Dan Carle
After a championship career as a pioneer in Canadian university women’s hockey, Jessika Audet has earned the respect of her teammates. Now 31, more than a dozen years older than many of them, Audet is enjoying a goaltending renaissance with the uOttawa Gee-Gees.
No question that Audet, a master’s student in occupational therapy, feels her age some mornings when waking at 4:45 a.m. for practice. She is also frequently reminded about her advancing clock by team members.
“We call her ‘Grandma,’” says 22-year-old Danika Smith, the smiling Gee-Gees women’s hockey team captain in her fourth season. “We poke fun.”
Audet was around when university women’s hockey was a tadpole on the sports map. She backstopped the 1998 and 1999 Concordia Stingers to the Canadian university championships. Today, Audet wears No. 25 for the Gee-Gees.
Audet was three years removed from hockey before setting out to build a new batch of memories. Her third title shot is right around the corner.
“I debated it and finally said I think I can do this,” said the native of Charlesbourg, Quebec. “The challenge was to get the body in the shape.”
Audet pushed her frame and it has followed, albeit more painstakingly than at the start of her hockey career 23 years ago. The rest, like the two shutouts she earned by Christmas, is new history in the making.
“It’s all in the mind,” says Audet. “The first year [away from hockey] I was happy I wasn’t playing. But after the third year I missed the feeling of the ice under the skates, of feeling the shots.”
And of taking the verbal shots. “If it was always ‘Hi Jessika,’ then I would be worried. Now when I walk down the hall I get ‘Hi Grandma,’” laughs Audet, who will likely be back at uOttawa for her final season of eligibility in 2008-09. “I’m just one of the girls.”
The University of Ottawa will host the 2008 CIS women’s championships from March 6 to 10 at the Sports Complex. For ticket information call 613-562-5800 x 4337.
