While women have been entering the Hockey Hall of Fame, we haven’t yet elected to rank them. Maybe we will one day (we don’t rank coaches or executives), but we did make an exception for Don Cherry. If we were to ever make an exception for a female player, that person would be Hayley Wickenheiser, who quietly required today following a post on Twitter.
Wickenheiser would first suit up for the Canadian Women’s Team in 1994 at the tender age of 15. That first appearance was the 1994 World Women’s Hockey Championship, where Team Canada would win the Championship. This would begin a more than twenty year stint with the National Team.
She would become very familiar with the podium. Six more times at the World Championship, she would become a Gold Medalist and would also win six Silver Medals. While those are worthy accomplishments, the reality of Women’s Hockey is that the Holy Grail is the Winter Olympics.
In 2002 at the Salt Lake City Games, Hayley would lead Canada to an Olympic Gold Medal. This was especially sweet, as the Canadians would lose to the United States in 1998 in Nagano, Japan, the first time that Women’s Hockey entered the Games they lost to the U.S. Wickenheiser would lead the Canadians to three more Olympic Gold Medals in 2006, 2010 and 2014.
Over her 276 Game career representing Canada, Hayley Wickenheiser scored 379 Points, the most of any player representing Canada. She is also the all-time leading scorer in Women’s Olympic Hockey.
She would also break barriers by becoming the first female to play in the Finnish Third League, the Finnish Second League and in the Swedish League. We think it is safe to say that she will soon be enshrined in the Hockey Hall of Fame.
We here at Notinhalloffame.com would like to wish Hayley Wickenheiser the best on her post hockey endeavors and thank her for the on ice memories.
Hayley Wickenheiser Retires. HOF Next?
- Written by Committee Chairman
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Published in Not in Hall of Fame News
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Read 2579 times
14 Jan
2017
2017
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