Hayley Wickenheiser back in the saddle with Eskilstuna after knee injury
Published Monday January 12th, 2009
Hayley Wickenheiser wasn't the only one anxious for her to get back on the ice and playing hockey.
On a recent visit to Eskilstuna, Sweden, her sister Jane saw how restless Wickenheiser was watching her men's team play without her. Wickenheiser sustained ligament damage in her right knee playing for the Canadian women Nov. 9 in Lake Placid, N.Y. She missed 13 of Eskilstuna's games.
"Watching the games, it was like I was still playing," Wickenheiser said Monday from Eskilstuna. "I was exhausted after every game just watching it.
"My sister came over for Christmas and after a few days she said, 'You need to get back on the ice because you're driving me crazy."'
The mental health of the Wickenheiser sisters was saved when Hayley donned Eskilstuna's red and white jersey again.
The 30-year-old from Shaunavon, Sask., has played two games since her return. Her most recent was Eskilstuna's win over Jarfalla on Sunday. Eskilstuna is a Division 1 club in the third tier of Swedish men's pro hockey.
Her first game back Jan. 7 was just under two months from the day she collided with a U.S. player during the Four Nations Cup final, which the Canadian women lost 3-2 in a shootout.
Wickenheiser, the Canadian captain, was told then by team doctors she could be sidelined anywhere from six to 20 weeks.
She preferred the first option. The five-foot-10, 171-pound forward started aggressive rehabilitation, which included five sessions in a hyperbaric chamber in Toronto, and was skating six weeks later in Sweden.
A hyperbaric chamber is thought to speed healing of an injury by increasing the amount of oxygen in the blood.
Wickenheiser wears a brace on her knee and has eased her way back into games. She played only five or six shifts in her first game back and about 10 minutes Sunday.
"I've been trying to be patient and not push it," she said. "I'm fortunate that my coach Mattias Karlin, he lost his NHL career to a major knee injury, and he said to me, 'I'm not going to let you make the same mistakes I did.'
"So he's been pretty cautious in not rushing me back."
Wickenheiser faced a difficult situation during rehabilitation because she's a professional player whose team pays her a salary and living expenses. The temptation was to get back in the lineup quickly.
She's playing with men who are bigger and stronger than her, and unlike in women's hockey, there's bodychecking in Sweden's Division 1 league. Wickenheiser couldn't afford to risk re-injury, particularly with the 2010 Winter Olympics on the horizon.
"Obviously it's another level when you play a game situation, but it's about just getting out there and not thinking about it anymore," she said. "The physical rehab may take six weeks, but then there's the whole mental rehab of knowing when you get back out there that the knee is going to feel strong.
"Especially playing here, it's a lot different than playing in the women's game. But I feel good and I don't think about it when I'm out there. Now it's trying to get back to where I was before I was injured and get the ice time up and those types of things."
The all-time leading scorer on the Canadian women's team with 136 goals and 152 assists in 194 games has a goal and two assists in 12 games for Eskilstuna. She ranks in the league's top 20 in faceoffs won at 53 per cent.
Wickenheiser was named the most valuable player of the last two Olympic women's hockey tournaments. Canada will need her power, speed and creativity to defend the Olympic gold in Vancouver.
She says she can't wrap herself in bubble wrap from now until the Olympics. The threat of injury is a fact of life for all athletes.
"Twenty-ten is a huge event and everybody wants to compete, but I don't think of it as 'preserve until 2010,"' she explained. "I think of it more as, 'This is what I do every day and this is what I love every day and 2010 is way down the road still."'
She's playing European men's hockey for a second time in her career. Wickenheiser spent parts of two seasons with Finland's Kirkkonummi Salamat in Finland in 2003. She had three goals and 16 assists in 40 games there.
Eskilstuna's regular-season record was 12-11-4. The club is 1-1 in its current round of playoff games to determine which team gets a shot at promotion to the Allsvenskan, or second tier, league.
Wickenheiser's Swedish season could be over as early as Feb. 20 or as late as mid-March, depending on how far Eskilstuna goes in the post-season.
She and the Canadian women will attempt to reclaim the gold medal at the world championship April 4-12 in Hameenlinna, Finland. Canada lost 4-3 to the U.S. in last year's final in Harbin, China.
Wickenheiser signed a one-year contract with Eskilstuna last summer. She, her partner Tomas Pacina and their son Noah will return to Calgary after her season concludes.
The women invited to try out for the Canadian Olympic team will congregate this summer in Calgary where they'll live and train until they depart for the Games.
The irony of getting injured playing women's hockey, when the risk in men's hockey is far greater, isn't lost on Wickenheiser. She's revelling in practising and playing every day again with the men.
"I still feel this is the best move I could have made," Wickenheiser said. "Even though I've been injured, I'll be a better player for it when I come back to the women's game and I'll have enough time to improve in the next few months.
"There's been some ups and downs, but overall I'm in a pretty good position."
Sports Illustrated rated Wickenheiser No. 20 in its list of the 25 toughest athletes last year and she was one of only two women on that list. She led Canada in scoring in the 2006 Olympics with 17 points despite playing with a broken bone in her wrist.
Wickenheiser has played in three Olympics Games and eight world championships. She did not play in the 2001 world championship because of a knee injury.
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