Coming a long way
Acadia Axewomen hockey team have ‘a lot to prove’
The Acadia hockey Axewomen continue to improve through hard work and determination as they set their sights on the upcoming championship weekend.
In her third season with the Axewomen, Hillary Dort of Berwick used to play with the Midget AA Valley Wild team. Dort is working toward a double major in chemistry and biology and plans to pursue a career as a pharmacist.
In spite of losing by a final score of 4 to 2, she said the team “really picked it up” for the March 5 home game against Holland College. They’ve come a long way but there’s still some work to do.
“We really improved over the season and I’m really looking forward to the end of season championship weekend,” Dort said. “I think we’ve got a lot to prove.”
She said they’d be ready for UNB when it comes time for their last regular season games at home.
“I think we just have to concentrate on playing together as a team, keeping up good morale and just working hard,” Dort said.
Now in her fourth season with the Axewomen, Hailee Coll of Charlottetown said they’ve lost a lot of experienced players over the past few years and are now in a rebuilding stage.
She said there is a lot of talent on the current roster, which is exciting, and they’re seeing many local players coming to Acadia to play hockey.
“We’ve been building all season, we’ve just been getting better every game so there is lots of potential moving forward and I’m looking forward to seeing what we can do in playoffs for sure,” Coll said.
She said they played hard against Holland College and it seemed like the Axewomen were “outworking” them. Acadia did a good job controlling the puck and had lots of shots but also some tough breaks.
“This game, if anything, really showed us that we can compete with this team and they are beatable and hopefully we’ll do that when it counts in April,” Coll said.
Moving forward, she said, the Axewomen have to concentrate on getting shots on net and working well under pressure. Puck control is imperative.
Head coach Dave Ettinger said the Axewomen have performed very well this year. They have 13 rookies who are “starting to buy in” and the team is steadily improving. With a 16-game schedule, it would be beneficial to play more but it’s difficult to pick up exhibition games given their travel schedule.
The Axewomen are on course to finish the regular season in third place before heading into the championship weekend in April. Ettinger said he remains confident that “we’ll peak at the end of March, when it really counts.”