Muller excited by “unbelievable” journey

Chatting hockey with Alina Muller, the “unbelievable” crops up a lot. After more than a decade at the top of the international game, the Swiss star is still excited by how far women’s hockey has travelled in that time.

Now 27, the Winterthur native made history as the first European player drafted into the PWHL and is a respected leader on her national team.

It’s a long way from playing on boys’ teams in her hometown – but the journey isn’t over yet for the Boston Fleet forward.

“It’s unbelievable to see how much the game grew in the past few years,” Muller said. “Playing in the PWHL, there’s no limits.

“It’s beautiful that people want to watch the games, to see our product on the ice. We can inspire the fans who travelled along the way with us. Whenever we meet them, we can see how emotional they get – especially older women who see how far women’s sports have come.”

Conscious that the buoyant state of women’s hockey in 2025 rests on a legacy of hard work that came in the preceding 20-30 years, Muller recognises a responsibility to keep driving that progress.

“I’m trying to do my job, to keep growing the product and make other dreams happen,” she said. “And when you look at the Worlds this year, Czechia is doing an unbelievable job putting the tournament together. There are fans everywhere wearing jerseys in the streets. It certainly feels different.”

With a record-breaking Olympic medal from Sochi at the age of 15 – nobody at the Games has collected hockey hardware at a younger age – Muller enjoyed an outstanding debut in senior international play. And she was no passenger on that team, scoring the game-winner to clinch bronze against Sweden.

Yet, back in 2014 the bulk of her hockey experience came from playing with boys. She started out fascinated by the kids practicing at her local rink in Winterthur, Switzerland, asked to join the team and worked her way up through all of the boys’ teams at her hometown club. She also jokes that she started in hockey before her older brother Mirco, 30, a fellow Olympian who played six seasons in the NHL with the Sharks and the Devils.

And playing with the boys for so long was a huge influence.

“I’m pretty thankful for the boys’ teams I played with at home,” she said. “Not everybody can play at such a high level with the boys, not everybody allows it. I’m super happy that I made such big steps there.”

The next huge step was to go to the…