B.C. sisters lead western wave to women's hockey team

A wave of players from Canada's most westerly province has hit the national women's hockey team. Two are from the same family.

Sarah and Amy Potomak of Aldergrove, B.C., will wear the Maple Leaf in Canada's two-game series against the United States starting Saturday in Plymouth, Mich. The second game is Monday in Sarnia, Ont.

The Potomak (pronounced POT-oh-mack) forwards and defenceman Micah Hart of Saanichton represent a veritable explosion of players from British Columbia, which has been under-represented on the Canadian women's team for years.

Goaltender Daniele Dube is the only B.C. player to appear in a women's world championship more than two decades ago.

Sarah, who turns 19 on Monday, and 17-year-old Amy will be the first sisters to play on the national team together.

"There's no words to describe how awesome this feeling is," Amy said.

'Dreamed of playing on national team together'

Added Sarah: "It's kind of surreal. We've played together since we were little and stuff and always dreamed about being on the national team together, but we never really thought that would happen.

"The fact that will actually happen, playing against the U.S. together is pretty special."

Sarah is a shifty, abrasive forward with a sense of occasion. She has already scored five game winners for the University of Minnesota Golden Gophers this season.

Three inches taller and almost 10 pounds heavier than her older sister, Amy proved at Canada's fall camp she can think and skate at national team speed, according to Melody Davidson, Hockey Canada's general manager of national women's teams programs.

Sarah signalled B.C.'s drought on the national squad was ending when she was named to Canada's roster for the 2015 Four Nations Cup.

"We've definitely helped each other a lot," Amy said. "We've always been really good at holding each other accountable and training together and practising the right things.

"I think she's helped me probably more so than I've helped her because she's older and she went through it first and always lent me a hand."

Both will play often over next month

The Potomaks will wear the Canadian jersey multiple times over the next month.

Sarah was also named to the Canadian women's under-22 squad competing Jan. 4-7 in the Nations Cup in Fussen, Germany, and Telfs, Austria.

Amy will play for Canada in the world under-18 championship Jan. 7-15 in the Czech Republic.

Hart, Erin Ambrose of Keswick, Ont., Halli Krzyzaniak of Neepawa, Man., Jillian Saulnier of Halifax and Saskatoon's Emily Clark join Sarah doing double duty for Canada in the U.S. series and with the under-22 squad.

Saskatoon forward Sophie Shirley, who makes her national team debut in the U.S. series, will also join Amy on the under-18 team.

This cross-pollination of rosters helps Davidson determine who is ready to play in the 2017 women's world championship and also who gets invited to try out for the Olympic team next year.

"This will be the last chance to see all three programs in best-on-best kind of thing before we have to make world championship decisions and then leading into centralization," Davidson said.

The women invited to try out for the Olympic team will be announced shortly after the world championship March 31-April 7 in Plymouth.

They'll congregate in Calgary in late summer and spend half a year preparing to defend the gold in Pyeongchang, South Korea.

Canada is 1-7 versus the U.S. since beating them 3-2 in overtime in the 2014 Olympic final.

Playing U.S. a test

There's nothing like facing the U.S. in front of a crowd either wildly for or against you to expose a player's strengths and weaknesses.

The Potomaks don't want their first time as Canadian teammates to be their last.

"This series is kind of like a tryout, so it's big for me and Amy to perform well and help Canada beat the U.S.," Sarah said.

The 2010 Winter Games in Vancouver and Whistler were a turning point for girls' hockey in B.C., in both inspiring kids to play the game and BC Hockey getting serious about putting them on the national team.

BC Hockey used $330,000 in Legacies Now funding from the provincial government to overhaul its female high-performance program between 2006 and 2010.

It was a changed system by the time the Potomaks and Hart entered it.

"There's not a lot of depth in B.C., but I definitely think it's improving all over," Sarah said.