Erin Johnson comes from a huge hockey family.
Her dad played for the Michigan national team and used to coach triple-A. Because of the scarce number of girl’s hockey leagues around the country, she played on an all-boys team until she was 16 years old. Not being able to continue her love of hockey in college diminished her motivation for the sport but sparked her motivation to get the idea of a girl’s club team off the ground.
So, when she saw that the program for club sports at the Marquette AMU only had a men’s hockey team, she took the opportunity to establish a new club on ice.
“I was crushed when I saw Marquette didn’t have a girl’s hockey team,” Johnson said.
From five members to 17 in a month, the amount of interest continues to grow for the club.
It all started on the satirical social media app, Yik Yak, when Johnson made a post about potentially starting a girls hockey club. The post garnered a couple of positive responses supporting the idea, so Johnson created a Snapchat form that got a wide variety of people interested.
One of those people is Lucy Hart, a sophomore in the College of Engineering.
“I had four people send it to me telling me I have to do this,” Hart said.
Hart played hockey throughout high school and enjoyed the experience so much she wanted to try and continue playing in college non-competitively. Hart’s team in high school provided a great environment and she wants a club team that can provide the same experience.
“As soon as I started, it was the structure of my life … Coming here and not seeing there was a team forced me to stop playing,” Hart said.
For Sidney Leonard, a junior in the College of Nursing, her passion for puck ran so deep that she emailed the Marquette Men’s Division II head coach asking if there were any women’s teams in the area.
The reply? “No.”
This year, Johnson plans on having an inaugural season of mostly practices encouraging more people to join and get them interested in the club.
Next year, however, the club wants to start playing games and joining tournaments to compete with some of the other schools in the area.
“We want to form a more competitive side to the team,” said Hart.
It’s hard for the team to determine who they’ll be playing against and at what level due to the wide variety of experience levels of currently interested members. Opponents from other schools will have to be within a 300-mile radius of Marquette.
Despite wanting to add a more competitive side to the team, the group of girls want to make the team more about getting people involved in the sport.
“I think it’s more about providing the opportunity to allow girls to play,” Hart said.
The group believes that the club will be a huge success because of the opportunities it provides to a community who’s been restricted.
“I think this club will give community to a lot of people whose community was shut off after high school,” Johnson said.
The group is planning to meet with the Director of Campus Recreation. James Friel, to present the written proposal for the team in hopes of becoming an official club sport.
If approved, it’s onto the ice.
This story was written by Ben Ward. He can be reached at benjamin.ward@marquette.edu.