Snikeris Heading to Camp

Before she heads back to New Haven for the 2008-09 academic year, sophomore goaltender Jackee Snikeris (Downingtown, Pa.) is going to camp. Snikeris is among a select group of goalies invited to USA Hockey's inaugural Warren Strelow National Team Goaltending Camp August 21-24 at the National Team Training Center in Ann Arbor, Mich. 
 
All goaltenders invited to the Warren Strelow Camp are under consideration to play for USA Hockey at the highest levels of international competition. The camp is for the top female and male goaltenders in the country and features both on-ice and off-ice work with multiple coaches. Joe Exter, the former Merrimack goalie who played professionally in the Pittsburgh Penguins organization, is USA Hockey's National Team Goaltending Coach.
 
Snikeris, who turns 20 in November, was the youngest of the four goalies invited to USA Hockey's Under-22 camp earlier this summer. She is coming off an impressive freshman campaign for Yale, having set the school record for single-season goals-against average (2.18) and posted the fourth-best single-season save percentage in school history (.921). A five-time USA Hockey player development camp pick when she played for the Taft School and the Connecticut Polar Bears prior to coming to Yale, Snikeris was honorable mention All-Ivy League and an ECAC Hockey All-Academic selection in 2007-08.
 
Yale has an extensive history with U.S. women's national teams. Rising senior defenseman Helen Resor (Greenwich, Conn.), who was on the U.S. U-22 Select Team from 2003-2005, played for the U.S. in the 2006 Olympics and has also played for the U.S. in two IIHF Women's World Championships. Rising senior forward Crysti Howser (Wilmette, Ill.) is playing for the U.S. U-22 Team in a three-game series vs. Canada Aug. 20-23, the second year in a row she has been a part of that series. Head coach Hilary Witt played on the U.S. National Team in 2000-01 and was an assistant coach with the U.S. team in 2006-07, earning a silver medal at the 2007 IIHF World Championship. Former Yale men's hockey assistant coach Ben Smith coached Team USA at the Olympics three times, winning a gold medal in 1998, and now serves as a national team advisor. Forward Maria Dennis '88 was on the 1990 U.S. Women's National Team, and goaltender Laurie Belliveau '98 was on the 1999 U.S. Women's National Team.
 
USA Hockey's Goaltending Camp is named after Warren Strelow, who helped coach the goalies on the gold medal-winning U.S. "Miracle on Ice" team at the 1980 Olympics. Strelow also coached in the NHL, working with stars such as Martin Brodeur. Strelow passed away in 2007.