Angela Ruggiero
Angela Ruggiero
Angela Marie Ruggierois an American ice hockey defenseman. She is a member of the International Olympic Committee and was a member of the United States women's national ice hockey team, medaling in four successive Winter Olympic Games, including one Gold medal, two Silver, and one Bronze. She competed in ten Women's World Championships winning four Gold medals and six Silver. She also authored a memoir about her hockey experiences called Breaking the Ice. She also was a contestant on the...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionHockey Player
Date of Birth3 January 1980
CountryUnited States of America
Shari's a player you see who has made tremendous strides in the last couple of years. She was always a good college goalie, but there are a lot of good college goalies out there. She's worked hard. She's in peak shape. Coach couldn't ask for more. A lot of it for her is getting experience between the pipes because that position is so mental.
It's taken away from hockey. That wasn't hockey today, in my opinion. That was power play and penalty kill. And it brought me back to last Olympics, when it was no rhythm. It was power play and penalty kill. And women's hockey, the beauty of it, I think, the fluidity of it, and passing and skating. When you have power play and penalty kill, that's all systems ... so we haven't had that much opportunity to work that.
We know this is sort of their gold-medal game. If they beat us, they'll have a higher medal than they've ever had. ... We work on focus in sports psych, so this is the time we need it.
I'm really happy we've had these close games, because Canada hasn't had these types of battles.
After they scored, we all reminded ourselves what we had dedicated our lives to and settled down and played like we knew we could.
I'm upset that Canada has been running up the score , especially against the host nation. There was no need for that. They're trying to pad their stats.
It's hard to build the game when it's being played like this. I'm here to promote our game on the biggest stage it's got, and it's not the best hockey in the world when the teams are so different.
It's happened two Olympics in a row. Will it be three?
They are the reason I play hockey. I play hockey to beat Canada.
We lost in the semifinals, but we still wanted to bring home a medal to the United States.
We were excited to win the game and excited to win a medal, but I think maybe in the back of our heads we wished we were playing (against Canada). But we're still proud of ourselves.
Before, I was the baby of the team and now, even though I'm not the oldest, I have more experience than almost anyone, ... I'll never be able to fill their shoes, but I know my role has changed a little bit. Their legacy has inspired every single person on this team.
At the beginning of the Games, we were looking to win one color and, in the end, we're taking home a different one.
The resilience of this team, the character we showed in coming back and beating Finland yesterday, we're all proud of ourselves in the fact that we're bringing the U.S. home a medal, It was great for us to start off strong, and I think we scored like two minutes, 30 seconds into the game, a good testament to the team that we were really refocusing and really went hard right from the beginning.