TBC: The Role I Played

Manitobans have played high-level sports across this globe for a while now, and our province is lucky to have these great athletes call Manitoba "home" when they're competing. Sure, they move to other parts of the country, but the Manitoba in them never truly disappears and they always seem to come back for a number of reasons. Today, I am happy to review the book written by one of Manitoba's finest ambassadors - an athlete and and a teammate who many are proud to have. She too makes this clear in her new book as Teebz's Book Club is proud to review The Role I Played, written by Sami Jo Small and published by ECW Press. While I've known Sami Jo Small for some time, The Role I Played presented a unique view on her life, her trials and tribulations in hockey, and her pursuit of an Olympic dream while competing with a number of other women who have the same dream. Make no mistake: The Role I Played was a captivating read!

Known for her beaming smile and bubbly personality, Sami Jo Small is a three-time Olympian and five-time World Champion with Team Canada as one of their selected netminders. She has two gold-medal victories and one silver-medal victory to her name while playing with Canada at the Olympics, and she was twice named as the MVP of the IIHF Women's World Championship while helping her team to those five gold medals. She is a graduate of Stamford University where she earned a degree in Mechanical Engineering - Product Design after attending the school on a track-and-field scholarship where she threw both discus and javelin for the Cardinal. She helped to found the CWHL out of the ashes of the original NWHL, and she was most recently the general manager of the Toronto Furies franchise before the league folded. When she's not wrapped up in hockey, Sami Jo Small is a public speaker where she spreads her message of positivity. She is married to Canadian paralympian Billy Bridges, and she, Billy, and their daughter Kensi live in Toronto.

I count myself as extremely lucky to have spoken with Sami Jo Small a number of times prior to her writing this book, and I thought I had a pretty good idea about her career and her work both on and off the ice. What I wasn't aware of in all of her years on the ice as an elite goalie was how hard she had to fight to earn every spot on every team she made. There still is some stigma about girls playing on boys' hockey teams to a degree, but Small was a trailbalzer in Manitoba as she grabbed every opportunity she could every time there was a chance for her to play higher.

What I didn't expect to find in The Role I Played was the emotional roller coaster that Sami Jo Small takes us on through her career highlights and a few low moments. From watching players she admired be cut to having her name called for big games to being relgated to the back-up role to winning accolades at the highest levels for her work on the ice, The Role I Played will certainly take you on an emotional journey as you read about Sami Jo Small's career. In knowing Small, however, she wears her heart on her sleeve and every story had me hearing her voice as I read through the passages, giving The Role I Played even more feeling for me as I read through the book.

I was shocked, as I read The Role I Played, that Hockey Canada's coaching staff deal with each player as if they're robots. As Sami Jo Small makes clear, the meetings she had with a number of the coaches seemed very cold and off-putting with zero empathy shown for players who were having their dreams crushed by news of not making the team. It's this honesty in Small's experiences and this pull-no-punches description of the machine that is Hockey Canada that had me shaking my head a number of times as I read through the paragraphs. I know Small included an apology at the start of the book for depicting some people in a light of which they may not approve, but reading these experiences makes me wonder how many of Canada's elite athletes have simply walked away due to their experiences. The Role I Played shows a darker underbelly that I'm not sure that Hockey Canada wanted exposed.

I will say that, despite the ups and downs she faced and experienced, Sami Jo Small seemed to make friends with everyone that she encountered in life. Some of those friendships lasted a short time while others will last a lifetime, but it's clear that everyone who pulled on a Team Canada sweater was part of a family whose bonds couldn't be broken by any force in the universe. I would say the same thing went for any of the teammates that Sami played with in a Mississauga, Brampton, or Toronto jersey in the NWHL and CWHL and a Stamford jersey or sweatshirt in the NCAA.

It speaks volumes to how these friendships are stressed by these high-level sports situations, and how those bonds are forged and made stronger when everyone backs each other up in the face of adversity. Players like Vicky Sunohara, Jennifer Botterill, Delaney Collins, and Susie Yuen span several generations of Team Canada squads, but Sami Jo Small is close to each of those players and many more.

The friendships made while facing adversity reminds me of a paragraph in The Role I Played about the gruelling camp that the Canadian women went through in PEI in preparation for the 2006 Torino Olympic Games. Small writes,

"Thirty-one days done. We are a broken bunch, but we made it through the month. Exhaustion doesn't mean the same thing to me anymore. I now know I can keep going when every last cell in my body wants me to quit. I know my teammates need me as much as I need them. We are on this journey as a team, and ultimately, we are stronger together."

Those words ring true throughout The Role I Played with the stories that Small tells. Despite being pitted against one another for playing time, opportunities, and the chance just to wear the maple leaf on their chests, the women who make up the Team Canada women's hockey team always rise to the occasion when they play for one another and play together as a team. That's the hallmark of Canadian champion hockey teams, and Small recognized this importance of friendships and playing for each other while pushing each other to excel individually in order to find greater success.

Overall, The Role I Played was a quick read for me as I was immersed in Small's storytelling from the first page right through the epilogue. Learning about her life, her relationships, her struggles, and her successes gives me better insight into who Small is as a person, and I can see why she's an amazing human being after reading this book. She's clearly blessed as an athlete, but her life has become so much more exceptional thanks to her experiences, her friends, her family, her drive, and her determination. Reading through the 344 pages was easy thanks to Small's writing style, and her stories will take on the emotional journey that she went through as she experienced life. Because of this great storytelling ability, The Role I Played absolutely deserves the Teebz's Book Club Seal of Approval!

With a nationwide release coming up this week, you'll be able to find The Role I Played in most bookstores. It's entirely worth the price on the sticker, and I feel like readers of all ages will enjoy this book if they're up to the 344-page challenge. I was and I enjoyed it, and I'm sure you will too!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!