An appointment with a superior can cause discomfort. What can I expect: praise, even a raise? Or: the termination? When Sandra Abstreiter was called in for afternoon coffee with Montreal manager Danièle Sauvageau and head coach Kori Cheverie on Monday, she probably already had good things in her head. Why should she lose her courage now? Abstreiter, born and raised in Freising, Upper Bavaria, is currently the best German ice hockey player. The 26-year-old was voted the best goalkeeper at the World Cup in April and has been playing in the Professional Women’s Hockey League (PWHL), the counterpart to the North American men’s professional league NHL, since January. That means she was under contract there. But she was rarely allowed to play. Only three times in 24 games this season. And that’s why Abstreiter had her agreement with Ottawa dissolved. To try out Montreal.
:From the garage door into the 20,000-seater arena
Sandra Abstreiter from Freising is the only German in the North American women’s ice hockey league. In Ottawa she is number two. The DEB team should lead the goalkeeper to the quarter-finals at the World Cup – at least.
“I wanted to challenge myself again,” said Abstreiter at the beginning of November at the Germany Cup in Landshut. She doesn’t see her season in Ottawa as number two behind Emerance Maschmeyer, the Canadian Olympic champion and sparkling blonde, as lost time, by any means. “It was a good year as an experience, I regret it zero point zero.” Every training session and every game was at a level “that I only know from the World Cup.” But in their eyes there was a risk “of being stuck for years.” And being stuck as number two is not her goal. One day, Abstreiter wants to be number one on a PWHL team. So off to Montreal.
Two days after winning the Germany Cup, Abstreiter got on the plane, four days later she was on the ice, another eleven days later she had the aforementioned appointment in the manager and trainer’s office: “And then they tell you relatively quickly what’s going on. What Sauvageau and Cheverie had to tell her was: Congratulations, you did it! Sandra Abstreiter is going into the second season of the PWHL as one of three goalkeepers for the Montreal Victoire. She will play her first league game with her new team this Saturday.
The decisive impetus for the new professional league comes from tennis idol and activist Billie Jean King
You have to remember that again. The players’ union PWHPA went on strike for four years because the conditions for a professional women’s ice hockey league in North America were these: no health insurance, family-unfriendly travel and salaries below the German minimum wage level. Until Kendall Coyne Schofield, a multiple world champion and Olympic gold medalist with Team USA, gathered her courage and called Billie Jean King, the former tennis world number one and feminist activist. King, in turn, encouraged the sports-loving billionaire Mark Walter, who, in addition to the LA Dodgers (baseball) and Lakers (basketball), also runs the Premier League club Chelsea FC – and within a few months the PWHL was born. Now, for the first time, players can count on a collective agreement with annual salaries between $34,000 and $80,000. That’s a far cry from the million-dollar salaries in the NHL. But at least so much that she gets from her Being able to live sport and see how it develops.
And of all things in this relatively comfortable situation, a German goalkeeper, the only German in the league, has her contract in Ottawa terminated in order to compete with two competitors for the last vacant position in Montreal. That takes more courage than calling Billie Jean King – and a lot of self-confidence. “I focused on everything I could control,” said Abstreiter before her departure from Landshut. “Two places in the goalkeeper position have been taken. The goal is to get the third spot.” A Plan B? Don’t give it.
The league is booming and Montreal is a magnet for spectators
Abstreiter developed this all-American winning mentality that gives her new club its name in six years at Providence College and in the NCAA university league. And unlike last year, when she left the Germany Cup for the training camp with an 8-0 defeat against the Czech Republic, this time she was allowed to present the trophy to the fans and flew confidently to Canada.
The PWHL is on national television, and Montreal is the ultimate spectator magnet. For the game against Toronto on April 20, 21,105 fans came to the Bell Centre, where the Canadiens usually race across NHL ice – a world record for a women’s ice hockey game. According to a Canadian study, the PWHL has earned the reputation of being the most respected organization in Canada within one season. There are more games this season, and next season the league will be expanded by one or two locations. Abstreiter says: “The enthusiasm is there.”
Her first official day at work brings her together with her old team from Ottawa. There is no resentment about her move: “The girls were all keeping their fingers crossed for me to make it into the squad,” Abstreiter told the ARD Sportschau. You see each other again with a smile on your face. On Saturday afternoon, at coffee time.
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