheiser Centre) bears her name. In 2010, she founded WickFest, an annual event that brings together young female hockey players from around the world to build skills, confidence and friendships.

Wickenheiser’s story is proof of the power of spending time in nature. That’s why we’re proud to share it as part of our Small Ponds, Big Goals campaign. Playing hockey outdoors, she says, helped her experience, prepare for, and appreciate the game in a different way.

“I love the outdoors. I could live literally outside—cold, warm, doesn’t matter. I think we got very used to being in the freezing winters of Saskatchewan and learning how to bundle up and dress warm,” she says.