Engel-Natzke joins Caps, 1st woman to become NHL video coach

Emily Engel-Natzke wanted to make the National Hockey League as a video coach.

When the Washington Capitals named Engel-Natzke video coordinator on Thursday, she not only accomplished that goal, but she also became the first woman to hold a full-time position on an NHL coaching staff.

“I’ve never kind of really looked at myself in that lens, and I think if you may have asked me a week ago, I wouldn’t have wanted it to be a big deal,” Engel-Natzke said. “But with everything that’s going on kind of geopolitically, I think I’m more so just honored to be, I guess, the first. Hopefully that just opens the door even further for people who want to get into this job and this profession.”

It’s the latest in a series of promotions for women around the NHL in recent months after decades of slow progress in diversifying the sport in the coaching and executive ranks.

“This was earned and deserved,” coach Peter Laviolette said. “We feel like we hired really a qualified person that we brought into the organization two years ago and came in and did an outstanding job, and that’s what development is all about. For me, we got the best person and that’s the most important thing.”

Engel-Natzke’s path to Washington began in earnest in 2017 when she began working as the full-time video coach for University of Wisconsin men’s hockey coach Tony Granato following several years assisting with the men’s and women’s programs there.

“When she first came on, one of the questions I asked her is: ‘What do you want to do with this? Is this a fulltime gig for you? Is it something you want to try to pursue at a different level?’” Granato said. “And she said, ‘Yep, I want to figure out how I can be the first woman to make it to the NHL on the video side of things.’”

Engel-Natzke, 31, came from the Hershey Bears, Washington’s top minor league affiliate, where she was the first woman to be a full-time member of a coaching staff in the American Hockey League.

After playing two seasons of Division III hockey at Adrian College, Engel-Natzke got a heavy workload at Wisconsin to prepare her for the pros and then took another step in Hershey, presenting 5-on-5 scouting reports of opponents and becoming more involved in the day-to-day operation of the team.