New York Sirens forward Sarah Fillier takes to the ice for practice during the PWHL Pre-Season Mini Camp in Toronto on Nov. 20. Fillier was the first pick at the 2024 Professional Women’s Hockey League draft.Sammy Kogan /The Globe and Mail
Sarah Fillier says it was a dream come true to hear sports icon Billie Jean King call her name, declaring her the first pick at the 2024 Professional Women’s Hockey League draft. The walk to meet King on stage seemed to take forever, as Fillier weaved through an applauding crowd that June day in Saint Paul, Minn., in the final seconds before she officially became a pro hockey player.
Fillier had already tasted best-on-best play – she had a breakout Olympic performance with Canada en route to gold in 2022, and been chosen MVP at the 2023 world championship. She’d become a regular with Team Canada, and people began calling her the next big talent in women’s hockey. Fillier finished her NCAA career at Princeton University, all the while watching on TV as many of her friends played in the PWHL’s inaugural season.
Finally, Fillier gets to join them. She’s in training camp now, preparing to make her debut on Dec. 1 with the New York Sirens, who had the league’s worst record last year and struggled to fill seats. There is hope that, Fillier, 24, can help the Sirens build a foothold in a crowded sports market.
“Every team I’ve been on, in international or college play, I’ve always expected a lot from myself,” Fillier told The Globe and Mail this week. “It’s a privilege to be able to feel the pressure of being a first overall pick.”
She hasn’t played her first pro game yet, but Fillier already has some big endorsements. Equipment brand CCM signed her alongside Macklin Celebrini, who was selected first in the 2024 NHL Draft by the San Jose Sharks. Fillier also has a deal with Gatorade.
The native of Georgetown, Ont., has always been a precocious talent. She began hockey when she was 3 and played on boys’ teams until she joined an Oakville Hornets girls team at 13. She shone in opportunities to play with older girls.
Fillier, left, skates up the ice in a practice session. Fillier Had a breakout Olympic performance with Canada en route to winning gold in 2022, and was chosen MVP at the 2023 world championship.Sammy Kogan /The Globe and Mail
Jaime Bourbonnais, her teammate in New York and Team Canada, is two years older than Fillier but remembers her Oakville team calling her up when they were teens.
“She was so young, and she was the best player on the ice, even from that age,” Bourbonnais recalled this week at camp. “Every time she gets the puck, she makes something happen.”
She played basketball in high school, plus sprints, hurdles and long jump. She got on the radar of Hockey Canada and U.S. universities. When Princeton coach Cara Morey first visited Georgetown to watch 14-year-old Fillier play hockey, she saw a kid with top skating ability and hockey IQ, who “could see the game way ahead of her peers.”
Fillier was 17 at her first camp with Canada’s senior women’s team. The team assigned her superstar Marie-Philip Poulin as a roommate.
So those inside women’s hockey had known Fillier’s name for a while before she earned wider attention with her big performance in the 2022 Winter Games. Just 21 at the time she potted her first Olympic goal 64 seconds into her debut game, the first of two that day. The youngster was placed on marquee lines with veterans Natalie Spooner and Mélodie Daoust, Poulin and Brianne Jenner. Fillier scored eight goals in Beijing, including a hat trick against Sweden in the quarter-finals.
“It was like, ‘how many Olympics can she play in? And can she become a captain of Team Canada?’” Morey said.
Between the pandemic and Olympic preparations, Fillier was absent from college hockey for two years. Returning to school in late 2022 was challenging.
“The expectations of what you did at the Olympics follow you, and people expect something bigger and better when you move back to college,” Fillier said. “It took me a while to get back into it, plus balancing the academics again. Much harder than I expected.”
Still, she finished her Princeton career with 93 goals and 194 points in 120 NCAA games, including a career-high 30 goals in her senior year. She played there with her twin sister Kayla. For a third time, she was a top-10 finalist for the Patty Kazmaier Award, given to the U.S. women’s college hockey player of the year.
She joins a New York team that notched nine wins and 26 points in 24 regular-season games last season and missed the playoffs. Building a new fan base in one of North America’s busiest sports and entertainment markets was challenging. They also weren’t playing in the Big Apple. The team spread its home games among venues – Prudential Center in Newark, N.J.; Total Mortgage Arena in Bridgeport, Conn.; and UBS Arena on Long Island. In other markets, the PWHL was filling stands and setting attendance records.
The Sirens will make Prudential Center – also home to the NHL’s New Jersey Devils – their home this season. Fillier and some teammates have moved into a three-bedroom apartment a quick drive from both the arena and the team’s practice rink in nearby West Orange.
New York was next-to-last in scoring last year, with 53 goals. That despite having an impressive roster – including Olympians Ella Shelton and Bourbonnais from Canada and Alex Carpenter and Abby Roque of the United States.
The Sirens’ new coach, Greg Fargo, faced Fillier many times in the NCAA as coach at Colgate University.
“She’s incredibly explosive, and you don’t always see her coming or hear her coming,” Fargo said. “When the puck is down deep in the offensive zone, you can lose track of her pretty quickly and she reappears at the right time. And I know from being on the other side of games just how much that can hurt you.”
Morey describes Fillier’s skating “like she’s floating above the ice, it’s so quiet.” Fillier is expert at changing speeds and weaving through players.
Fillier will take to the ice for her first game with the New York Sirens on Dec. 1. Fillier finished her Princeton career with 93 goals and 194 points in 120 NCAA games, including a career-high 30 goals in her senior year.Sammy Kogan /The Globe and Mail
More body contact is allowed in the PWHL than in the NCAA or international women’s hockey, so it’s natural to wonder how the 5-foot-5 Fillier will handle pro defenders looking to mash her into the boards.
“She’s slippery and evasive,” Morey adds. “So it’s not going to be easy to line her up and play the body.”
Fillier is relishing a more physical game.
“I did take a lot of penalties my senior year in college. I think because I was a bit stronger than the 18-year-olds I was playing against,” she said. “So this is exciting. I’m getting into a league where that physicality can be shined and won’t necessarily be punished.”
As other high draft picks signed two- and three-year deals with their teams, Fillier didn’t ink her one-year deal with the Sirens until earlier this month, just before training camp.
“I always knew I was going to end up in New York, and New York always knew that they wanted me,” Fillier said. “I wasn’t really stressed or anything. We just wanted to come to a deal that was going to benefit both of us and make sure that we were both happy.”