For Winnipeg’s Sophie Vandale, life as she knows it has always included some form of hockey – and not just any house league or recreational pickup game either.
We’re talking AAA, high school, U-Sports and now, wait for it… professional hockey.
Yes, the 23-year-old who grew up in Winnipeg’s St. James neighbourhood has found herself a new home for the 2022-23 season. Vandale will continue travelling east following her five years at the University of Prince Edward Island, all the way to Ingolstadt, Germany – a south-central city of 140,000 residents in Bavaria.
“I feel like it hasn’t really hit me yet,” Vandale told Game On. “It doesn’t feel like I’m going to be a professional hockey player, because growing up you never really hear about it. I think it’s really nice for younger girls to see that it is possible to follow your dreams and play hockey professionally overseas.”
You may recognize Ingolstadt as the location from Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel, ‘Frankenstein’, or, rather, recall Ingolstadt as the site of the Audi Forum – AKA, the headquarters of the massive luxury sports car manufacturer and the world-renowned Audi museum.
But for Vandale’s friends and family, it will be the new home of one of Winnipeg’s finest female hockey players – at least for half of the ERC Ingolstadt Panthers’ 20 regular season games.
“It’s a small, but very competitive league,” the 5-foot-5 defender said. “There are only six teams and as for travel, you either play a doubleheader at home or two on the road. Playoffs are in March, and because Ingolstadt won the league last year, we were given an invite to an invitational tournament in Switzerland this coming September. From all I have heard, it is quite competitive and I am really looking forward to it.”
For Vandale, the location of Ingolstadt and the female DFEL Bundesliga didn’t exactly fall in her lap, but instead it was an ongoing commitment process following a lengthy period of self-recruiting and the various processes associated with it.
“I feel like it’s really hard for females to venture off to Europe,” she said. “Especially because European teams don’t really know which players are graduating and who actually wants to go play overseas. So, in all honesty, they really don’t reach out to you first.”
Vandale actually went on a podcast and spoke about both her willingness to find a professional team overseas, but also the difficulty in tracking down contacts on team and league websites written solely in foreign languages. But soon enough she was connected with Jaclyn Hawkins of Women’s Hockey Life in Ontario, who seemingly saved the day.
“Jaclyn gave me a spreadsheet of every single women’s team from the German, Austrian, Finnish and Swiss leagues,” Vandale recalled. “From there I looked up the rosters to see which teams were losing players and then began sending out emails. I had a few Facetime calls with various teams, but this one German coach, we talked for over two hours. After sending him all my game clips, we Facetimed again and I told him I would accept his offer for this coming season.”
Having spent the past five years with the University of Prince Edward Island Panthers, Vandale will remain a Panther in Germany – something she found rather amusing through the overview process when contacting various clubs.
“Yeah, I was with the PEI Panthers and now ERC is also the Panthers, it’s pretty funny how that worked out,” she laughed. “One of my old teammates from a long time ago also played for one of the league teams in Germany – not the Panthers – but also just loved her experience there too. Everyone I have talked to that has gone to Europe has said it has been great.”
The former Winnipeg Avros AAA star will look to bring some strong defensive play to the Panthers’ blueline as well as her leadership qualities – something she has been able to develop over her time wearing the green and white on the island.
“I didn’t know anyone in PEI and just thought it would be a really neat experience to get out of my comfort zone and meet new people and go somewhere I had never been before,” she said of leaving Manitoba to play for a very Maritime-dominant university.
As a matter of fact, she was voted in as the Panthers' team captain for the 2021-22 season – a distinction she will not soon forget.
“It was obviously an honour to get selected,” Vandale said. “The past two captains were from Ontario, so I knew it was possible to step into that role, even being from out of province. It was a bit interesting though, as islanders do like seeing a fellow islander as their leader, but we had assistants who were from the island, so that was really nice.”
Now having graduated from UPEI with a Bachelor of Education in French, Vandale has done some primary school subbing at the end of the 2021-22 school year while also currently working at Winnipeg’s Camp Manitou. But she was greeted with a very interesting employment proposition from her new coach in Germany upon her contract finalization.
“After I told him I was a teacher, he actually sent my résumé out to a couple of different connections,” she said. “Sure enough, I was offered a job teaching French to Grade 7 and 11 students with an international school. Normally that would have been a job that I’d take, being such a cool opportunity in a different country and all. But with a new curriculum and a different age group than I’m used to teaching, as well as playing hockey, I knew it would be a bit too much. So then my coach said he could also set us up with a part-time office job, which I think would be nice to have some additional money on the side and give me something to do as well, when I’m not travelling.”
With a somewhat relaxed hockey schedule, Vandale is looking forward the opportunity to explore Germany and its surroundings, but hockey, of course, will remain the priority.
“It’s definitely something to move away from home within the country, but to go to Europe I think it will be a whole different experience, culture and language,” she said. “I am hoping to try to learn some German while there. We don’t play every single weekend, so our coach will let us travel to different countries. Obviously, the fact that the countries are so close to each other will make it a lot easier to travel. I am really excited for that.”
Having been coaching girls hockey over the past while in PEI, Vandale continues to push herself and her career forward as a pioneer in North American women’s hockey. Understanding the significance of her decision to travel overseas is one thing, but helping to show a younger generation of female hockey players that anything is possible, no matter the gender or believed stereotypes, is another fact of the matter, altogether.
“They want you to think that it’s only a ‘guy thing’ to go to Europe and play hockey,” Vandale said. “I really hadn’t heard of many girls going over to Europe to play hockey, and truthfully, we aren’t at the exact same equal playing fields yet. But if I can somehow get to Europe by playing hockey, that’s like my end goal, right? I’ve been coaching and have been trying to show the girls that this is what you can do when you get older. Dads are always great to have as coaches, but it’s also nice to have females who have been through the systems and can coach you too.”
Comments