Fast credits PWHL season for Worlds performance
Renata Fast has long been considered one of the best female defenders in hockey.
She and partner Jocelyne Larocque are a duo opposing offences do not want to face, either at the world level or within the PWHL.
The Toronto teammates are positionally sound, physically hard to play against and have a hockey IQ that ensures they’re a step ahead of their opponent’s thought process.
It’s only recently, though, that Fast has started unlocking an offensive potential very much in line with the defensive skill set that has long been on display.
It has opened up the other side of the ice for the smooth, swift skating Burlington, Ont., native and has made Fast a true dual threat.
At the recent IIHF Women’s World Championship, Fast was Canada’s leading point getter in the tournament with three goals and three assists in seven games.
She was named defender of the tournament and was a tournament all-star on defence.
Fast is convinced none of it happens without the PWHL and without her PWHL head coach Troy Ryan, who is also her Team Canada coach, pushing her to be aggressive in looking for her own offence.
“I have to give Troy a lot of credit for the messaging he has been sending to the D corps with Toronto, but even with Team Canada too,” Fast said. “Just being fearless and taking opportunities and calculated risks.
“It’s crazy. Once he started putting that message in my head and I started actually doing it, the success you can have is crazy.”
In step with that newly adopted aggressive approach in terms of taking Fast’s game to the next level has been the opportunity to play or practise every day in a professional environment that the PWHL is giving women for the first time in their careers.
“A huge part of it is also definitely this league,” Fast said. “It’s the consistency of play. I think we said going into worlds, we hadn’t been to a world championship where we’ve had so many opportunities to prepare heading into those games. Like, the mentality you want to go into a game with, just being confident.
“I remember previous world championships going in not knowing what to expect. But here I knew what to expect because I knew the way I was playing. So the league definitely sets us up for success.”
Fast said the biggest difference in her game is she no longer fears making a mistake.
“It’s part of that fearless mentality Troy is emphasizing,” she said. “He has told me before that you have to be prepared to have turnovers to have success and when you look at it that way, OK, if I turn it over the odd time I’m confident in my ability to get back and make a defensive play and see what I can do and see how far I can stretch it.”
Fast and the six other PWHL Toronto players who went to the world championships and won gold with their head coach and GM Gina Kingsbury are now fully back in PWHL mode having played two road games — a loss in Boston and another seminal moment in league history in a win over Montreal at a soldout Bell Centre.
With that win over Montreal, Toronto has assured themselves of a playoff spot and now have three games beginning Sunday in New York to fine tune things for the playoffs.
Ryan has made it very clear he’s far more interested in being fully ready for a playoff run than he is in where the team actually finishes in the standings. Toronto could still finish as low as fourth in the standings.
“Without getting ahead of ourselves or being too arrogant, we felt like with five games to go we were in a good position to be in the playoffs so we started to shift our focus to playoffs,” Ryan said, referring to the five games that remained once the world championships were over. “We are not caught up in this race for first place,” he said. “We’re just not. We want to get better for the playoffs so I thought it was time to tinker and not really have to grind out these games.”
Fast also sees the importance in fine-tuning over these final couple of weeks, particularly with the group being separated for the better part of a month for those world championships.
“Yeah, we’ve had two games together, but I think in those two games you could see we still need to get that timing and that chemistry back,” she said. “These next three games will be important to do that as well as just getting practices in together.”
Nothing, though, has changed Fast’s mind about the group Kingsbury and Ryan have put together in this inaugural PWHL season.
“I couldn’t be more confident about this group,” Fast said. “It’s fun to be with them every day and it’s a good chemistry group off the ice. On the ice we are willing to do what it takes and I’m excited to see where that takes us.”