Taking a fondness for blue and gold to another level

You might be aware that Charline Labonte, the Canadian women's hockey team goalie,, plays in the CIS with the McGill Martlets.

The Windsor Lancers have the next-best thing to an Olympic hockey gold medallist: Their lineup now boasts defenceman Frida Nevalainen, who was on the silver medal-winning Swedish team in Turin. The name is admittedly new to me, but the memory of tearing up in February 2006 when Sweden upset Team USA in that semi-final shootout at the Olympics is not. You know me, I am typically one-quarter overjoyed by Swedish sports triumphs, plus I was on emotional overload from some personal stuff that week.

Nevalainen, 20, has already played a few games for the Lancers, but was introduced to the media earlier this week with fellow international student-athletes Sasha Lazic of Serbia (men's basketball) and Iva Peklova (women's b-ball) and Johanna Wernerssson (women's hockey) from the Czech Republic. Crazy.

Related:
Lancers lure Europeans (Mary Caton, Windsor Star)