Hockey In A Different Desert

You'd be forgiven if the title led you to believe that this was another Coyotes story or if the lede photo was some sort of artist's rendering of a new home for the Arizona Coyotes. Neither of those would be correct, but this is a story about hockey in the desert. That desert, however, is surrounding the city of Dubai, United Arab Emerites where a major women's hockey tournament will be played next month. Normally, I don't write about lesser-known Asian tournaments, but this one has a cool twist to it that will connect a city in Canada to another country's national team who will be playing at that tournament in Dubai! Let's see how the dots connect!

The Union Women Ice Hockey Tournament will be played September 5-9 in Dubai, UAE as a handful of teams make their way to the Middle Eastern country. We've seen teams such as the Bahrain Ice Hockey Club, the Shaheen Falcons, and Team India play at past tournaments in UAE, so this tournament does attract some good competition. While none of those teams are going to strike fear in most teams across the world by IIHF rankings, UAE does have 115 registered female players in their country as UAE looks to promote winter sports in a country that has an average annual temperature of 28.2°C. The coldest month on the calendar for Dubai is January at 19.4°C, so it's not like we're talking about a country that plunges into sub-zero temperatures by any temperature scale.

It should be no surprise that Dubai has money as we've witnessed time and again from that country, and they continue to build massive multi-sport complexes that house winter sports facilities. UAE has five indoor rinks including the one pictured at the top in the Sport Society Mall, so this country is spending a lot of money to boost its presence in winter sports.

One way to do that is to invite other teams to come and play at your state-of-the-art facilities, and that's what the Union Women Ice Hockey Tournament will aim to do as they invite teams from across the planet to play in Dubai for one week in September. The tournament's aim is to help the UAE National Women's Team prepare for the 2024 Asia and Oceania Championship, so they'll likely have a couple of decent teams there. One of the teams that's accepted an invitation? Team Philippines who likely will be one of those teams at the 2024 Asia and Oceania Championship!

You may be asking why I've spent all this time on Dubai and Team Philippines without mentioning a Canadian city, so let's bring this all together nicely by announcing that three Winnipeg-born players will be joining Team Philippines in Dubai in September for this tournament! Hanna Pagdato, who plays for the Mount Allison Mounties in the AUS, and her sister, Larissa Pagdato, who was a forward for the MWJHL's Northern Stars, will join the Philippines team in two weeks, and they'll be joined by Winnipeg-born defender Jordy Wyant who plays for Saint Mary's University at the NCAA D3 level in Winona, Minnesota! How cool is that?

The Pagdato sisters were on a local radio station in Winnipeg this morning with their dad, Larry, as they spoke about the opportunity on 680 CJOB's The Start with Brett Megarry, Lauren McNabb, and Greg Mackling. Here's the 11-minute interview from CJOB!
I am pretty excited for these three women to hit the ice in Dubai with the Phillipines National Team, and I'm hoping there will be a lot of amazing stories they'll bring back from UAE! This is an opportunity few get, so congratulations to Hanna, Larissa, and Jordy!

For those who may be wondering, Team Philippines National Women's Team is currently unranked as per IIHF rankings, but, as Larry stated, the sport is growing within Philippines' borders. They currently have just 48 female players registered and just two indoor rinks in the country, but their team will be cobbled together from players in their domestic leagues and from abroad just as Team China did for the Beijing Olympics and Team Korea did for the Pyeongchang Olympics. If Team Kazakhstan does play in the UAE tournament, they could be bringing players who nationalized as well, and they include former Mount Royal Cougars defender Erin McLean, former Alberta Pandas defender Kalista Senger, former Ottawa Gee Gees forward Roxanne Rioux, former Western Mustangs forward Kendra Broad, and former Toronto Blues forward Breanna Berndsen all play for the Kazakhstani squad. It seems Canada will be well-represented in UAE!

It should be a fun tournament and an unforgettable experience for the Pagdato sisters and Jordy Wyant, and I'm excited to see how they do in Dubai. That's not normally a place where my attention focuses in September, but the hometown connection to the tournament makes it a little more relevant for this writer!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!