When the calendar flipped to 2012, the University of Calgary Dinos had 43 national championships to their name. Volleyball, football, swimming, track & field, the Dinos had banners for them all, but there was one sport that eluded them – hockey. 

Cue the 2011-12 Dinos women’s hockey team.

On Mar. 11, 2012, 10 years ago now, a 5-1 win over the Montreal Carabins gave Calgary their first hockey national championship in school history.

Danielle Goyette, head coach of the national championship-winning team, and someone who has won a few big games as a player herself had a pretty simple phrase when asked to sum up this team in one sentence.

Goyette went on to elaborate that this team was special in so many ways, but what differentiated this particular group of women was how well everyone owned and knew their specific role on the ice.

“The balance we had with the players, with the offence, defence and goaltending, was really special,” the two-time Olympic gold medallist explained. “Nobody was trying to do someone else’s job and it just led to great chemistry within the team.” 

Casey Irving, one of the team’s co-captains and the only fifth-year athlete on the roster, knew that Goyette and the rest of the coaching staff deserved heaps of credit for the ‘team-first’ culture they had instilled with this group.

“Having the coaching staff that we did, with Danielle, you knew what your role was because you had to work for it,” said Irving. “You had to earn your ice time, if you lost the puck you had to fight to get it back, and everyone was just on the same page. We were all in.” 

And although her career ended on a high, Irving saw both the highs and lows of the Dinos women’s hockey program, as did Goyette.

When Goyette took over the program in 2007, the Dinos were playing in the ACAC and there were even talks about cutting the program, but she believed that the Dinos were capable of much more. 

“When I took the job, I told everyone my goal was to play at the highest level and I asked if that was possible,” said Goyette. “They told me that to do that we would have to be successful, and I said ‘okay, we will be.” 

She made good on her promise, and in her second season behind the bench, the Dinos took home the ACAC championship in the 2008-09 season, allowing them to make the jump to the next level in the 2009-10 season. 

Irving was a part of that ACAC championship-winning team, as well as the team who finished in the bottom half of the Canada West in their inaugural U SPORTS (then CIS) season, and her journey throughout her career as a Dino not only helped her grow as an athlete but also as a person. 

“Being able to start at the bottom and slowly chip away was a huge accomplishment for me,” she explained. “Growing as a player, as a team, through five years, it has helped me become successful in life.”

Part of the reason Irving enjoyed so much success in her last two seasons, was that sitting beside her in the locker room was the greatest women’s hockey player of all time, Hayley Wickenheiser. The four-time Olympic gold-medallist was dominant on the ice, putting up 46 points over 23 games, including 14 in the seven playoff games the Dinos played en route to the championship. 

But as valuable as she was on the ice, she was just as valuable off it. 

“Having Wick there helped the girls learn what it meant to work hard,” said Goyette. “The team learned that the training off the ice was so important. She taught them how to prepare for practices and how to prepare for games and that was a big, big factor in the program moving forward.”

Sinead Tracey, a third-year forward on the team, confirmed that Wickenheiser was instrumental in moulding the strong mental framework of the group.

“There was an understanding between the discrepancy in skill level between the U SPORTS level and what Hayley was used to,” said Tracey. “But what Hayley instilled, I think, is that playing with heart and passion and effort is all you really need to do. Bring the skills that you have and bring them at 110 per cent.” 

Sure enough, this entire Dinos team did just that, especially in the game that Goyette still describes as the “best university hockey game that she has ever been a part of.” That game was Calgary’s opening round matchup in nationals against the then-defending national champion McGill Martlets. 

The Dinos pulled out a 1-0 win, thanks in large part to outstanding goaltending from Amanda Tapp, who stopped 20 shots in the shutout and outduelled former Team Canada netminder Charline Labonté in the process. 

Tracey, the lone goal scorer in the game, epitomized the team-first mindset of this special squad so much so, that she says she barely remembers scoring the goal.

“It was almost like a detachment from yourself,” said Tracey when asked to reminisce on the goal. “It wasn’t like I thought to myself ‘oh, I scored it’, it was more like ‘we scored it.’ And then it was instantly just back to trying to stay as disciplined as we had been and keep defending.”

Calgary did enough to hang on, then took out their provincial rival Alberta Pandas in the semis before defeating the Carabin in the program’s first-ever trip to the national final. The Dinos also topped the Pandas in the Canada West Final to bring home the conference banner, another first for the program. 

Tapp, who is the current goaltending coach for the Dinos, was named tournament MVP and was also named to the tournament all-star team along with Wickenheiser and defenceman Stephanie Ramsey. 

In the 5-1 championship win, Wickenheiser scored two goals and added two assists, while Iya Gavrilova, Jenna Smith and Elana Lovell rounded out the scoring.

Ten years have come and gone, and this team will always be remembered as the first team to ever bring a hockey national championship to the University of Calgary.

But arguably, the more important development throughout the year was the everlasting bond made both on and off the ice.