Cochrane hockey player Raedyn Spademan is heading to Prince Edward Island in February as a member of Alberta's U18 female hockey team, to compete in the 2023 Canada Winter Games.
The 16-year-old forward, who for most of the year plays for the RINK Hockey Academy in Kelowna, B.C., said she was thrilled to make the provincial squad. She said it's been a goal of hers since watching some of Alberta's championship-winning team at the 2019 Canada Winter Games in Red Deer.
“I’m so excited. It’s something I’ve been wanting since the initial invite list came out," Spademan told The Eagle, during a return home for the recent holidays. "I was able to watch some of the 2019 Winter Games, so it was cool to see myself hopefully being there one day.”
Held every four years, the Canada Winter Games is a multi-sporting extravaganza that mimics the Olympic Games. The 2023 event will see thousands of Canada's top U20 athletes from over a dozen sports converge in P.E.I. for two weeks of competition.
"It was super neat [watching the Games in 2019]," Spademan said. "I knew Sarah Wozniewicz – she’s also a Cochrane girl, and she was on that team. It was cool to watch her play. That team was super hard-working and eventually ended up winning it.”
While she currently plays for RINK in the Canadian Sports School Hockey League (CSSHL), Spademan's hockey career previously saw her suit up for minor teams in Cochrane and Olds, before enrolling at the Edge School for Athletes in Springbank for her Grade 10 year. After a season of playing for the Edge Mountaineers, she moved to the Okanagan to play for RINK, which also fields teams in the CSSHL.
The Grade 11 student-athlete touted the coaching as the main benefit of moving to the Kelowna-based sports academy to further her individual development.
“Our coach is absolutely amazing," she said. "The development we do there, we’re basically on the ice every day for an hour and a half or two hours, doing skills after school. RINK really takes pride in the detail they put into their athletes and I’ve already noticed a big improvement in my game from being there.”
In her first year at RINK, Spademan has scored seven goals and collected two assists in 17 CSSHL games thus far.
One of Spademan's colleagues at RINK, goaltender Farah Walker, from Airdrie, is also going to P.E.I. as a member of the Alberta team.
Off the ice, Spademan said she's excited to take in the Olympic-esque atmosphere of the Canada Winter Games once she's in P.E.I.
“I’ve heard there are events like, people go around and trade pins with other provinces, so I’m excited for that," she said. "And being at RINK, it’s cool because there are girls from all different provinces who come to play on that team, so there are girls from Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Alberta and B.C., and I’m excited to play against them.
"I’m just excited to soak in the experience and watch the other sports too. It’s going to be a lot of fun.”
In addition to making Alberta's team for the upcoming Canada Winter Games, Spademan also verbally committed to play for Clarkson University – an NCAA Division 1 hockey program, based in New York State. After she's signed her letter of intent for Clarkson in her Grade 12 year, Spademan said she'll move to New York in the fall of 2024.
Another local representative on Alberta's U18 girls' hockey team is Makayla Watson from Rocky View County, who plays for the Edge.
