Felicia Hardy Biography,

[JCarson 744]

Felicia Hardy was born in New York and was raised by her single father Walter Hardy who was in the business of acquiring and trading unique and valuable items. As a result of her father’s unique employment, she spent considerable time with her nanny who happened to be a significant VHL fan. As a result, Felicia Hardy spent much of her childhood immersed in the sport of hockey. 

 

At the age of 3, Felicia got her first pair of skates. Like many things in her young life, skating seemed to come naturally to her and soon she was flying fearlessly around the ice, stick in hand. She joined the local girls’ hockey league and her love of hockey bloomed. 

 

For the most part her younger years were normal for a child obsessed with sport. School during the day, playing hockey in the evening and on weekends. Being somewhat of an absent father, he always made sure to enroll Felicia in the best hockey training schools possible. 

 

Unfortunately, there was always one thing that made Felicia Hardy different than other children her own age. Felicia Hardy was always a large child, hitting a massive growth spurt at age 8 that had her hit 6’1 and by the time she was done growing at 14 she was 6’8.  

 

By high school things had begun to change, Felicia’s height had made her an outcast among the children (she knew her size intimidated them), and they often mocked and ridiculed her, calling her names like The Beast. One day in the middle of grade nine, Felicia was approached by the school’s Physical Education teacher Marv Wolfman, who invited Felicia to try out for the school hockey team. Fueled by the love of the game she agreed to try it out. Her skills coupled with her size made her a natural fit for the team. It was while playing high school hockey that she first took up the position of defender. Marv Wolfman worked with Felicia to teach her everything she needed to know to grow into the position. Spending time helping her build a training plan. He even introduced her to VHL defender and New York American, Zeedayno Chara. 

 

She continued to learn and get better during her high school career, working hard to keep her grades high enough that she would be allowed to play hockey while spending all her time working on her skills. Felicia’s development showed that not only did she have the size to play an intimidating game she also had developed significant skating skills and hand eye co-ordination. Over time the nickname of The Beast faded, to be replaced by several new nick names, Freight Train, Cat Burgler and finally Black Cat. 

 

Throughout her high school career, she was approached by a variety of post-secondary institutions looking at providing her with a scholarship if she would agree to play for them. The issue was that throughout High school Felicia found herself not sure what she would do. Having not been an academic individual she never saw herself going to university and so she tended to push the various post-secondary organizations away. 

 

Felicia graduated and as she could not decide what to do, she decided to spend some time traveling the world. It was while traveling around Europe that she decided to take in a few VHL games. As luck would have it the London United were doing a European swing and she was able to follow them around, city to city catching games. While in London, prior to one of the games she was at the arena early trying to catch some of the players practicing as she was hoping to get some autographs. Finding the rink empty she decided to put on her equipment and take a lap around the ice. It felt good to be out on the professional ice surface cruising around stick in hand. Suddenly she heard a voice yell from around the bench area. Looking in that direction she found herself looking at several of the London United players and coaching staff. Embarrassed, she skated over to get off the ice, apologizing for intruding on their space.  

 

Sitting at the far end of the bench packing up her equipment trying to be as invisible as possible, she couldn’t help but watch as the London players took the ice. She had lost track of things when she felt a hand touch her shoulder. It was at this point she realized that she was going to be in trouble for being there to begin with, trespassing within the facility. She looked up expecting it to be security to there to escort her out but found that it was one of the London United training staff. He introduced himself as the penalty kill coach and was wondering if she would put her equipment back on and join them on the ice as they could use another person to assist in a few defensive drills. Ecstatic Felicia agreed and soon found herself skating with some of her idols. It was a fantastic experience. When practice ended, the coaching staff asked Felicia to come up to the offices. They introduced her to the GM of the London United Team, and he picked up the phone and made a call.  

 

Sitting absolutely stunned with what was happening she heard the London GM talking with someone, saying that he had a young talented player sitting in his office that might make a great VHLM player and hopefully would have a great career. Later that day she went to dinner with the London GM and was introduced to a player agent. This is how everything began.

 

[Triller 1,684]

I remember having Felicia on ice for that practice.  Her sheer size was intimidating even for someone who has seen the biggest the VHL has to offer.

 

As it looks now, I am excited to either play with or against her for at least her rookie season in the VHL.