Color of Hockey: 'Bar is being raised' for Puerto Rico women

William Douglas has been writing The Color of Hockey blog since 2012. Douglas joined NHL.com in 2019 and writes about people of color in the sport. Today, he profiles the Puerto Rico Ice Hockey Association’s first women’s national program training camp, held in Aston, Pennsylvania, June 10-11.

Any notion Sabrina Honeycutt had that the Puerto Rico Ice Hockey Association’s first national women’s program training camp was going to be an easy skate evaporated the moment she stepped onto the ice.

“Oh my gosh, I was shocked because when I heard ‘summer camp,’ I was like, ‘Oh, this is going be light work,’” said Honeycutt, a forward with Liberty University’s American Collegiate Hockey Association Division II women’s team in Lynchburg, Virginia. “It was skating 100 percent, like, for two hours, getting better.”

Coach Lee M.J. Elias put more than 30 players through the rigorous two-day camp at IceWorks Skating Complex in Aston Township, Pennsylvania, in June to assess the progress of PRIHA’s women’s program and gauge the level of talent in a Puerto Rican hockey pipeline that stretches across North America.

“I did about four hours of exit interviews with all the players, including the NCAA players, and I heard multiple times, ‘I wish I had come into the camp in more shape or in more preparation for the camp,’” Elias said. “That tells me that the bar is being raised. They could have easily said, ‘Oh, wow, this was tiring,’ or ‘This is too much.’  Instead, the comments were, ‘I’ve got to make sure I'm even in better shape next year for this camp.’ It just shows you how we're raising the bar each and every time we step on the ice.”

Elias is pressing for Puerto Rico to achieve its objective of someday competing in women’s and men’s International Ice Hockey Federation world championships and, eventually, the Winter Olympics.

“Our growth over the last year has been substantial, not just in new players, but in talent,” he said. “The task is on me to kind of build a culture where we can have a lot of different talent levels on the same team, all fighting for the same goal. In a camp like this, that’s part of the messaging, the ability to come together under one flag.” 

An IIHF associate member since Sept. 29, 2022, Puerto Rico won a gold medal at 2025 IIHF Ice Hockey Federation 2025 Women’s 3X3 Series on Nov. 17 in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where it defeated Argentina 7-6 in overtime to avenge a 7-3 loss to the Argentines in the gold medal game of the inaugural IIHF Women’s 3x3 Series in Sao Paulo in November 2024.

The June 10-11 camp in Pennsylvania featured NCAA and college club hockey athletes, elite Under-19 and Under-16 players, along with youth players.

Julia Echavarria, a goalie with NCAA Division III William Smith College in Geneva, New York, said she was surprised by the number of players who attended the camp and their skill level.

“It shows that we have a place to showcase our skill," Echavarria said, "we have a place to come together and share our culture and share our love for hockey and share other values, like teamwork, camaraderie, things like that. 

"I think it's super important for Puerto Rican girls to have an avenue like this, because you know, you don't exactly picture ice when you think of Puerto Rico.”

The camp is part of a busy summer for the women’s program and PRIHA. Its women’s and men’s teams head to Montreal for the second stage of the Challenger Series at Sportplexe Pierrefonds beginning on Thursday.

The summer tournament includes women’s teams representing Puerto Rico, Lebanon and Greece. The men’s bracket features teams representing Puerto Rico, Greece, Jamaica and Lebanon. 

A women’s team from Apna Hockey, an initiative that provides a network and support for South Asian hockey players in Canada, will play exhibition games at the tournament.

Puerto Rico’s women will look for their first win in the series after losing three games in Chicago May 8-11.

“I think the camp helped us realize what we need to improve on,” Honeycutt said. “It helped us with endurance, edges, skill work, stick handling, shooting, everything.”

PRIHA travels to San Juan Aug. 5-9 to host Fiesta de Hockey, an event to help grow the game on the U.S. territory island. 

“We have a roller/deck rink now,” Elias said. “We're going to be touring the island to show our hockey development side of things, but also to help the players connect to the island. It's really important that they understand who and what they're representing when they put that jersey on.”