Canadian Sarah Fillier's hockey rise has everyone in awe — even her twin sister
CBC
"Are you serious?"
Few people, if anyone, know Canadian hockey star Sarah Fillier better than her twin sister, yet even Kayla Fillier couldn't believe what was unfolding.
Sarah, just 21 at the 2022 Beijing Olympics, had scored twice mere minutes into her debut against Switzerland.
Kayla, who plays alongside Sarah at Princeton University, was watching the game with teammates on campus.
"[We] sat there and kind of laughed a bit," Kayla recalled to CBC Sports. "Like your first game you're going to score that many goals? And I remember going to practice the next day and everyone is kind of like, 'Are you serious?' We knew she was good, but like, that many points in your first Olympic game?"
Sarah finished her Olympic tournament with eight goals, second only behind teammate and MVP Brianne Jenner. Her Beijing breakthrough — and world championship follow-up, where she added seven points in four games as Canada won gold — brought her into focus as potentially Canada's next great hockey player.
Just over one year after winning gold at those Olympics, Sarah is struggling to grapple with her accomplishments herself.
"I'll look at pictures and it kind of seems surreal. You second guess that it actually happened and I still don't really have words for it," she told CBC Sports. "It was a dream come true, and to do it with people who I idolized, like Marie-Philip Poulin and [Natalie] Spooner and Jenner made it even more special."
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Spooner, who played on a line with Fillier and Mèlodie Daoust in Beijing, was equally awestruck.
"We would joke about it after," she told CBC Sports. "We're like, OK, we're going to go out this game and score [on the] first shift again, huh?"
Spooner, 32, first got to know Fillier, now 22, in the year leading up to those Olympics through training together in the summer and then the Olympic centralization period in Calgary.
Spooner said it was their three separate playing styles that made their line mesh so well.
"Melo, she's such a great passer and can really distribute pucks to people. For me, I picture myself as a power forward. So I get the pucks from the corners [and crash] the net front. So I think really if we can get the puck on either Melo or Filly's stick, like if Filly gets a shot, I'll be in front, either to pick up the garbage or to screen."