Lucas Punkari
After a fifth-place finish in last season’s ACHA Division II national championship ended a streak of four-straight appearances in the title game, the Rainy River Community College Voyageurs women’s hockey team is in rebuilding mode with only one returning player on this year’s roster.
But head coach Evan Amdahl believes his team might be flying under the radar a little bit heading into the 2012/13 season, which begins Oct. 20 against the Iowa State Cyclone at Kerry Park Arena in International Falls.
“We are kind of the dark horses as far as that goes,” Amdahl said after his squad’s scrimmage with the Muskie girls’ hockey team at the ’52 Canadians Arena here Friday afternoon.
“With the four-year schools, you have a few freshman only and a ton of veterans,” he noted.
“But we are hoping that our two-year program, with a number of first-year players, will be something that our opponents will take for granted.”
After eligibility issues dropped the number of Voyageurs’ forward lines from three to two in the second half of last season, an entire line of forwards will be unable to play this year due to a variety of issues.
“One of the girls got pregnant, another tore her ACL, and another one blew out her rotator cuff,” Amdahl explained.
“That’s an entire line of forwards who are out, so we would have been way better off with them playing,” he reasoned.
“But that just comes down to bad luck and you can’t predict that.”
With forward Janet Scherrer the only player returning from last season’s squad, Amdahl has had to look in a variety of places to bring in new faces.
“We have players from Ottawa, Montana, and Utah on the team, so we have people coming in from nearly everywhere in North America it seems,” he noted.
“We have two goalie coming into the team this year, with Kristen Andrews from Halifax and Sammi Harrity coming from West St. Paul, so that should be a big key for us going forward,” Amdahl added.
There also is some local flavour to this year’s team as former Muskie forward Taylor Dixon, Rainy River native Jaylene Anderson, Baudette blueliner Alicia Beckel, and former International Falls Broncos’ forward Bailey Bernard all are coming on board.
“We’re still working with Taylor [Dixon] on her feet, but her hands are phenomenal and we are excited about having her on board,” Amdahl enthused.
“Jaylene is following in her sister Brenley’s footsteps, but she is her own person and she is a great person to have on our team, especially with her personality,” he added.
“Her high school teammate at Lake of the Woods, Alicia, is going to add a lot to our defence,” Amdahl said.
“And while Bailey hasn’t practised with us yet as she has a bad hip, we are hoping to have her skating with us shortly.”
With the national championship slated for March 7-10 in Washington D.C., there’s a lot of time to get the young Voyageurs up to speed to try and get the team back into the final.
“Our goal is to just get better every day and to come to practice and get better,” Amdahl said.
“If we do that and take care of the little things, such as moving our feet and making passes, the goals and winning should take care of itself,” he added.
