URL:http://www.canoe.ca/HockeyWomen/apr1_sta.html

Tuesday, April 1, 1997

STACY WILSON GOES FOR FOURTH GOLD MEDAL

KITCHENER, Ont. (CP) -- For New Brunswick teacher Stacy Wilson, it's
now or never -- Nagano or bust.

Wilson, 31, is on a leave of absence from her job as a physical
education and science teacher at a Salisbury high school as she
devotes her attention to trying to get to the Winter Olympics in
Nagano, Japan, next February.

She's living in Calgary and training at the national hockey centre
for women, and she's here playing for Canada in the women's world
tournament this week.

"I've been training hard," she said after practice Tuesday. "Going to
Calgary has really helped my game as well, just getting on the ice a
lot more and getting expert coaching."

As was the case with many of the veterans on the Canadian team,
Wilson started playing hockey in a boys' league because there were no
girls' leagues in the 1970s.

"Nobody thought it was strange, I don't think," she recalled. "It was
a sport and I was just playing it."

By the time she was 14, there was nowhere for her to play next so she
set aside her equipment. She picked it back up after enrolling at
Acadia University and for the last 10 years has been a key player on
New Brunswick's teams in national tournaments.

Wilson, a five-foot-six defensive forward, was a member of Canada's
teams that won the first three women's worlds, in 1990, 1992 and 1994,
and aims for a fourth gold medal here and a trip to Nagano. The lineup
will be named in September.

"Everybody has stepped up their training," she said of the
competition for Olympic roster spots. "You want to make sure you're
there and you're trying everything you can so you don't have any
regrets no matter what happens.

"It certainly is worthwhile. The Olympics are the ultimate goal in an
athlete's life and at my age I'm not looking for another chance at it
-- this is it. So I'm going to give it everything I have."

SLAM! 

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