Elite Prospects

Lily Roberts’ obsession with sticks, pucks and blind passes began on the suburban rinks of East Coast America. While most children were happy just to keep practising their figure eights, Lily wouldn’t stop looking over the barrier at the ice hockey players. “I thought ‘no thanks very much!’ because of all the gear and training,” says her mother, Liz. “But Lily really persisted. The decision to play came entirely from her. She loved the thrill and speed; it really captured her.”

Lily played in the States for four years before returning to Australia aged 11. The small pool of players here means she must compete in a mixed team. At the end of July, she was one of only two females on the winning NSW U15 team at the National Ice Hockey Championships. In October, she played for NSW again, this time in the Women’s National Ice Hockey Championship. The team won bronze and Lily was awarded the Most Valuable Player for NSW. She also plays for the Sydney Bears in both the U15 Mixed Team and the Women’s Team and is in the squad for the Sydney Sirens, who play in the Australian competition in summer.

But the real excitement for Lily came back in June when she helped Australia win a bronze medal at the 2022 IIHF Ice Hockey U18 Women’s World Championship Division II tournament in Istanbul.

Nine countries were represented: the Netherlands, Great Britain, Latvia, Kazakhstan, Iceland, Spain, Turkey, Mexico and Australia, with Spain finally taking the gold.

At just 14, Lily was the youngest age eligible to represent her country. She and her teammates surprised the Australian ice hockey community by beating the Netherlands and Latvia on their journey to third place - the first Australian team to do so.

It was an achievement made more significant by the fact that, while all members of the team were Australian citizens, a number live and play overseas. When they met in Turkey, they only had a few warm-up matches to gel as a group before the international competition began.

“Everyone puts in 100%. People who play ice hockey love ice hockey and put their heart and soul into every training and every game,” Lily says. “And we are also really close - not only all the Australian players but the international players as well. At the world competition in Istanbul, we joined the Turkish team for their traditional dance, and when it was over, we went on a boat cruise with the team from the Netherlands. I am still in contact with quite a few of the girls I met.”

The matches were streamed live on YouTube, so Lily’s Wenona friends and their families could watch from wherever they were and make encouraging comments from afar. But her biggest fan is her father. “He learned about ice hockey from watching me play and has driven me for hundreds of hours to matches across NSW and interstate. He now even manages our Under 15 team.”