Bby blueliner breaking barriers

Kaleigh Fratkin was three years old when she tagged along with older brothers Jesse and Casey to the hockey rink. She wanted to be just like them, so she made her dad, Ron, go home and get her brothers’ old skates so she could play, too.

“The minute I stepped out on the ice, every time, I was just happy to be there. I liked the atmosphere. I liked all aspects of the game,” said the 16-year-old Fratkin who has been invited to Calgary for an evaluation camp for Canada’s under-18 women’s hockey team that begins tomorrow.

Eventually the Fratkin family bulldozed the pool in their backyard and turned it into a roller hockey rink. She’d be out there every day strapping on the roller blades doing all sorts of skating drills and battling her brothers. “They’d strap me in net as a goalie and shoot pucks at me.”

At first, Fratkin, who plays defence, was put in with older girls. But the boys were a challenge more to her liking.

“It just pushed my game. It was more competitive and as I got older just the physical strength and the speed of the game got quicker. That’s what pushed me to stay with it,” she said.

Fratkin didn’t just play house league with the boys. She’s always been on the boys rep team, first of all with the Burnaby Winter Club and then with the Burnaby Minor Hockey Association bantams and midgets. Although, at that age, the boys began to get bigger and stronger she’s been able to keep up, especially when it comes to skating.

“I could take the physical strength because having two older brothers always beating me up, it wasn’t like I had never been knocked around,” said Fratkin. “They had to catch me before they could hit me.”

Last year, Fratkin was chosen to play for Canada’s U18 squad in a series of games against the U.S., but was left off the 2008 world championship roster in favour of older players. This year, only six players from last year’s team are returning to tryout for the team that will play the U.S. in Lake Placid, N.Y., and then the world tournament in Fussen, Germany in January.

Fratkin’s long-term goals are to obtain a NCAA hockey scholarship and to become the first B.C. skater to play for Canada’s women’s team in the Olympics.

There are many short-term routes she could take to get to those places, she’s just not sure which road to go down. It’s not like she can just go to Google Maps and get directions.

For the last few years she’s been commuting daily to the hockey academy at South Delta secondary. Although she loves the program, which has a connection to the Vancouver Giants, and she helped the school win the AAA provincial high school soccer championship, the commute is taking its toll.

One alternative is to return to Burnaby to attend the French immersion program at Moscrop and keep on playing midget hockey with the boys, maybe even with the Northwest Giants major midget team. Recently she attended the Junior B Grandview Steelers camp where she was named to the camp all-star team.

To get noticed on the national stage, however, it helps to be playing against female competition. But that’s not strong in B.C. and the senior Breakers team is a little too old for her family’s comfort. So she just might go to Alberta, Saskatchewan or Ontario where the female game is at a higher level.

It doesn’t seem to matter what she does, getting the scholarship seems as achievable as a shot into an empty net from the slot. Even though she’s just finished Grade 10, Fratkin’s been inundated with inquiries from American universities. Big ones like Wisconsin, Ohio State and Princeton. She dreams of playing in the 2010 Olympics, but that’s likely tougher than scoring from centre ice on Roberto Luongo.

“It still will be a dream so I’m going to keep fighting for it. It’s possible,” said Fratkin. “This year is quite important.”

Hence the dilemma about what to do in September.

“I have no clue,” said Fratkin shrugging her shoulders. “There’s a lot of options, it’s just what option is right for me. Coming from guys hockey, what is going to challenge me and challenge myself to improve?

“You know the [female game in other provinces] is stronger but you don’t know if it’s going to be challenging enough.”

Although Jesse Fratkin just finished his freshman season at Brown University while Casey will play for the Merritt Centennials of the B.C. Junior Hockey League, a decade from now their little sister may be the one every hockey fan in Canada has heard of.

ggranger@burnabynewsleader.com