“If you can come to any game this season, you should come to the outdoor game.”
That’s a message that Buffalo Beauts defender Dominique Kremer relayed to family and friends in Louisiana before gearing up for her third season in the Premier Hockey Federation. They listened, and last Friday night the captain had seven more fans at RiverWorks to watch her play.
“They came here and knew right away they weren’t in Louisiana anymore,” joked Kremer, noting the 30-degree temperatures and snow that greeted her guests on arrival. “My four friends from Louisiana had never seen me play in person before. It’s one thing to watch on a screen, but to see us live and for them to see people wearing my jersey, makes everything so real and so exciting. The outdoor game experience is just an absolute blast. It was really cool for them to experience that.”
Kremer calls Louisiana home but grew up in Iowa and has also lived in North Dakota. Despite life in Midwest states with frozen ponds around her, last season’s classic was the first time she ever skated outdoors.
“Everyone thought I was joking,” she laughed. “It was even more of a special time for me in that sense because I had never done anything like it before. I love it. The venue is so fun, and it just makes for an all-around awesome experience. It’s that one game that all our fans come together and cheer for us. It really is a different atmosphere and level of support that we get in that game.”
The event is dubbed the Buffalo Believes Outdoor Classic, which is a fitting play on words for many reasons. Despite the unfavorable result for Kremer and the Beauts in last Friday’s edition, the 25-year-old can find the silver lining and belief that better days are ahead.
“The outcome wasn’t what we wanted but it was also a super fun game, a super close game, and competitive, as every game in the PHF has gone so far,” said Kremer. “I’m a big believer there is a plan for everything and that everything falls into place as it should, and I trust the process.”
Following weekend losses to Toronto, the Beauts remain in last place with just one win and four points through six games heading into the holiday break.
“Ideally we don’t want to walk into next year being at the bottom of the standings, but I’ve come to find that the Beauts love facing adversity and we love making it difficult on ourselves and have that uphill battle,” said Kremer. “I genuinely believe we’ve been in every single game that we’ve played. I don’t think that anyone is head and shoulders above us and everyone on the team strongly believes that too.”
The six games the Beauts have played to this point are the fewest among the league’s seven teams, unaided by a November postponement. An optimistic Kremer notes how the outdoor game can function as a motivator and the second half schedule may work to their advantage.
“I think we’re going to hit a point and really take off and there will be no holding us back,” she said. “We’re going through a similar situation as last year where we have a really light first half of our schedule. We’re experiencing a lot of similar things, and it’s winding up our schedule to create a really heavy, busy second half of the season. I think that will work in our favor. We’ll just get in a rhythm and be in that game mode confidently. I do think the outdoor game is a turning point. It felt like we were still in preseason, barely playing any games and just practicing all the time. I think everyone, especially our newcomers, got to see the level of support and love that our fans have for us in that moment, and it really brought people together.”
Kremer says it took a moment in between periods at RiverWorks where the team looked at themselves and knew they had to step up.
“We knew we had more, and it just took for us to acknowledge it,” she said. “No more excuses. Let’s get out there and let’s be better. I’m hoping that will filter into the rest of the season.”
Anybody that watched the outdoor game surely saw a difference in how Buffalo attacked the second period. The momentum continued into Saturday’s game where they pushed top ranked Toronto to the brink. It’s a sign that the pendulum can swing towards the Beauts, who rank fourth in PHF goals-per-game after finishing at the bottom a year ago.
“There were a lot of games last year where if we weren’t scoring first, it was tough for us to get anything back,” said Kremer. “This year, I never count our team out regardless of what the score is or regardless of how the momentum feels or what the situation is. We all want to fight back, and I think that’s universal across the board. Everybody on this team does not accept losing.”
Kremer got her first goal of the season on Saturday, a welcome relief for the reigning Defender of the Year who led all PHF blue liners with six snipes during the 2021-22 campaign.
“Personally, I always want to do more,” she said. “I enjoy scoring and putting up points and helping my team in that way, so in that sense I’m slightly frustrated in that I want to do more for my team. I’m happy with my defensive game and I would say on that side I’m playing better than I ever have, but I would like to kick my offensive game into gear a little bit more. I think everybody on the team is in that mindset. We’re all kind of feeling that pressure, but also ownership that these are the expectations that we have of ourselves and how we want to help the team.”
In addition to her award-winning accolades, Kremer holds the distinction as being the first player in PHF history to sign a two-year contract. Like all players, she is excited by the announcement of a salary cap increase to $1.5 million next season and what the future holds for the league and sport.
“This is great news for women’s hockey, and this is exactly what we wanted,” she said. “I’m just stoked knowing that we keep taking these steps towards having a sustainable league. I believe next year we can pretty much have almost everybody making a livable wage, and I think that’s huge to say that our full-time job is hockey.”
Any excitement for next season and beyond hasn’t swayed Kremer from her belief and commitment to Buffalo and showing people that this year’s group is capable of a second-half surge.
“We’re not counting ourselves out so I would tell others not to count us out either. 2023 will bring on a lot of good things for us.”
Cover photo by Mike Hetzel
