Goaltending becomes ‘obsession’ for Brown

Shelby Brown won’t even pretend that signing to play college is anything but a big deal.

The 17-year-old goaltender, who lives in the Nesbitt area south of Brandon and is a graduate of Crocus Plains, will be attending Dakota College at Bottineau and joining the Dakota Jacks women’s hockey team next season.

“It’s an every-day topic,” Brown said. “I keep in touch with coaches, I’m going for a school tour (this week), but I’m also going to see the team and get along with them a bit just so I can understand how they’re doing this year and make sure that everything is ready for me next year …

“It’s unbelievable to me still. My mind can’t wrap around it.”

What makes it even more amazing is that she’s doing it in a position she didn’t even like when she first tried it. Brown, who is five-foot-five and catches with her left hand, started in hockey as a player and had a terrible first experience between the pipes.

“I was honestly thrown into it in the best way possible,” Brown said. “I think it was between atom and novice where everyone played goalie. I hated it at first, and told myself I was never going to do it again. I could barely skate with my goalie pads on.

“I was thrown into it for a second game when the team wanted me to and I started loving it. I told my parents I wanted to play goalie in my second year of atom, and they said OK.

“… It kind of became my obsession when I played it the second time.”

A lot of youngsters balk at being their team’s last line of defence and being counted on so heavily, but Brown sees it completely differently. That became abundantly clear when she played high school hockey with the Crocus boys in 2023-24 when she was in Grade 10, posting a 4.64 goals-against average in 15 appearances with a team that went 10-17-3-0.

“Honestly, I love being under the pressure,” Brown said. “I find that having doubt against me, that she’s a girl and she’s smaller.”

That was compounded by the fact she was the only goalie on teams when she was younger, so being sick or injured just wasn’t an option.

“It didn’t become a hassle, it became an obsession,” Brown said. “From then on, being in net wasn’t a problem because I was in love with it. It’s one of the very first things I can truly say I had a goal for, and I kept going with it.

“That obsession became reality. Even at 17, I still have drive to do what I want to do when I was that young. Even little me had that dream.”

While she doesn’t currently have a goaltending coach, she has improved her game as she’s gotten older. As a smaller goaltender, that means being quicker, positionally sound, and always prepared for the puck.

“I’ve gotten a lot faster being up and being down,” Brown said. “I love to look around people. I love having that person in front. I’m also very gritty in the net.

“I like to push people, and I like to get people out of my way so I can see. I’m very agile in the way I move, I look around the ice and am thought out and very in the moment. I like to worry about what’s happening right now and not worry about the future.”

Brown is suiting up for the Westman Falcons in the A-level Rural Manitoba Female Hockey League, where she has a 1.94 goals-against average despite her club’s record of two wins and three ties.

“I grew up with almost all of these girls,” Brown said of the Wawanesa-based club. “The team chemistry is insanely awesome. We’re all a bunch of girls who like to drive. It doesn’t matter if you’re a brand new, fresh player, we all have that drive. It’s a bunch of girls who want to win, and have each other’s backs regardless of what happens.”

At this point, hockey is her only sport, but that wasn’t always the case.

While she was at Crocus, her other sport was 15s rugby when she was in Grade 11 or 12. She said the high-intensity sport had a positive impact on her hockey.

“I know sevens is a smaller game, but 15s, you still have that running and you’re making tackles,” Brown said. “You gain stamina through rugby — personally, I would gain stamina every game — and it would go into my next season of hockey and my training.

“Watching the pass and watching people around the field would be kind of like being in the net. You’re watching what’s in front, and you have that stamina of getting up and down.”

Her cousin Natalie Williamson of Brandon is also a goaltender, who is in her fifth season with the University of Regina after graduating from the Westman Wildcats.

Brown began thinking about playing post-secondary hockey in Grade 8, and it became a huge mind-set for her in Grade 10. One of the Plainsmen coaches, Jeff Moore, also coached the Assiniboine College Cougars and that lit a fire in her.

“I needed a push to finally find my place and find a school I could go to,” Brown said. “I always watched college hockey growing up, but Grade 8 was when I started watching the good (Division) D1 schools and that was my eye opener. In Grade 10, I started to look for a school that not only wanted me as a player, but wanted me as a person too.

“When I signed in Bottineau, that was my biggest thing, I found a school that wanted me as a player and wanted to take care of me as a person as well.”

She spoke to a couple other schools. She will visit campus for the first time this week, but was in Bottineau to attend their recruitment camp.

“That was when they said, ‘We really want you,’” Brown said. “The way they sat down and talked to me, that they wanted me as a player but also cared about me as a person to sit down and talk with me off ice, that was when I made the decision to go there.

Neil Franklin of Brandon — via Deloraine and Melita — is the school’s head scout. He said it wasn’t a difficult decision to sign the teenager.

“Shelby attended our spring skate and impressed the coaching staff to the point of Shelby committing that day,” Franklin said. “A very hard-working, determined goalie, we are very pleased to have her committed. She has played levels of female hockey and also has played with male teams in the area. Having two goaltenders graduating in 2026, Shelby is a timely welcomed addition.”

Since she is no longer in school, Brown is working this year and getting her drivers licence, while trying to get on the ice lots too. She calls it a prep year for next fall and can’t wait for her big adventure to begin.

“It’s insanely nice,” Brown said. “You always kind of worry about the what-ifs, but to me, it was just having that final say that they wanted me, It was a huge relief.

“Some people don’t even make it to the ACHA level, so to have that opportunity to say I’m going there and I made it, even if it’s not at D1 level yet, it’s still an absolute relief for me and an opportunity that I won’t take for granted.”

» pbergson@brandonsun.com