Ashton Bell thought she was walking into a routine team meeting. But as the Vancouver Goldeneyes defender came off the ice following a session with the goalies, prepared to review video and go over drills with her teammates ahead of the team’s season opener against Seattle, she quickly realized this was no ordinary gathering.
Standing in the locker room alongside general manager Cara Gardner Morey and the rest of Vancouver’s staff as players filed in was Vancouver Rise defender Shannon Woeller, captain of the newly crowned Northern Super League champions. Woeller had been named captain ahead of the Rise’s inaugural campaign, and now she was at the rink to help the Goldeneyes announce their own.
“I was just honoured to be part of the leadership group,” says Bell, who earlier in camp had been among seven players voted by her teammates to be among Vancouver’s leaders. “And then Shannon announced my name.”
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It’s a fitting honour for the player selected with Vancouver’s first pick in the expansion draft, but it still took Bell by surprise. As she relays the story from the team’s hotel in Newark, N.J., following a busy, delay-filled day of travel — travelling on U.S. Thanksgiving is not for the faint of heart — she’s had a little time to let the new title sink in.
Everything is new for the 25-year-old captain and her teammates, who kicked off their inaugural campaign last Friday with a wild OT victory over the Seattle Torrent on home ice in front of a sold-out crowd of nearly 15,000 fans. Now in the middle of an 11-day, three-game road trip, including Wednesday’s return to her old stomping grounds in Ottawa and Saturday’s upcoming matinee against the New York Sirens (noon ET / 9 a.m. PT on Sportsnet), Bell reflects on her experience so far and what’s to come in Vancouver.
This interview — part of a regular series featuring PWHL players, staff and management — has been edited for length and clarity.
SPORTSNET: You’re the first captain in Vancouver Goldeneyes franchise history. What does that mean to you?
BELL: I certainly wasn’t expecting it, just with the group that we have — we have so many leaders in that locker room with so much experience. So, just super grateful, and couldn’t be more excited to help lead this team alongside so many incredible players.
It’s been a busy few months, starting with the expansion draft in June. What was that whole experience like for you?
Obviously, there were a lot of unknowns at the time for everyone. You didn’t really know what was gonna happen, what the format of the expansion was gonna look like, how many players you were gonna be able to protect.
Once I wasn’t protected in Ottawa — no hard feelings there, the players that they protected are unreal, and I would have done the same thing — then, just knowing where they were expanding to, with Vancouver and Seattle, I would have loved to be a part of either one of those teams. But Vancouver especially, just being in Canada, and out west, that’s somewhere that I can see myself putting down roots and being long-term. So, when that whole process kind of started, I had had a couple conversations with (Gardner Morey) and sparked my interest with her and how I would love to be a part of building and growing women’s hockey out west. To hear my name being called there in the expansion draft was super special. I couldn’t be more proud and honoured to be a part of the organization.
It’s early days, of course, but what are your impressions of the team and its identity?
There’s been lots of hype around our team, just on paper, how skilled and talented we are and how much experience we have in that locker room. I think we can play many different styles, which is super exciting. We can be physical, we can be fast, we can make those pretty plays. And I think you’ll see a bit of all of that from us. I think our big focus right now is being solid defensively, and then that will allow us to go have fun in the o-zone with the amount of skill and talent that we do have in that locker room, and kind of giving us the free rein to go play free in the o-zone, but being tough and gritty to play against, as well.
What has your experience in Vancouver been so far, in terms of getting to know the fanbase and hockey market?
I moved out to Vancouver in early July, so I kind of got a taste of what hockey in Vancouver was all about this summer and the excitement around having a professional women’s team out west. Anyone you would run into on the street was just super excited to have a team out here, was gonna get season’s tickets, and just super fired up and welcoming.
And that home opener, I still don’t think it’s fully sunk in just how cool and special that game was. The fans were into it right off the bat, and just having the (Pacific Coliseum) packed was incredible.
Just having our own rink as well — that being our barn, with our branding and our logo all over it and skating out onto the ice with the Goldeneye (logo) at centre ice, it’s pretty cool to see just how far women’s hockey has come. We’re just super lucky that we can call that place our own.
I’d love to know what it felt like at the rink when Sarah Nurse scored that first goal.
You couldn’t have scripted it better with Nursey getting the first goal and then it just being back and forth — you know, we’re down, then we’re tied up again, we’re down, we’re tied up — and then Claire (Thompson) scoring with like two minutes left to tie it up and send us into overtime. And then for (Abby) Boreen to get that overtime winner, we couldn’t have planned it out better. It was just a super entertaining game for the fans to get into, and I think we gave them a good show of what this league’s all about and what they have to look forward to in games to come.
You made your return to Ottawa on Wednesday night and got a really warm reception from fans. How did that feel?
I’m super grateful for my two years there. I learned a lot and had a great experience. The community was incredible. I fell in love with the city and fans and we had a great group of girls there. So, it was definitely a little bittersweet, seeing the girls, but I’m just grateful to be with Vancouver and get to be a part of this organization and helping grow it.
You’re in the midst of a pretty long road trip. Does that help with the early chemistry, considering you’re spending so much time together?
It’s definitely really beneficial. We have some time here on the road on our days off to watch video and to learn systems, and I think that will definitely help us in the long run to try to build an identity and a culture and get some chemistry going amongst our group. We have a super-fun group, so it’s been pretty easy. A lot of character people in our locker room and just good, genuine people. So, we’re definitely excited to be on the road right now.
It seems like a great weekend to be in New York.
Yeah. After the game we have a couple of days in New York before we head to Boston, so we have a trip planned to go into the city, which will be fun.
Maybe some shopping ahead?
I think we’re going to go see a show, a musical.
Oh, fun. Do you know which one?
No, I don’t. (Emma) Greco’s kind of our ‘team fun committee’ we call her (laughs), so she’s been planning some stuff for the girls to go see.
