Kiah Vail has won championships before, such as a gold ulu at the 2016 Arctic Winter Games in Iqaluit.
But this week will be different.
Vail will be playing on the biggest stage in Canadian midget girls hockey and she's ready for it.
The 16-year-old from Fort Smith is playing with the St. Albert Slash at the Esso Cup national midget girls hockey championship in Bridgewater, N.S., which began yesterday. The Slash took on Les Pionneres de Lanaudiere from Quebec in their opening game, the score of which wasn't known as of press time.
But getting to the national championship was a long enough process and it all began last month in the Alberta Female Hockey League playoffs.
The Slash had to play a best-of-three qualification round series against the Edmonton Pandas, which they swept in two straight to qualify for the provincial championship. Oddly enough, the Pandas are the team that Vail played for last season.
“It was weird,” she said. “I played with a lot of those girls last season, I've gone to hockey camps with them and I just created so many bonds with those girls. I grew up with them so it was interesting.”
Once in the provincials, the Slash finished second in the round-robin behind Rocky Mountain, the only team to beat them in the round-robin, but the Slash exacted revenge at the right time as they went on to defeat them in the final, 3-2 in double overtime, to win the title and advance to the Pacific Regional Championship against the Greater Vancouver Comets in another best-of-three series.
St. Albert won game one of the regional, 4-2, with the Comets coming back to win game two by that same score. Game three saw St. Albert score early and then hold on for dear life but they were able to shut the door, winning 1-0 to punch their ticket to the Esso Cup.
Vail said that lead was never safe until the final buzzer sounded.
“We focused a lot on defensive play,” she said. “We had to play as a team and come together because it was a new team we hadn't seen before so we didn't know what kind of style they would have. We had to be really offensive in Alberta because there's a lot of scoring but we had to reset against the Comets. You have to be able to adapt and come up with new strategies.”
With the Esso Cup underway, the Slash are taking on the four other regional champions from around Canada – Ontario, Quebec, Atlantic, West – and the host team, Metro Boston Pizza from Bridgewater.
“We know a bit about Ontario because we've played tournaments there but we don't know a lot about the teams from Quebec and Atlantic,” said Vail. “We know we're going to have to win out at nationals to have any chance at winning.”
The Slash actually come into the nationals this year as the defending champions but this year's roster is a lot different than the one that won it all one year ago because now its got seven rookies.
Vail said that hasn't been a problem because everyone meshed together quickly this season.
“We have a lot of talent on our team,” she said. “We actually have one line of rookies and another line of veterans but everyone stepped up their game and that helped us beat the Comets and get to nationals. We play so well as a team and we all pulled together.”
See the next edition of NWT News/North for an update on the team's progress.