Team USA grinds to a stop
Two national field hockey players detail COVID-19 breakup
Nicole Woods and Alexandra Hammel didn’t plan on being home in March.
Along with the rest of the United States national field hockey team, the two Massachusetts natives were training in San Diego between stops in the FIH Hockey Pro
League. Now they’re both at home, trying to cope and train remotely while they wait to return to the field.
“It was crazy, we put hand sanitizer on everything, we had them all over our backpacks,” said Hammel. “Trying not to touch our faces, just be really cautious and aware.”
The players, who are fulltime in field hockey, were flown back to Philadelphia and then dispersed back to their homes.
“We all had Clorox wipes and were just wiping everything down,” said Woods, 23. “We took a red eye (from San Diego), tried to wash our hands as much as possible, the Purell and everything, our coaches found travel-sized ones for the whole team.
“It was pretty scary.” Woods, a Beverly native, played collegiality at Louisville. Before that, she became a field hockey sensation nearly overnight. Woods grew up pursuing ice hockey, but decided to pursue field hockey her junior season, typically late for someone to make that choice.
“I was so set on being a hockey player,” said Woods. “My junior year I went to a camp and I was so sick of putting on wet hockey equipment so I turned to my mom and said ‘I want to try field hockey.'”
Hammel also played ice hockey, along with several other sports, before focusing on field hockey exclusively once she went to Boston University.
A star hockey player on the turf and on the ice in Duxbury, the two now-national team teammates connected the dots that they were high school rivals.
“When I joined the national team we were talking and I realized, ‘Oh, you know what? We were the same year,'” said Hammel. “We played against each other (in ice hockey), it’s so crazy. We looked up pictures online and articles. It was funny we didn’t even realize.”
Hammel knew she wanted to pursue field hockey by the time she was in high school, a different path from Woods, who didn’t pick up a field hockey stick until her freshman year and saw herself on the national team just nine years later.
“I was like, I just want to try this,” said Woods. “It was always one new thing after another. Things kept getting exciting.”
The two were familiar with each other in college, but it wasn’t until they were on the national team together they got close, and “joke about stupid little Massachusetts things,” according to Woods.
It gives them a unique bond, even though they’re apart from the rest of the team for now.
“Playing Duxbury (Hammel’s team), they were state champs all four years,” said Woods. “It’s pretty funny we were both Herald All-Scholastics the same year and never knew each other, and now both of us don’t play ice hockey but are on the national team for field hockey.”
The United States didn’t qualify for the Tokyo Olympics — now postponed — but both Hammel and Woods have their sights set on helping the team make it in 2024.
For now though, just like the rest of us, they’re making do from home.
“There’s uncertainty when we get to start training again,” said Hammel. “That’s been a little unsettling, but we’re staying connected with the team.”