Grant-A-Week WINNER
Kate Betts-Wilmott - Field Hockey

Frustratingly often hallmates in Neill House, where I am in residence at the University of New Brunswick in Fredericton, holler out of their rooms asking when the next hockey game is going to be played. I always know. They always holler back "No Kate, real hockey, not field hockey." But for myself and my teammates on the UNB Varsity Reds, field hockey is as real as it gets. When It came time in 1999 to chose a university, the strong field hockey heritage (an eleven year winning streak) with the intimate campus size and concurrent arts and sciences program tipped the scales in favour of UNB, over giants such as Queen's and U of T even though they were much closer to my Toronto home.We pick up our sticks six days a week be it for games or for practices, and then there are team runs and team study hall, under the diligent eye of coach Sherry Doiron.

Considering how big a part of my life it has become, field hockey hasn't been there for very long. My mother had me in skates with a hockey stick when I was three, like most Canadian kids but it was another 12 years before I would pick up a real hockey stick. I was incurably competitive in middle school and grade nine. I played soccer, basketball, and softball, one year. I ski raced. I played ice hockey and swam the next. At the beginning of grade 10 I sprained my ankle playing basketball in the schoolyard, thereby ending the season of whatever sport I decided to pick up, or so I thought. I was approached to play goal for the field hockey team. Friends knew I wanted to play something and a goalie who couldn't run was better then no goalie at all.

I played one year for my high school, Jarvis Collegiate Institute in Toronto under coach Ms. Craigie McQueen, before the French and English faculties split and I followed French instead of high school sports. It didnn't matter much on two counts, Toronto high school teachers went on a work-to-rule policy eliminating sports and extra-curricular activities, and by then I had fallen in love with this new-to-me older type of hockey and I was playing for the Toronto Field Hockey Club, coached by Peter D'Cruz among others.

Practices were more often and the competion was stiffer. Based on the shortage of goalies I started off playing for both the women's team and the junior team as well as various tournament teams for games around Ontario and in the United States.

I played for the Brampton Lions Junior co-ed team, and in one instance for our men's team when their goalkeeper, Derek Valles, couldn't play. Despite all the bruises from the previous, on that occasion I was thankful that I had been practicing with the men's teams for years.

Thanks to a very powerful offence Toronto Field carried home many medals and is a power in club hockey in Toronto. Making the transition from high school hockey to club was an intense enough ordeal. In High school we spent all our time running and learning the basics. In a club practice they assume you know them.

Making the transition to playing for a university team was yet another step. I was expected to know the basics but also step up my fitness level for almost daily practices. Having entered into the sport as a means to avoid running, this came as quite a shock. Even after five years, of hockey, my body could barely keep up, but my Canada, CAAWS, girls body image,where to play sports, girls self-esteem, girls soccer, girls cycling, girls and nutrition, nutrition for active girls, Canadian Association for women and sport, girls@play, snowboarding, skating, boarding, girl site, sports girl, extreme girl, mountain biking, skateboards, surfboards, X Games"> Thanks to Nike and CAAWS, I hope the bruises will become fewer with better protection, and not, God forbid, from getting in front of fewer shots.

Kate Betts-Wilmott
UNB Varsity Reds Field Hockey Team
Fredericton, NB

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