Hockey is Canada's game and very popular in rural Saskatchewan. While hockey has been mostly played by males, there have always been female teams.
In the last couple of years, female hockey has made it big in the Winter Olympics, and interest in female hockey has soared among all age groups in Canada. That interest has been revealed by the growing number of female hockey players and teams in the Humboldt region.
Jodie Hergott plays with the Stick Witches, a Humboldt-based female team. The Witches got their start in 1997 when it was formed as a recreational team playing in Watson, Hergott explained. It was run for a couple of years by Amy Irwin of the City of Humboldt, but then the players took it over, she added.
The team is carrying 20 players this year who practice once a week and play once a week in an informal league. The league includes female teams from Allan, Dundurn, Colonsay, Clavet, Viscount, Martensville, Watrous, Saskatoon, Davidson, and a combined Outlook, Hanley, and Loreburn team.
"We're just out for fun and exercise and laughter," Hergott said of the Witches.
Players on the team range from 19 years of age to 47.
"We lost our 53-year-old when she moved away a couple of years ago. I could always say we had a grandma on the team," Hergott said with a smile.
The team still gets requests from people who want to join, enough that another Humboldt-based team, the Daisy Dukes, and a LeRoy-based team, the Cougars, were formed.
Beth McNally is one of the organizers of the Daisy Dukes. The team is in its third season, after starting in 2008.
"We needed another team because there were more players," she said.
They had 12 players that first year and 23 the second, McNally said.
The Dukes don't play in any kind of league, they just arrange games with other teams in the area, including Prince Albert, Colonsay, Aberdeen, LeRoy, Melfort, and Wadena.
"A league is a big commitment," McNally said of why they haven't joined one. "We like the flexibility of setting our own schedule."
The team provides a way for the women to get out of the house and burn off some steam, she added.
The Dukes' players range between 19 and 30 years of age, she noted. Players on this year's team are from Humboldt, Bruno, Marysburg, and Middle Lake.
The players also represent a variety of skill levels.
"We have players who haven't played before or who have only played ringette," McNally noted. "It's rewarding watching them develop from year to year."
The Dukes play out of Watson because they have a better ice time there - Sundays at 5 p.m.
"We have prime time ice in Watson," McNally said.
Kelli Timmerman is one of the organizers of the Cougars in LeRoy.
The team only started last year, but there is lots of interest in the area, Timmerman said. This year's team has 19 players from LeRoy, Quill Lake, Annaheim, Humboldt, Watson, and Wadena. The players range in age from 23 to 45.
Timmerman and her sister played ringette for years, but once they got out of school, they quit playing. Two years ago, they went to a ringette tournament in Calgary which raised money for breast cancer.
"It was so much fun, that we decided we had to get back on the ice," Timmerman said.
They advertised for players for a hockey team, but found most of their players through word-of-mouth, she explained.
The Cougars are just a recreational team, but they did find a coach this year to help the players develop their skills, Timmerman said.
"We're not real competitive, but we like to play good and play hard," she stated. "We want to get out for some fun and some exercise."
The team has players who have never played hockey before and some who have never skated before, along with some who have played hockey all their lives, Timmerman noted.
They play teams from Wadena, Drake, Humboldt, Prince Albert, Warman, Melfort, Clavet, Allan, and Wynyard.
"It's a lot of driving, but most of our games are on weekends," Timmerman explained. "Our practices are on Thursdays at 9 p.m. after the kids go to bed. Instead of sitting on the couch, we go to the rink.
"It's a real joy getting out there and playing."
