The Hockey Show - Episode 726

The Hockey Show, Canada's only campus-produced radio show that strictly talks hockey, is back in the confines of the UMFM studios for another show this evening, but we won't be joined by Montreal Victoire defender Kati Tabin as she's far too busy to make an appearance. If you're attending her camp, have a great time, but we'll focus on some bigger stories tonight as the world of hockey has some good, some not-so-good, and some absolute treachery happening in it over the last week. There's a pile of stuff to chat about this evening, so settle in for another examination of the game and all its connections on The Hockey Show at 5:30pm CT!

They won't be looking for a dolphin like the pet detective shown, but Teebz and Jason will look at the newest gambling-trend-turned-investment-tool with which the financial world is hoping to capitalize. Beyond that madness, they'll discuss Rogers canning the HNiC Punjabi broadcasts, the OHL cracking down on fighting again, Jeff Skinner's new home, Fort Wayne's incredible jerseys, a pro ball player, championships in three leagues, there's finally a name and logo for one team, and whatever else comes across the desk at our hosts. There's lots to discuss tonight on the show, so settle in for an hour of hockey opinions and thoughts on The Hockey Show at 5:30pm CT on one of 101.5 FM, Channel 718 on MTS TV, or via UMFM.com!

If you live outside Winnipeg and want to listen, we have options! The UMFM website's streaming player works well if you want to listen online. We also recommend Radio Garden if you need an easy-to-use online stream. If you're more of an app person, we recommend you use the TuneIn app found on the App Store or Google Play Store.

If you have questions, you can email all show queries and comments to hockeyshow@umfm.com! Tweet me anytime with questions you may have by hitting me up at @TeebzHBIC on Twitter! I'm here to listen to you, so make your voice heard! And because both Teebz and Jason are on the butterfly app where things are less noisy, you can find Teebz here and Jason here on Bluesky!

Tonight, Teebz and Jason chat high-stakes gambling, stupid decisions, expensive fights, Swiss chalets, historical accuracy, pro hits, winning teams, new names, and much more exclusively on 101.5 UMFM and on the UMFM.com web stream!

PODCAST: August 20, 2026: Episode 726

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

New Zealand Crowns A Champion

With the calendar flipping to August and the summer entering its later stages of the season, summer hockey leagues and camps will begin to give way to full seasons once more. When the seasons are flipped, though, teams who play through the winter in the southern hemisphere will get to look forward to warm summer days like we're experiencing now. That's the case for the New Zealand Women's Ice Hockey League as the NZWIHL crowned a champion today despite the game being televised during the wee hours of Saturday in North America! Which teams made the final and what were the storylines? Let's take a dive into the NZWIHL!

The two teams shown above were your finalists from the four-team NZWIHL as the Auckland Steel and Wakatipu Wild earned their way into the final game to determine the 2026 NZWIHL championship. The Wild beat the Dunedin Thunder on Saturday to book their spot in the final while the Steel dismissed the Canterbury Thunder earlier on Saturday to claim their berth as well. Dunedin, it should be noted, beat the Thunder in the bronze medal game on Sunday afternoon.

Auckland came into the final as the favorite thanks to posting an undefeated regular season where they went 11-0-1-0 for 35 points. That one overtime win came back on July 25 when the Steel needed 57 seconds beyond regulation time to win 2-1 over Dunedin. Jasmine Horner-Pascoe scored her 14th goal in overtime for that win, and she'd finish second in team and league scoring with 26 points. League leader Katya Blong had 35 points, third-place leader Lauren Askenazy had 21 points, and fourth-place leader Brooke Patron had 17 points all for Auckland. In short, they scored a lot and won a lot.

Wakapitu struggled to find their rhythm this season, posting a 2-6-1-3 record for 11 points and finishing in third-place. Kelli Burstein ha a good season with ten goals and 14 points, but no other Wild player scored more than seven points. New Zealand-born Jordan Wichman was 2-3-1-0 this season with a 2.75 GAA and a .921 save percentage, but it's hard to win games when the Wild only averaged 2.00 goals-per-game. However, a four-goal outburst by Burstein powered the Wild to a 5-1 win past the Thunder in their playoff game for an unexpected chance at Sunday's NZWIHL championship!

Would the Wild have enough left in the tank to upset Auckland?

That question was answered early in Sunday's championship game as Auckland scored three times in the opening ten minutes and five times in the first frame to pace the Steel to a 5-1 lead after twenty minutes. The teams would trade goals in the middle period before Auckland tacked on two more in third period to skate to the 8-2 championship win as the 2026 NZWIHL season came to a close!

Highlights from the NZWIHL championship game can be seen below!


What's fun in all of this is seeing a player like Katya Blong do well as she skates with McGill where she's earning her kinesiology degree. Blong looks like she's going to be one of New Zealand's best players for a long time, and it's awesome to her skating in the Canadian university circuit. Brooke Patron was a Saskatchewan Huskies defender for four seasons and she appears to be helping the NZWIHL and the Steel with her skills. Goaltender Alexa Gibson seems to be enjoying life in Auckland after skating for the Ottawa Gee-Gees!

Even cooler is that Lochlyn Hyde, who splits the goaltending duties with Gibson, has jumped into the NZIHL - the men's league - on occasion when teams have needed a goaltender. To date, Hyde has played three games in the top division where she has a 3.50 GAA and an .885 save percentage, and has helped out the second-division league twice where she's officially 1-1-0! How cool is that?

On the other side, Wakatipu had no players who suited up in U SPORTS, but Kelli Berstein did play for the University of Minnesota. However, the gap in skill between these two teams was evident in the final as Auckland outshot Wakatipu 38-22 and controlled the play a lot. I get that no one is going to tell Auckland to break their team up to disperse talent across the other three teams, but the 14-point gap between Auckland and second-place Dunedin is hard to fathom in a four-team league. Something has to change for New Zealand hockey to continue to develop good players for international competitions.

Congratulations to the Auckland Steel on winning their fourth-straight NZWIHL championship! It's their eighth championship overall in the NZWIHL, and I imaging they'll be gunning for a fifth-consecutive and ninth-overall championship in 2027 if everything goes well. Perhaps we'll see another team step in and claim victory, but another solid season is in the book for Kiwi hockey, the NZWIHL, and its players!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

The Rundown - Extended Family

With it being the holiday season, there's likely a chance that you'll be at a family gathering where you'll encounter extended family. Most of these people you know, but there could be that odd aunt, uncle, or cousin whose attendance at those family functions isn't as regular. That's what today's edition of The Rundown is all about - catching up with those former U SPORTS players who are playing in faraway lands, but still helped to build the programs into what they are today.

I started this last season, but it seems appropriate for us to ask an obvious question: what happens after players graduate or leave programs? As we know, some will have earned degrees and can go off and work in those chosen fields, but a lot of women want to keep playing hockey as the competitive fires continue to burn. Where are they doing that? Who might be looking for talented hockey players to improve their standing in their respective leagues and capture a championship? We'll answer some of those questions today.

Once more, I spent time scouring all the leagues as I went looking at all the former U SPORTS players who are off playing professionally at some level across the planet. Some leagues have many former U SPORTS players playing while other leagues do not, but the coolest part, I think, is seeing how many women are still pursuing their hockey dreams while, in some cases, travelling to amazing places to play hockey. I won't lie when I say I'm envious of some of these players based on where they call home for this season, but that's the benefit of being an outstanding player whose talents are coveted.

Let's get into these leagues and see which U SPORTS players are playing, and we'll work through as many leagues as possible. What should be noted is that a number of the schools who once had these women playing for them have done very little to draw attention to the success they're having after these players left those respective campuses, so I'll once again fill that void as I normally do.

Without further adieu, let's take a look at who's playing where.

SWHL - Switzerland

This league is also named the PostFinance Women's Hockey League.

Skaters

Name	Team	G	A	GP	University
Estelle Duvin	SC Bern	13	17	19	Montreal
Joelle Fiala	HC Davos	5	11	23	UBC
Lea MacLeod	‎ ‎ ‎ ‎Langenthal‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	6	9	25	StFX
Lauren Dabrowski	Fribourg	5	14	23	StFX
Kaleigh Quennec	SC Bern	3	5	14	Montreal
Jessika Boulanger	Langenthal	3	2	24	Montreal
Dominique Scheurer	ZSC Lions	1	1	19	MacEwan

There are less former U SPORTS players playing in Switzerland than there was last season, but there are still good players who are scoring points for their teams. The only conference not represented in Switzerland is the OUA, and we may see both Kaleigh Quennec and Dominique Scheurer skating in Milano-Cortina for the Swiss team come February. French-born Estelle Duvin sits sixth-overall in scoring after winning the scoring title last season with 54 points.

EWHL - Central Europe

Skaters

Name	Team	G	A	GP	University
Ashley Taciuk	SKN Sabres	12	15	16	Nipissing
Lauren Nicholson	Almaty	11	14	15	TMU
Jaime Magoffin	SKN Sabres	10	14	16	Guelph
Breanne Trotter	Almaty	9	12	17	Mount Royal
Léonie Philbert	EV Bozen	4	17	16	Concordia
Maggie Peterson	Kärnten	8	12	18	Windsor
Emily Baxter	Budapest	7	12	12	TMU
Katherine Birkby	Almaty	11	7	17	Ottawa
Emma Hall	Kärnten	7	7	18	UBC
Rebecca Clarke	Salzburg	4	10	18	Calgary
Megan Breen	Budapest	3	8	12	TMU
Majorie Bolduc	Kärnten	5	4	9	Bishop's
Meaghan Chittick‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	SKN Sabres	3	5	15	Guelph
Kate Wagner	Almaty	3	5	17	Calgary
Mariah Hinds	Almaty	1	4	13	TMU
Alex Gowie	SKN Sabres	2	2	8	Calgary/Alberta
Kate Gallant	Kärnten	0	0	7	Saint Mary's
Roxanne Rioux	Almaty	1	5	17	Ottawa

Goalies

Name	Team	Record	GAA	Sv%	GP	University
Alice Philbert	EV Bozen	n/a	1.55	.936	16	Concordia
Rachel Seeley	Almaty	n/a	2.25	.895	10	TMU

There's definitely a wider range of players skating in the EWHL when it comes to conferences. Ashley Taciuk sits in second-place for league scoring while Lauren Nicholson is third-overall. For the shortage of OUA players in Switzerland, the league that plays in Poland, Austria, Hungary, Slovakia, Italy, and Kazakhstan boasts the most U SPORTS players in Europe this season! And there's probably room for more!

SDHL - Sweden

Skaters

Name	Team	G	A	GP	University
Jaycee Magwood‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	‎ ‎ ‎ ‎Luleå‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	8	14	26	Regina
Mathea Fischer	SDE	8	12	27	UBC
Sarah Bujold	Luleå	8	8	25	StFX
Erica Rieder	Luleå	4	9	26	Manitoba
Emma Bergesen	Brynäs	0	1	5	Mount Royal
Sophie Lalor	HV71	0	0	3	Saskatchewan
Chanreet Bassi	‎ ‎ ‎ ‎Linköping‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	0	0	3	UBC

Goalies

Name	Team	Record	GAA	Sv%	University
Camryn Drever	Skellefteå	8-8-0	2.29	.918	Saskatchewan

Five Canada West schools have players skating in the SDHL which is considered the second-best women's league on the planet. Sarah Bujold is a former U SPORTS Player of the Year, so she can clearly hold her own as well. Magwood is eighth-overall in league scoring, but she finds herself eleven points back of the leaders. Between the pipes, Camryn Drever is keeping Skellefteå in the hunt at sixth-overall, but it's a four-way race for first-place between Luleå, Brynäs, SDE, and Frölunda in the ten-team league. HV71 appears to be eliminated from the playoffs despite mathematically being alive.

DFEL - Germany

Skaters

Name	Team	G	A	GP	University
Madelyn Walsh	Eisbären Berlin	2	7	18	Brock
Shani Rossignol	Mad Dogs Mannheim	6	1	18	Moncton
Lore Baudrit	ERC Ingolstadt	3	2	12	Montreal
Alix Yallowega	ERC Ingolstadt	2	4	18	Dalhousie

There are less U SPORTS players playing in Germany this season, but credit goes to the four players who are calling Germany home. Madelyn Walsh is having a solid campaign as she has nine points from the blueline for the Eisbären Berlin as the leading U SPORTS player, but Memmingen has a 14-point lead over Budapest and a 15-point lead over Berlin in the standings. Mannheim might be out of the race.

NDHL - Sweden

Skaters

Name	Team	G	A	GP	University
Cassidy Maplethorpe	Rögle SK	21	28	12	BRK/ALB
Hunter Mosher	Södertälje	7	13	12	Nipissing
Scout Southward	Almtuna IS	11	8	10	QUE/TOR
Sophie Lalor	Troja-Ljungby	10	6	9	Saskatchewan
Aimee O'Neill	Hammarby	8	6	12	Saint Mary's
Mackenzie Drake	Troja-Ljungby	7	2	11	Dalhousie
Jesse Jack	Troja-Ljungby	3	0	2	MacEwan

A handful of U SPORTS players are playing in Sweden's second-division professional league, and all of these teams are looking for promotion to the SDHL this season. Former Badgers and Pandas sniper Cassidy Maplethorpe is torching the league by leading in goals and assists, and has a nine-point lead over second-leading scorer Sara Boucher who plays with Maplethorpe for Rögle SK. Rögle SK, it should be noted, is 11-0-0-1 while Hunter Mosher's Södertälje squad is tied for first-overall with a 10-0-2-0 record. Keep an eye on those teams!

PWHL - North America

Skaters

Name	Team	G	A	GP	University
Jade Downie-Landry	Montreal Victoire	0	0	0	McGill
Rylind MacKinnon	Boston Fleet	0	0	5	UBC
Emmy Fecteau	New York Sirens	0	0	6	Concordia
Catherine Dubois	Montreal Victoire	0	0	3	Montreal
Kaitlyn Willoughby	Montreal Victoire	0	1	5	Saskatchewan
Alexandra Labelle	Montreal Victoire	0	1	5	Montreal
Kelly-Ann Nadeau	Montreal Victoire	0	0	5	Montreal
Jade Downie-Landry	Montreal Victoire	0	0	0	McGill

When Montreal has 75% of the U SPORTS players in the league and they're the only Canadian team to boast Canadian university-trained players, it would appear that selling the PWHL dream to Canadian university players might be a pipe dream. That being said, good on Danièle Sauvageau for believing in these players. As you can see, none of them have exploded out of the gates when it comes to filling the net, but they're all contributing in their own various ways.

IHLW - Italy

Goalies

Name	Team	Record	GAA	Sv%	University
Gabriella Durante	Real Torino	n/a	1.69	.947	Calgary

Gabriella Durante has played in just four games this season, but she's continuing her strong play that we saw in Canada West and last season in Italy. It would be ridiculous for me to suggest she'll be a starter for the Italian team when they have Martina Fedel, Elisa Biondi, and Margherita Ostoni competing for spots, but the two U SPORTS netminders - Fedel and Durante - should have the inside track on an Olympic roster spot when it comes to Milano-Cortina!

Naisten Suomi-Sarja - Finland

Skaters

Name	Team	G	A	GP	University
Miressa Mäkelä‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	‎ ‎ ‎ ‎HIFK Challenger‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	1	1	2	Manitoba

Mäkelä is playing her second season in Finland's Division-II level of hockey, but "playing" might be more of a fill-in role when she's needed as she has five games in just over a season to her name. She was injured in her only season of Canada West hockey, and she didn't make it until the end of the season. She returned home and rejoined her old team prior to the Canada West season ending.

Women's Extraliga - Czechia

Skaters

Name	Team	G	A	GP	University
Martina Maskova‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	‎ ‎ ‎ ‎HC Banik Pribram‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	2	1	2	Regina

Maskova has barely played this year, but she's back with Banik Pribram for another season. Like Mäkelä above, she seems to be playing either on a part-time basis. Maskova has been playing with Banik Pribram since leaving the University of Regina in 2021. She does not play on the Czechia national team so no Olympics for her.

FFHG Féminin Élite - France

Skaters

Name	Team	G	A	GP	University
Emmanuelle Passard	‎ ‎ ‎ ‎Jets d’Evry-Viry‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	12	9	6	Montreal

There are no Canadians playing in France this year, but the Université de Montréal does have a player skating in her home country. Passard is third-overall in league scoring, and three points back of the leader. It seems that playing for les Carabins may have paid off for her!

LIHH - Spain

Skaters

Name	Team	G	A	GP	University
Courtney Kollman‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	‎ ‎ ‎ ‎CG Puigcerdà‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	21	18	10	MRU/CAL
Annaliese Meier‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	‎ ‎ ‎ ‎CG Puigcerdà‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	7	6	9	Calgary

Kollman and Meier have helped CG Puigcerdà to a tie for second-place in the Liga Nacional de Hockey Hielo femenina while Kollman sits in second-place for league scoring behind a 20 year-old named Eva Aizpurua who has a 13-point lead on Kollman. Both have sat a few games here and there, but I don't think Puigcerdà will complain about either's production considering the team is 9-2-0 on the season with games in-hand. Spain has been good to these two former Dinos.

AWIHL - Australia

Skaters

Name	Team	G	A	GP	University
Jordan Kulbida‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	‎ ‎ ‎ ‎Adelaide‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	8	7	10	Regina
Danielle Butler‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	‎ ‎ ‎ ‎Melbourne‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	10	2	10	Windsor
Katherine Bailey‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	‎ ‎ ‎ ‎Perth‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	2	5	10	Guelph
Kelsie Lang‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	‎ ‎ ‎ ‎Sydney‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	1	10	10	Calgary
Madison LaPlante‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	‎ ‎ ‎ ‎Brisbane‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	3	4	6	Windsor
Alison Carlisle‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	‎ ‎ ‎ ‎Brisbane‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	1	0	6	Trinity Western

It's actually pretty impressive to see this many former U SPORTS players continuing to play the game in Australia. With the growth of men's hockey in that country, the women's game has followed with most of the Australian women's national team playing at home. Jordan Kulbida leads the Rush in scoring, and she's tied for sixth-overall in league scoring. She was a big part of the Rush offence last season, and she continues to carry that offensive load this year!

NZWIHL - New Zealand

Skaters

Name	Team	G	A	GP	University
Brooke Patron‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	‎ ‎ ‎ ‎Auckland Steel‎ ‎ ‎ ‎	8	5	8	Saskatchewan

Goalies

Name	Team	Record	GAA	Sv%	University
Alexa Gibson	Auckland Steel	4-0-0	1.61	.939	Ottawa

It should be noted that these numbers are from the 2024-25 season that concluded in the summer as the NZWIHL plays during the southern hemisphere's winter as opposed to the summer which is happening now. Regardless, I wanted to make sure these two players got the recognition they deserve because Patron was third-overall in league scoring this past season while Gibson had the top GAA and save percentage. Auckland won the NZWIHL championship this season with Patron being named the top defender! Congratulations to her!

There's the list of players I could find who are playing professionally in some corner of the globe. There are 68 total players who represent 25 U SPORTS schools out of the 35 schools that have varsity hockey teams! That's a heckuva testament to the skill level being produced across this country when 71% of the schools have someone playing professionally! Will there be more players in new homes next season?

More locally, all nine teams in Canada West are represented by at least one player, and 29 former Canada West athletes are playing professional hockey. That's an amazing achievement that's only equalled by the four-team RSEQ conference, so Canada West certainly deserves some kudos. The Calgary Dinos have seven players skating professionally, UBC has five players, Saskatchewan has four players, Regina and Mount Royal have three each while each of Manitoba, Alberta, and MacEwan have two skaters, and Trinity Western has one player who is playing professionally. Again, well done, Canada West, on developing these outstanding athletes!

To all the players who opted to either take a season off or move on to another chapter of life, you're not forgotten either. As stated above, you laid the bricks for the path that future generations will follow, and those efforts will not be ignored by this writer. Your circumstances may have changed for any number of reasons, but your contributions at the university hockey level and beyond will always be appreciated. Thank you for laying the path for the next stars!

The Last Word

This was a long entry that took a lot of time to compile and write, so I hope you enjoyed the look at all the players who are skating professionally somewhere this season. These women still are, in this writer's view, some of the best to have ever played the game at any level, and I wish them all the best this season and beyond, even if that beyond takes them away from the game at some point.

For all players, coaches, staff, fans, parents, and former players who make this game so good, I hope everyone has a very merry holiday season, that health and happiness find you in whatever form you desire, and that everyone is surrounded by friends, family, and loved ones during this season. It's the most wonderful time of year, and then we get the rush of playoff races before the big dance starts!

Happy holidays, everyone! All the best to you and yours including extended family no matter where they find themselves this year!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

Who Is That Kiwi Goaltender?

If I asked you who the top goatender playing in the New Zealand Ice Hockey League currently is, I'd give you a pass because I doubt many people would know. Catching NZIHL games would be something only die-hard hockey fans would do unless you knew someone playing in that league, but my goal today is to introduce you to someone awesome who may interest you in catching a game or two on YouTube. As you know, goalies sometimes have the hardest job in hockey when it comes to helping their teams win, but the current starter for the Botany Storm has her team in first-place in the NZIHL while sporting some of the best statistical numbers in the league! And yes, I said "HER".

The goaltender pictured above is Grace Harrison, and she's the starting netminder for the first-place Botany Swarm in the NZIHL. Harrison's having a solid campaign with an 8-5-1 record, a 3.25 GAA, and an .870 save percentage as she's helped Botany to a 9-5-1 record and 28 points, just ahead of the SkyCity Stampede. And if that doesn't impress you enough, here's the kicker: the other goaltender with a 1-0-0 record is Alexa Gibson, a 23 year-old, former University of Ottawa goaltender! Putting all that together means the Storm are leading the NZIHL with women owning all their wins this season!

I'll asterisk the paragraph above by saying that Gibson isn't on the Swarm's everyday roster as she's actually one-half of the goaltending tandem for the NZWIHL's Auckland Steel, but she was the goaltender of record in the 10-4 victory over the Canterbury Red Devils on May 18 in her NZIHL debut! What may have made that night better for Gibson is that she also recorded an assist! How about that debut in men's professional hockey - 32 saves on 35 shots in 58:44 of ice time, her first professional men's hockey win, and one assist? Frame that gamesheet, Alexa, because that is awesome!

In Harrison's case, she has been proving herself since she was a youngster playing with the Auckland Juniors alongside her older brother. In an opportunity that few New Zealanders get, she headed to Canada to play with the Toronto Leaside Wildcats in the Ontario Provincial Women's League in 2013-14 when she was 16 through a hockey program organized between the Toronto Leaside Girls Hockey Association and New Zealand Ice Hockey Federation.

"It definitely was pretty farfetched," Harrison told The Hockey News' Jared Clinton in 2021. "But it was one of those things where I had really supportive parents who agreed that hindsight is not a fun way to live, so just kind of roll with it."

Her six weeks of time with Leaside was good enough to convince the Ontario Hockey Academy to recruit her as a 17 year-old, and her time in the Canadian High School League following a solid showing at the IIHF Women's World Championship Division-IIA tournament was enough for St. Lawrence University to want to see more as they asked her to join the team for 2015-16 which caught Harrison by surprise.

"I thought, 'Maybe I’m not good enough for (Div. I),'" she told Clinton about joining St. Lawrence. "'I'll go play in the CIS and get some rink time.'"

The faith shown by the Saints' coaching staff paid off in spades as Harrison became one of the top netminders in the NCAA over her four seasons there. In 96 NCAA games, Harrison went 49-26-18 with a sparkling 1.92 GAA, a .918 save percentage, and 16 shutouts. While she couldn't backstop St. Lawrence to a national championship, it was pretty easy to see the Auckland-born Harrison was one of the best players - male or female - to come out of New Zealand. Not bad for a kid who didn't think she was good enough to play there!

One person who saw more than anyone else did was Botany Swarm GM Travis Crickard. Crickard, a former goaltender who once played alongside Genevieve Lacasse, saw the same talent, drive, and dedication that he saw with Lacasse, and he recognized that Harrison would likely be the goaltender of the present and future of New Zealand hockey following her time at St. Lawrence.

"I'm watching her and thinking about where she fits in the spectrum of other goaltenders in New Zealand, and I kind of had the same feeling," Crickard said to Clinton about Harrison. "She looks just as good or better than anyone else here. She moves better, she's technically better and, for one thing, she's significantly younger than some of the goalies in the league."

With the CWHL folding in 2019 and the COVID-19 pandemic shutting things down for a couple of years, Harrison nearly walked away from the sport. She had her degree in statistics so she could have grabbed a job and settled into that life, but it was her current Swarm teammates who talked the netminder into coming back to the game in 2021. The only question was where and for whom would she play.

In 2021, she was the second woman to suit up in the NZIHL that season with Canterbury Red Devils goalie Lilly Forbes. Forbes was playing for the NZWIHL's Canterbury Inferno when the Red Devils called her up to stop pucks for them in 2019-20, and Forbes was named as a full-time member of the squad in 2020-21. However, it appears she retired following her appearance for New Zealand at the 2023 IIHF Women's World Championship D2B tournament, leaving Harrison as the lone woman in the NZIHL. Forbes looked like she could be part of New Zealnd hockey's future as she too was part of the Toronto Leaside-New Zealand Ice Hockey Federation partnership!

Harrison, on her own accord, has grabbed the reins of the Swarm and never looked back. In 2019-20, she went 0-3-0 as she got her feet wet in professional men's hockey, improved to 5-3-0 in 2020-21, and she hasn't posted a losing record in any season since her debut. She became the first woman to play in the NZIHL final on September 2, 2023, and she has the Auckland Storm flying high this season. Nothing is guaranteed when it comes to Auckland finishing atop the standings or winning a championship, but Grace Harrison is doing her part to make those a reality. And from what she told The Hockey News, it sounds like she has the right attitude when it comes to all her success on the ice!

"I quite like to roll with what just comes up," she said. "That's worked out really well for me so far. St. Lawrence happened really last minute, going to Canada happened last minute. Roll with the punches.... Hockey has done some incredible things for me, so we'll see what comes next."

I'm hoping Grace Harrison wins that NZIHL championship this season, and can help New Zealand get back to the IIHF Women's World D2A tournament this season. New Zealand will be in the D2B tournament in Hong Kong from March 30-April 5, 2026, and they'll face the likes of Mexico, Ukraine, Belgium, Hong Kong, and Lithuania in their efforts to move up the IIHF tournament board. If they do, I expect Grace Harrison to be a big part of the reason why they get promoted!

Botany has a pair of games this upcoming weekend as they'll battle the SkyCity Stampede on Saturday and Sunday in what could determine which team finishes atop the NZIHL standings. After a two week break, the semifinal series in the 1-vs-4 and 2-vs-3 series begin on August 2, and the NZIHL Championship will begin play on Friday, August 15 in a three-games-in-three-days final. My hope is that Grace Harrison is playing in that final series, and we get to see her win an NZIHL championship trophy to add to her lengthy goaltending résumé!

Before we go, we can tie off a few loose ends as well by saying that Bartek Ewertowski is the backup netminder for the Botany Swarm behind Grace Harrison, and that Alexa Gibson and Auckland secured first-overall in the NZWIHL after the Wakatipu Wild dropped their final game of the season to the Phoenix Thunder. That means that Gibson and Auckland will play Phoenix in the one-game 1-vs-4 semifinal on Saturday, July 26 with the NZWIHL final scheduled for Sunday, July 27 as the Toronto-born Gibson has a good shot at capturing a championship after winning her first NZIHL game!

Isn't international hockey fun? I may have to plan a trip because need to get to games in Australia and New Zealand!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!