Graduate forward Emma Maltais (17) participated in the 2021 International Ice Hockey Federation Women’s World Championship, the 2022 Winter Olympic Games and the 2022 IIHF Women’s World Championship — and she won gold medals at all three competitions. Credit: Mackenzie Shanklin | For the Lantern
While Ohio State won its first NCAA women’s ice hockey national championship and second WCHA championship last season, graduate forward and captain Emma Maltais earned gold medals.
After serving as Ohio State’s captain in her senior season in 2020-21, Maltais received her first call-up to Hockey Canada Centralization Camp in summer of 2021.
She stepped away from Ohio State to participate in the 2021 International Ice Hockey Federation Women’s World Championship, the 2022 Winter Olympic Games and the 2022 IIHF Women’s World Championship — winning gold medals at all three competitions.
“The six months that I was trying out for the Olympic team were the hardest but the most rewarding I’ve ever been a part of,” Maltais said. “Year after year, you do go to camp, you do try out, but that step from development to the senior team is a major step that requires a lot of commitment, a lot of choices in summer training, to try and put you ahead of people.”
Maltais is returning to Ohio State with more than just her medals. She said the experience she gained as a fourth-line player with Team Canada will help her relate to her teammates more as she reclaims the captaincy at Ohio State.
“I think playing a different role on the national team made me understand what people go through at different levels,” Maltais said. “I had never experienced having less playing time, being that role on a team, really seeing my value in terms of being a good teammate, rather than always being the one producing or being on the ice.”
Head coach Nadine Muzerall said one reason for giving Maltais the role of team captain comes from what she learned from her older teammates on the Canadian national team.
“When she’s with Team Canada versus here, the mouth was shut,” Muzerall said. “She’s listening to some of the greatest in the world and her ears are open. So, I think that you learn a lot more when you’re not talking as much.”
While Maltais may not have been on the ice for the Buckeyes last season, she was present in University Park, Pennsylvania, as a spectator when they took home the program’s first-ever national championship.
“Of course, you want to be there in those moments of victory and to be a part of it, but they made me feel a part of it,” Maltais said. “Over the last four or five years, the program has grown immensely, and I think every player who has been a part of it in those last five, six years should feel that they were a part of that win. They supported me going to accomplish my dream, so I was doing the exact same thing for them.”
Senior forward Jennifer Gardiner, who played for Hockey Canada’s U18 team and National Development Team, said she and her Buckeye teammates “definitely felt her presence on the rink” despite Maltais’ absence last season.
Gardiner also said Maltais’s level of competitiveness is one of her greatest strengths as a teammate and leader.
“She focuses in on such little details all the time,” Gardiner said. “It’s so cool just to be able to play with a player like her and pick up on little things that she does. She really pushes me every day to be faster, be better, have a better shot.”
After winning gold medals, Maltais said she hopes her experience can help her teammates reach similar heights.
“I just get a different opportunity now to introduce them to my friends, make them feel more comfortable, tell them stories about what it’s like,” Maltais said. “You’re so intimidated as a young kid going and participating in those events, because those are your idols. So, I really get the chance to kind of bring them in and give them advice.”
Although every player wants to win championships, Maltais’s decision to return to the Buckeyes for a fifth season revolves more around her connection with Ohio State and her teammates than the potential for glory.
“Loyalty is one of my core values, and I think that Ohio State has done a lot for me, and I want to be loyal to Ohio State,” Maltais said. “You can’t turn down a fifth year at an institution like this, so I just think that it’s not only good for my development, but it’s also good because of everything that has helped me really become who I am in my career and as a person here.”
