USA Hockey Magazine

"I had to do a lot of self-promoting because I was playing boys' hockey and I wasn't in Massachusetts being seen by these schools," she says. "I caught the eye of a couple coaches and I went on a few visits. Providence didn't need a goalie. Northeastern brought me but it wasn't the best visit. UNH showed up at one of my games in Massena, N.Y., and the head coach offered me a position and a schol- arship at that point." T h a t c o a c h , R u s s Mc C u r d y, w a s i n the midst of g oing 264-36-10 over 15 seasons, beginning in 1977, behind the Wildcats bench. "And the rest is history, I guess," says Whitten Hamlen, who started all four years at UNH, winning a pair of ECAC titles. "[McCurdy] just literally showed up at the high school rink to watch me play boys' hockey. Pretty amazing, the fact that he took the time to come out and see me." Had their planets aligned a little earlier, Whitten Hamlen could have been taking over between the pipes at UNH for Dyer Hayes, who had also met with McCurdy years before. "I remember clear as day, [McCurdy] came down to watch one of our girls' games, stood out in front of the Coke machine and said, 'I'm Ross McCurdy and you're a fine g oaltender," recalls Dyer Hayes, whose assumptions of play- ing at UNH wound up being derailed. " Yo u k i n d o f a s p i r e t o g o t o t h e b e st team. Right as I was starting to get my applications in, during that process, I got denied because I didn't have two years of language." Enter Northeastern, where someone whose dyslexia would go undiagnosed for decades could thrive in a co-op curricu- lum perfect for the hard-working Dyer Hayes, who wound up graduating with honors and playing three sports. "It was truly a dream come true, and I really feel it was meant to be," says. "And, of course, the greatest arena in the United States of America, possibly the world, the original Boston Garden and the old- est standing arena in the United States, Matthews Arena." During her junior and senior seasons, Northeastern went 48-3-1 and won two E CA C t i t l e s — s o m e t h i n g a k i n t o t h e national championship considering the axis of the sport's powers at the time—to close out the 1980s. In the late 80s, if there was a radar for Team USA's goaltending prospects, Dyer Hayes and Whitten Hamlen hadn't heard of it. In fact, Whitten Hamlen hadn't really even heard there were try- outs for the first IIHF Women's World Championships in 1990. "It was like a rumor," she says. "I didn't think there was much of a radar before the 1990 world championships, to tell you the truth," adds Dyer Hayes. But she did try out, then make and start in goal for that team, the very first of its kind, with the imposing Dyer Hayes wear- ing red, white and blue, and a "Charlie the Eagle" helmet. In a case of the more things changing while staying the same, the United States and Canada met in the final. Team USA did not win, but the event was a success, playing to full crowds for the games in Ottawa, all facts that may have more to do with the future of women's hockey than many knew at the time. Had that tournament fallen flat, there's a chance women's hockey isn't on the Olympic program in Nagano, there's no gold medal win for Team USA in the inau- gural event, and the path for women in the sport remains as unclear as it had been before that history-making gold medal for the team that so many know by heart. C o l l e e n C o y n e w a s o n t h a t h i s t o - ry-making team, earning gold in Nagano, with Sara DeCosta and Sarah Tueting on the roster as goaltenders. But Coyne, a defenseman from Massachusetts and now the president of the Boston Pride, was also on the 1992 and 1994 IIHF Women's World Championship teams where Dyer Hayes and Witten Hamlen were the pri- mary goaltenders. "At that point, Erin and I had been teammates at UNH, so I knew her very, very well," says Coyne, who tried out for the 1990 team but did not make the final camp cuts. "And Kelly, she played with Tom Barrasso, and she was like a legend. And I knew that she was really good." As the '90s progressed, while her play- ing time in games may have been less a focus for Team USA, Dyer Hayes' leader- ship was most certainly on display. "Kelly, she was so super-confident, just carried herself that way, and she was constantly complimentary of everybody else," Coyne says. "So welcoming. And, still, to this day, she's the same way. She tried to plant that confidence in every- one around her. I don't remember her ever making someone feel like they were anything less than awesome." 28 // JUNE 2022 T he Goalie Issue USAHOCKEYMAGAZINE.COM "I had to go to a fitness test that none of the boys had to go through. But I get done with that, and I killed it, of course. They were, like, 'Yeah, she can play. It's OK, she's not fragile.'" – ERIN WHITTEN HAMLEN Erin Whitten Hamlen's love of the game was so strong that she shook off the disappointment of not making the 1998 U.S. Women's Olympic Team and returned between the pipes the following season during the 1999 IIHF Women's World Championship. PHOTOS BY USA Hockey Magazine Archives

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