'Role model': USA forward Abby Roque's Winter Olympics experience groundbreaking for Indigenous player
CORRECTIONS AND CLARIFICATIONS: A previous version of this story misstated Abby Roque's historical significance for the U.S. Olympic program. She is the first Indigenous player to suit up for the U.S. Olympics women's hockey team.
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Part of Paste BN's 10 to watch series profiling some of America's top athletes competing at the Beijing Olympics
The Olympian ran through drills in the old hockey barn during four mornings the week of Christmas to stay fresh.
Abby Roque's workouts inside Pullar Stadium were supposed to be private. Her father, Jim, and two local college players would join her during the brief break she had from the U.S. women's national team camp in Minnesota ahead of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.
Word travels fast in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, when it has to do with Roque these days.
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From Feb. 3-17, the town will "Turn the Soo Red, White & Blue," a campaign that apparently intends to "Roque The Soo" — residents are encouraged to show their support for Roque and the U.S. women's hockey team with window decorations, homemade signs and employee dress days.
After one training session, Roque signed an award for a local player. It was called "The Abby Roque Award." She took a picture with a different girl who stopped by the rink in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula on another day.
“To see their eyes, to see Abby, it was just a cool thing, the impact she has on these young girls,” Jim Roque told Paste BN Sports by phone.
By the end of February, there will be thousands more young people with eyes on Abby Roque, the first Indigenous player to suit up for the U.S. women's hockey team at the Olympics. Her impact will stretch much farther than the Upper Peninsula – she can influence a community that rarely receives representation from one of the biggest sporting events in the world.
Being “first” through a glass ceiling is never easy. It always brings attention. Answering the cloned, repeated questions about who you are, with the biggest games of your career on the horizon, can be tiring.
“At the same time,” Roque (pronounced "rock") told Paste BN Sports, “I’m grateful for the opportunity to have a platform to speak up and to make it known that there is an Indigenous player on this team, just doing her best to make sure that there is a physical player to look up to and to make sure that other kids growing up know that they can play hockey and it can do amazing things for you.”
Plus, it was only a generation ago her family hardly acknowledged their Indigenous identity.
“So you really have to be appreciative of the opportunity,” she said.
Abby Roque's hockey DNA
Roque’s in-game personality, compared to who she is off the ice, couldn’t be any more different.
“On the ice,” Roque said, “I can be a pain.”
The forward, who figures to slot in as a third-line center for Team USA, plays with an edge.
The moment the game is over, though, Roque is all smiles in the handshake line. Playing with boys will teach you that balance.
“That’s how she had to survive,” said 1980 U.S. men’s gold-medal winner Mark Johnson, her college coach. “She had to be gritty. She had to be strong on her feet. She had to (withstand) checks from guys that were obviously much bigger and stronger than her and figure out how to play at that level. So if someone wants to get pissed, she’ll probably be the first person to get pissed right in there with you.”
U.S. national team coach Joel Johnson experienced this during Roque’s collegiate playing days. Then an assistant at the University of Minnesota, Johnson would chirp Roque as she skated past the opposing bench; he’d previously coached her on the team that won gold at the 2015 U-18 world championships.
“She would chirp right back,” Johnson told Paste BN Sports. “And yet at the end of the game, there was always a big smile — win or lose.”
Offering scouting reports on Roque, evaluators point out her mind first – the innate instincts, the heightened hockey IQ.
As the daughter of a coach, it makes sense. The “best thing” Jim Roque can say about his daughter, the player, is that she prioritizes the front of the jersey – the type of teammate who is more excited when others score.
“She’s always been a playmaker and extra pass person – drives me crazy at times,” he said with a laugh.
The “most important thing” – and there’s a difference – is the desire to win, Jim Roque said. Listed at 5-foot-7 and 180 pounds, Roque is not the biggest player. She’s probably not the fastest, either, said Joel Johnson.
“But if you challenge her to a footrace, she somehow wins. If you challenge her in the corner, she somehow comes out with the puck. When she needs to make a play, she makes it,” Johnson marveled. “So whether it’s winning a faceoff, or winning a defensive battle, or creating an offensive chance, she somehow manages to get the job done in every aspect.”
The making of an Olympian
The main goal, of course, is not eyeballs. It's gold.
Roque was a sophomore at the University of Wisconsin, leading the Women’s College Hockey Association (WCHA) in points (41), while the U.S. women defeated rival Canada in a dramatic shootout to capture gold at the 2018 Games in PyeongChang, South Korea. She helped the Badgers win a national championship the next season. The pandemic cut short her senior season, but she was a top three finalist for the Patty Kazmaier Award, given to the top player in the country.
Roque began skating on the backyard rink Jim Roque constructed in their backyard once they moved to Sault Ste. Marie in 2001. (The home rink at Lake Superior is named after Clarence "Taffy" Abel, an Ojibwe Native American who won a silver medal at the 1924 Olympics and played in the NHL.)
Receiving help along the way is essential to Roque’s origin story. As the lone female on her teams growing up, coaches made sure she felt comfortable and had her own dressing room.
And even though it's his occupation to scout and evaluate hockey talent now, Jim Roque had no idea there was a star in the making in his own backyard. It wasn’t until his younger daughter was 14 and was invited to a regional camp in Detroit and then a national camp in Rochester, New York, that he became aware of her potential.
Fast-forward a decade, and Roque positioned herself so that a pair of recent injuries couldn’t even keep her off the 23-person Beijing roster. She broke her ankle during an October exhibition, and after she recovered from surgery, a slap shot in one of her first practices back shattered her left middle finger. Roque is expected to be at full health for the Winter Games.
To be her best, she needs to tap into her natural creativity on the ice.
“She’ll try anything. She’s done some amazing things with pucks and plays,” her father said. “I love that about her.”
That doesn’t mean he’s unafraid to motivate.
“I told Abby, ‘If you’re going to beat Canada, you’re going to have to have some impact. You’re a good enough player that you’re going to have to do something, step up and play well,’” he said. “She’s that type of player. And if they’re going to win, she’s going to have to do something, she can’t just be along for the ride.”
Embracing Indigenous roots
Jim Roque’s family is part of the Wahnapitae First Nation, an Ojibwe band located in Ontario, Canada. And for most of her life, Abby Roque never thought much of her Indigenous background.
Just across the Canada-U.S. border (but about four hours from the Wahnapitae’s reservation), Sault Ste. Marie (pronounce "Soo") has an American Indian population of 11.6%, according to the latest U.S. Census data from 2020.
“When I was younger, it just kind of, I knew who I was and I was surrounded by other Indigenous players and kids in my community,” Roque said. “It wasn’t uncommon to see other Indigenous players playing hockey, it was a very common thing. I don’t think it was until college that it really clicked for me, how rare it is to make it at this level as an Indigenous player.”
In some ways, it’s the opposite of how her father grew up. As a kid, Jim Roque’s mother told him and his siblings to not divulge their Native background while they grew up in Killarney, Ontario. She feared her children would be subjected to discrimination, or worse, they would be placed into the Indian residential school system.
“To realize that my mother went through that stress, worrying about my brother and two sisters, if something was going to happen to us, if we were going to get taken out of the home,” Jim Roque said. “I never lived in fear, but just thinking back to my mother and how she lived through that, that was kind of crazy.”
Those concerns are not foreign to Crystal EchoHawk, a member of the Pawnee Nation of Oklahoma who serves as the CEO of IllumiNative, a women-led organization that empowers Native people to pursue justice and equity for their communities.
From 2016-18, EchoHawk’s group conducted a comprehensive research project to better understand American views of Native Americans.
“The biggest thing that we found is that the majority of Americans know very little about Native Americans,” she said.
About 80% of respondents were not sure the race still existed.
“I think if you ask any Native American in this country, they feel that, every single day,” EchoHawk said.
That makes EchoHawk grateful for an athlete like Roque. The Olympic platform matters.
“So many of our young people never get to see Indigenous peoples in sports, on TV, in film, across the board,” EchoHawk said. “So we’ve seen our representation really begin to break through in the last couple years.”
A 'role model'
Zach Whitecloud, an Indigenous player with the NHL’s Vegas Golden Knights, noted that Roque’s representation will not only be apparent to younger people. Parents watch, too.
“It’s arguably the biggest stage on the planet for sports,” he told Paste BN Sports. “For her to earn a spot on that team and represent our culture and our people … is hard to describe in terms of how that’ll reach.
“They’re going to look at her as a role model.”
Roque’s extended family will be paying attention, especially Jim’s brother, Larry Roque. Actually, make that “Chief Larry.”
While they didn't always embrace their roots, the Roque family always kept them. Older members of the family began moving back to the Wahnapitae community. Larry Roque decided to become more involved, as did his children.
“It grew on me,” Larry Roque said. “Eventually, I just moved out here. It’s a nice beautiful place to grow up. It’s quiet. Even though we didn't grow up with the culture, which is a sad thing, we’re bringing it back. I want to help bring it back and help the community get recognized and do greater things up here.”
One day last month, the chief met with his counterparts from other First Nation bands and one asked if he was related to the Olympian Abby Roque.
“I told him who she was and they’re all proud of her,” Larry Roque said. “All First Nations are proud of any member that makes it and goes on to have a successful career, in anything, not even just sports. Anything they do. It can be acting. It can be singing. We’re all proud of each other’s members, no matter where they come from.”
And the people are supporting Abby Roque – and not just with well wishes. Roque wrote a letter to the band asking for financial support (Chief Larry recused himself) to train prior to these Games, and she received an undisclosed amount (a Wahnapitae spokesperson said the financial terms are not available).
“You kind of have that connection and you have all the support back home, you wanna just play, not just for your country, but the Indigenous community – the young girls, the young boys,” said First Nations member Brandon Montour of the NHL’s Florida Panthers. “It just gives it that extra motivation, that whether you’re Canadian or American, anything is possible.”
And Roque wants to pay it forward. She sees a lane to help make hockey more accessible, not only for the Indigenous community, but for young people of all backgrounds. She’s not afraid to admit that hockey can be intimidating and unwelcoming. In the past week, two racist incidents against Black players have been made public professional hockey in North America.
“I think it’s about getting kids with sticks and sports and gloves and teaching them the basics of hockey, so if they go up to the rink they’re not going to be embarrassed, or not feel like they don’t belong,” she said. “And then making sure that when you get to the rink, everybody (there) is inclusive. Because maybe you go to the rink and you don’t know hockey, and you feel like an outsider, because it is a hard sport to learn and pick up – just making sure that kids can go to the rink and be OK with that.”
Jim Roque wants her to understand that she has a voice, and that she should use it to speak out for what she believes in. To talk about her experiences. To motivate.
And whether it’s hockey, other sports or even non-athletic endeavors, EchoHawk believes there is an Indigenous youth like Abby Roque prepared to enter the spotlight.
“So what do we need to do to make sure they get (that) access to opportunities to shine and excel in the way that Abby has?” EchoHawk said. “And she’s really helping to open the door for that.”