By Kellen Forrest for Dinos Athletics
The name Hayley Wickenheiser needs no introduction to Canadians.
One of the best Canadian athletes ever and the greatest women’s hockey player of all-time, Wickenheiser is no stranger to accolades, both on and off the ice.
But when she got the call that she was going to be inducted into the University of Calgary Dinos Hall of Fame as part of the Class of 2024, it really hit home for the sports legend.
“It’s something that’s very near and dear to my heart,” Wickenheiser, BKin’13, MSc’16, Hon. LLD’18, MD’21, said on the induction. “I’m very honoured … I have a lot of love for the University of Calgary. It’s been really good to me over the years.”
Her time with the University of Calgary was so good to her, in fact, that Wickenheiser called being a student-athlete with the Dinos the best job of her life.
“You learn how to manage your time, be disciplined,” Wickenheiser said. “I always say that it’s the greatest job a person can have is being a student-athlete. It’s the greatest job I’ll ever have.”
That’s quite something coming from an individual whose resume includes five Olympic medals (four gold, one silver), seven world championship gold medals, and who is currently both a doctor and an assistant general manager with the Toronto Maple Leafs.
But Wickenheiser will be the first to admit that her time at the University of Calgary was key to helping her become the well-rounded and accomplished person she is today.
“I use the skills (learned while being a Dinos student-athlete) every single day, whether I’m, you know, in the middle of an emergency in the emergency department, or I’m at the ice with a John Tavares,” Wickenheiser explained. “You learn how to be part of a team and I was a part of a lot of great teams through those years, I really enjoyed it.”
In terms of her on-ice success with the Dinos, Wickenheiser delivered in every way.
During her time as a Dino, she played 68 regular-season games, scoring 134 points (1.97 points per game), and brought the women’s hockey program both its first Canada West and U SPORTS championships in 2012.
Wickenheiser joined the program in 2010-11 after winning her fourth Olympic gold medal at the 2010 Games in Vancouver. She gave an immediate boost to the program, taking a team that finished with a 7-17 conference record the previous year, to a 16-8 record and a Canada West playoff appearance. Her inaugural season also saw Wickenheiser take home both the Canada West Player of the Year and the U SPORTS Player of the Year honours.
The biggest game of her Dinos career came in the U SPORTS championship in 2012 hosted by the University of Alberta, where she scored two goals and two assists in the gold-medal game, giving the Dinos the 5-1 win over the Montreal Carabins and bringing home the national championship to Calgary.
Wickenheiser is no stranger to a hockey game with a lot on the line, but that one in Edmonton was right up there for her in terms of importance.
“It was as serious and as important to me as any Olympics or a world championship just because it was the first and, you know, it’s important, those are a big deal,” Wickenheiser said.
The win was extra sweet for Wickenheiser as she took some extra motivation from the fact that some doubted whether she should be suiting up with the Dinos.
“There were a lot of people saying I shouldn’t be allowed to play U SPORTS,” Wickenheiser said. “I remember one poster in the rink at U of A which said, ‘if you’re in our textbooks, you shouldn’t be in our league.’
“Nobody wanted us to win. And so I wanted us to win, of course. And so there was that, like, let’s do something here that hasn’t been done. And I took a lot of pride in that team and winning that championship.”
Wickenheiser breathed new life into the Dinos women’s hockey program, but she knows she didn’t do it alone. She credited her teammates, former Dinos head coach and Wickenheiser’s Canadian national team teammate Danielle Goyette and former Dean of Kinesiology Penny Werthner, just to name a few.
Wickenheiser also made sure to single out the late Joan Snyder for her generous donations and support she gave the Dinos women’s hockey program for more than two decades.
One of Canada’s greatest athletes of all-time will officially be immortalized in the Dinos Hall of Fame later this month along with a legendary class. And with the time she spent as a Dino,
Wickenheiser knows that there will be plenty of amazing athletes to join her and her fellow inductees in the future.
“There’s such a breadth and depth of athletes, coaches and builders that have come to the University of Calgary,” Wickenheiser said. “The university has fostered kind of this cool culture, and I hope that they can continue to attract and retain great athletes.”
The other members of the Class of 2024 are:
- Sam Effah — Athlete (track& field)
- Dan Federkeil — Athlete (football)
- Erica Wiebe — Athlete (wrestling)
- Les Gramantik – Coach (track & field)
- Gord Franson — Builder (soccer)