Larocque honoured to be a role model for next wave

When the puck finally drops for Toronto’s inaugural season in the Professional Women Hockey League, defender Jocelyne Larocque, the team’s first draft pick, will take a moment to appreciate being part of such a momentous event.

It will give some of the best women hockey players a chance to showcase their talents ona big stage. And for Larocque, that moment will mark a real-life manifestation of what is possible.

Years before she became the first Indigenous woman hockey player to participate in the Olympics, she was just a little girl from Ste. Anne, Man., who struggled with challenges to play on boys’ clubs. She remembers when a boy on the opposing team threatened to “wreck your life” when “hitting hockey” was allowed. That threat lived with Larocque the whole summer and, when the following season started, she told her parents she was sick and wouldn’t continue playing.

“This guy weighed probably 100 pounds more than me, and I was so scared to go,” she said. Larocque eventually told her parents, who were supportive and told her to always keep her head up.

But it wouldn’t be the only time people told her she did not belong.

“I’ve heard dads scream over the glass, saying, ‘Get her! Get her! Take her head off!’ And you’re like staring at them as a 10-, 12-, 14-year-old and feeling actually scared.”

Many others would yell at her in the lobbies and parking lots, telling her she is “taking a spot of a boy.” “If I didn’t love the sport, there’s no way I would’ve continued playing.”

She persevered, leaning on the support of her teammates and the path of her older sister Chantal, who also played hockey. During those years she also developed a stronger bond with other girls facing similar challenges, including her friend and fellow Manitoban Brigette Lacquette.

“She’s told me a lot of stories that she has faced a lot of racism, so for her it was almost like a double (challenge) where she was the only girl on her team plus she had so much negative things said to her,” she said.

Larocque, who is of Métis heritage, her Toronto teammate Victoria Bach and other Indigenous women hockey players are held in high regard, serving as trailblazers in facing and overcoming adversity, said Janice Forsyth, a professor in the faculty of education at the University of British Columbia whose research focuses on sports and culture from an Indigenous perspective.

“Female hockey players who aren’t racialized have a hard enough time to gain legitimacy in that sport in this country, even though it’s our national sport and they have demonstrated that they can be extremely successful,” she said.

“When you are racialized, then you also have to deal with people’s misunderstandings and their own biases towards you. It’s hard for athletes.”

Hockey players from Indigenous communities often face systemic barriers such as poverty, lack of facilities, lack of proper coaching and other services required to succeed in their playing careers, said Forsyth, who is a member of the Fisher River Cree Nation.

“There are a lot of really good players out there who are Indigenous, female and male, but they face additional barriers because they don’t have that kind of privilege (that athletes in other communities do),” she said.

Larocque has won at every level of hockey, with two NCAA titles, a Clarkson Cup victory in the former Canadian Women’s Hockey League, two Olympic gold medals, and three world championship gold.

“If I can be that representation for others, it’s a huge honour and something that I don’t take lightly,” she said. “It’s important for young kids to have role models.”

Representation has always mattered for Larocque, who grew up not seeing a lot of women athletes to look up to. She even admits not knowing there was a women’s national team until the 1998 Olympics, which is when her childhood dream of playing in the NHL shifted to playing in the Olympics. Now she is on the ground floor of another professional league, with another chance to inspire future generations.

“I feel honoured and I feel proud,” she said about the work that went into getting the professional women hockey league started. “To be able to dream it, you have to be able to see it.”

Toronto head coach Troy Ryan said the team’s impact on the local community will go beyond its performance on the ice.

“We have such a special group of high-performance athletes and high-performance people, so to be able to showcase who they are as people and who they are as athletes in a city like Toronto is a special opportunity,” he said. “We’re excited to actually get into the community and be involved and active and let the community be a part of our program as well.

“I do think we have a lot of players that are going to thrive in that type of environment.”

‘‘ If I can be that representation for others, it’s a huge honour and something that I don’t take lightly.

JOCELYNE LAROCQUE