Newcomer girls in Ottawa are celebrating their new-found hockey skills at an end-of-season tournament, just as the Ottawa Charge prepares to take to the ice for the women’s team’s first-ever playoff game Thursday.
These teen players may be new or relatively new to the sport, but that didn’t stop them from offering the pros some advice on the eve of the opening round.
“Good luck! You got this,” said Nefisa Siyad, 14, a Grade 9 student at Woodroffe High School. “Believe in yourself. Don’t give up,” added her sister Idle Siyad, 17.
The girls are getting a chance to play thanks to Hockey 4 Youth Foundation, which provides free access to after-school hockey for kids in B.C., Ontario and Quebec. The foundation’s motto is: “The only barrier should be the boards.”
Hockey 4 Youth estimates it costs families around $4,000 for one child to play hockey for one year, including equipment, team fees, ice rental and tournaments, among other expenses.
“We know that 71 per cent of newcomers express an interesting in playing hockey, but only one per cent ever will have an opportunity to play the game,” said executive director Moezine Hasham, citing research from the Institute for Canadian Citizenship. “We’re providing that easy on-ramp for them.”
But learning to skate and play hockey is anything but easy, especially for teens who are starting from zero.
“I was crying after I finished my first season. I was like, ‘I can’t do it, I can’t do it,’ and then I was like, ‘No, you can do it!'” said Rokhsar Rahmani, 18, a Grade 12 student at Earl of March High School who’s originally from Afghanistan.
Two years into hockey, she’s discovered something powerful on the rink. “You feel so confident. When I’m on the ice, I’m free. I don’t know how to describe it. I love being on the ice,” Rahmani said.
Most of the girls in this group are newcomers to Canada, but some of the players are new to the hockey for other reasons.
“I never really had any interest in it, ’cause I never had the money growing up to play it,” said Jaya Nicholls-Valiquette, 14.
“I have sisters that have special needs so [my parents] don’t really have time,” said Woodroffe High School student Iman Al Ahmad, 15, originally from Syria.
“Some people say hijabi girls shouldn’t play hockey because their hijab can get stuck,” said Idle Siyad as she showed off her sports hijab, which fits under her hockey helmet and tucks under her jersey.
“I can do a lot of things I never through I would do,” said Daniela Munguakonkwa, 17, who’s in Grade 11 at Gloucester High School.
Munguakonkwa said she loves to score and recently learned how to do crossovers, but her family — originally from Congo by way of Uganda — was perplexed when she first took up the sport.
“My family was really confused and surprised. They were like, ‘Why hockey?’ ’cause it’s not usual for a Black girl to play hockey. But I was like, ‘I got this,'” she said.
Munguakonkwa said she’s glad she persevered. “I feel all my stress go away. Everything disappears when I’m on the ice. I feel like I’m myself.”
“To be honest, the feeling of skating, the feeling of [being] free, like when you skate around, the cold air hits your face — I love that feeling,” said Ayah Yagoub, a high school senior at Gloucester who started playing hockey the first year after arriving from Sudan.
“Everything was very new to me. New culture, new country, new language,” Yagoub explained. “Hockey made me feel like I’m a part of Canadian culture. It made me feel like I belong.”
Khadiga Abbas, 17, is originally from Egypt and is now a senior at Ridgemont High School. She remembers signing up for hockey on her first day of Grade 9.
“Hockey is like the national sport of Canada, right? I was like, OK, let’s just try the culture here.”
The Charge, which competes in the Professional Women’s Hockey League (PWHL), takes on the Montréal Victoire at Place Bell in Laval, Que., at 7 p.m. on Thursday. Game 2 will also be in Laval at 2 p.m. on Sunday, before the best-of-five series returns to TD Place Arena in Ottawa for Games 3 on May 13, and if necessary, Game 4 on May 16.
If a fifth and final game is necessary, it will be back in Laval on May 18.