The irony of Annika Zalewski’s ice hockey career is that she got to play women’s hockey closer to home in college than she did in high school.
Zalewski, 28, of New Hartford, played for Colgate University in Hamilton. Growing up, though, she only played on boys’ teams locally.
The crowd would watch her walk into games, her ponytail hanging out from under her helmet and know that she was different —a girl on the team, she recalled.
“I only remember being the only girl on my team specifically,” Zalewski said. “And I would say there were maybe a handful of girls that played hockey within, maybe, I’ll say a 30-mile radius.”
To play on a girls’ team, she spent her sophomore year of high school at a Massachusetts prep school, played in tournaments with a girls’ team based in Buffalo (while playing on the New Hartford High School’s varsity boys’ team and a boys’ travel team in Morrisville), and moved in with a family in Buffalo for her senior year to attend a private day school with a girls’ team.
“That was what I had to do to get exposure as a girl,” she said. “There were still no girls’ teams around here. And when you’re a girl playing boys’ hockey, there’s no college scouts coming to a boys’ game to review you.”
Girls’ hockey is growing nationwide
Times are changing, though. Over the past 15 seasons, participation in girls’ ice hockey nationally has risen 65%, according to USA Hockey.
Locally, young girls still skate in coed programs, but their numbers are growing. And both the Utica Jr. Comets and Rome Youth Hockey Association have girls’ teams starting as young as 12 and under.
Clinton High School has hosted a girl’s ice hockey team made up of athletes from several area districts — including this school year a girl from the Owen D. Young Central School District in Herkimer County — for eight years.
And with the International Ice Hockey Federation Women’s World Championship taking place in Utica this week and next, many girls’ and women’s ice hockey advocates say the sky could be the limit.
“I think it’s amazing for the growth of hockey in this area,” Zalewski said. “For men’s and women’s hockey. I just think any time you have the best players in the world all competing in the same place, this is something really special. I actually think people maybe don’t even know how cool it is, maybe until they see a game and they get to appreciate the quality of play and…
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