Blades bring Cup to Beantown
Boston ends Montreal’s three-year reign as CWHL champs
Boston Blades defenceman Cherie Hendrickson hoisted the Clarkson Cup over her head after helping her team wrest the championship trophy from the hands of the Montreal Stars for the first time in three years.
But the 27-year-old has little time to celebrate after winning the Stanley Cup of women’s hockey in an actionpacked 5-2 final on Saturday.
On Sunday evening, after getting back to Boston on the team bus, she’ll head back to work. Not at the rink covering the blue line but in an ambulance. She’s a full-time paramedic in Lawrence, Mass.
“I had to play the bills somehow,” Hendrickson said. “This is kind of my vacation time.”
Hendrickson, like the vast majority of the 125 players in the Canadian Women’s Hockey League — the latest attempt at a women’s professional circuit — have jobs just so they can afford to play the game they love.
Hendrickson works overnights before jumping on the bus to get to tournaments, swaps shifts with colleagues when she can and takes holidays when she can’t.
“Even though we’re not getting paid yet, the league has definitely made strides in that direction,” she said. “Getting sponsors and having our equipment and travel paid for, those are really great.”
For Montreal Stars reserve goalie Jenny Lavigne, it’s back to work even sooner and without the benefit of a victory celebration.
She’ll arrive home at 2 or 3 a.m. on Sunday and her shift as a police officer in the Montreal suburb of Chateauguay starts just a few hours later at 7, she said.
“I’m sure one day women hockey players will be paid but I’m not sure I can be there when it happens.”
Lavigne is 28 and fears her netminding career will end before paycheques for women hockey players are in the mail.
“It would be unbelievable to be able to play for a paycheque. But each year I’ve seen progress,” she said, noting that women’s hockey now is more competitive and popular than it’s ever been.
Centennial Arena in Markham wasn’t filled to capacity for Saturday’s final but there was an enthusiastic crowd of about1,000 people on hand, including, for the first period, Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne.
The final was the game fans had been anticipating all season. The Stars were looking to win the Cup for the third year in a row, while their rivals, the league-leading Blades, were determined to take the honours to Boston for the first time. The two teams were closely matched during the regular season. The Blades (19-4-1) won just one more game than the Stars (18-5-1).
The Stars went into Saturday’s final undefeated after three days of round-robin play. When the two teams met Friday, Montreal won in overtime on a goal by Caroline Ouellette.
“It’s too bad,” Ouellette said after that game. “I feel like that was the final game. It had that atmosphere, but I think we can do it again tomorrow.”
It turned out to be Boston’s big day instead. The Blades capitalized on Stars penalties, scoring their first four goals on power plays.
Kelley Steadman had a natural hat trick and Jen Schoullis scored Boston’s other two goals. They also had some Canadian help minding the net. Blades goalie Genevieve Lacasse of Kingston, Ont., made 40 saves, including several crucial ones during a 5-on-3 Montreal power play in the third.
Lacasse is the latest goalie named to Canada’s national team, which is preparing for the IIHF women’s world championship in Ottawa April 2-9.
Of the 23 players named to the Canadian team, 17 play on the CWHL’s five teams. The Boston team is packed with U.S. national team members.
That’s part of why the Stars and Blades have such a heated rivalry.
“A lot of us play against them on the national teams, at world championships and at the Olympics,” said Ouellette, who set up Dominique Thibault for the Stars’ second goal Saturday.
Meghan Agosta-Marciano, another national team member, scored the first goal for Montreal.
“We had such a great tourna- ment,” said fellow national team member Catherine Ward, who was named the CWHL’s defenceman of the year earlier in the week. “Unfortunately, we didn’t capitalize when we should have.” Ward was also named the Clarkson Cup MVP on Saturday. It was an honour, she said, but not the prize she really wanted. “The most important was the Cup.” On hand to present the trophy was former governor-general Adrienne Clarkson. She donated the Cup to raise awareness that women’s hockey experience goes beyond being “cheerleaders” and “mothers who get up at 5 o’clock to drive their kids to games,” she said earlier this month when the Cup was en- sconced in the Hockey Hall of Fame “This trophy is for women who care about hockey, want to play it, become champions and become the best in a sport which we all love,” Clarkson said. Today, hockey is an accepted option. Young girls are taking up the sport in greater numbers than ever but they still can’t make a living at it. That’s something the CWHL and its players are determined to change over time. “Hopefully, one day girls like myself could pave the way to have those up-and-coming girls get paid and make a living,” said AgostaMarciano. For now, “we play for the love of the game.”