Kelly Béchard began her career as an ice hockey forward at the age of five, when her uncle needed more players for the boy’s team he was coaching in Sedley, Saskatchewan. For a long time, however, she focused her athletic talent on badminton, rising to the rank of provincial champion in doubles while she was still in high school. She began focusing more on her hockey career, joining Team Saskatchewan in 1993, and played one season with the University of Calgary’s women’s hockey team in 1997-1998, where she won the Canadian Interuniversity Athletics Union’s Award of Merit. She soon moved to Team Alberta and captured five national medals between 1999 and 2004: two gold (2001 and 2003), two silver (1999 and 2004) and one bronze (2000). After joining Team Canada, she won gold medals in 2000, 2001, 2004 and 2007 at the ice hockey World Championships (she also won silver at the 2005 and 2008 World Championships), and again in 2002 as a member of the Canadian team at the Winter Olympics. In the latter tournament, she played in five games, but scored no goals. For the 2004-2005 season she played with the Calgary Oval X-Treme of the Western Women’s Hockey League (a team that she has played on and off with since before the Olympics), before moving to the National Women’s Hockey League with the Brampton Thunder (2005-2006), and then the Mississauga Aeros (2006-2008). Prior to the Olympics, she had studied management at the University of Calgary, and completed her degree after the Games.
Canada