Good evening everyone & thank you for having me.

First, Congratulations to ALL of the inductees this evening.

I’m honored to be here today to introduce my team mate, my training partner, my warm up
buddy, my motivator, my captain, and my closest friend… Katie Baker.

I had the good fortune of meeting Katie Baker on the Junior National Field Hockey Team in 2004
at the Pearson Airport. At that time, athletes from across Canada would meet at the Airport to
travel on tour, so we’d frequently be meeting our teammates for the first time. As you can tell I
am much younger than Katie… so I was a rookie on the team and this was my first tour.
Well it was just my luck that I got seated on the plane beside Katie, in a section just the two of
us. Little did I know, this 14 hours flight to Santiago, Chile would be the start of a lifelong
friendship.

As I reflected on your illustrious career Katie, perhaps I should have known all along you would
end up in the Hall of Fame, there were many clues from the very beginning. Looking back, I
realized I learned quite a few things on that fateful plane ride about miss Katie Baker, all of
which still hold true today:

The First thing I learned was that she’s charmingly friendly- she strutted up to the team in her
cowboy hat, a big smile and a classic Heyyyyyya Girls! This became a very quintessential Katie
Baker move. Immediately once we boarded the plane together, I found out she had no idea
where Santiago Chile was… well that made two of us.

Which leads me to my second learning; she has the right amount of blind faith! An athlete needs
that to compete and survive a long career. As it turns out she’d have a similar attitude when
were walking out to the pitch to play the #1 team in the world Argentina, and Katie would match
up with the #1 Player in the world Luciana Aymar. She’d look over at me and say ‘Let’s Go Bird’.
Perfect amount of blind Faith.

I also learned on that plane ride that she leads with Connection. It took her 5 whole minutes to
have asked all about me to find a point of mutual connection. And it turns out it was that we both
love Plane Food! This exceptional quality would allow her to welcome new teammates, bring
others into her sphere, and create unity across teams. Connection is something Katie drove and
led throughout her career, no matter the team or her position.

The final thing I learned- even though we were strapped to our seats on the plane- was that
she’s fiercely competitive. Best exemplified by the speed & haste to which she ate my bread roll
and butter when I hadn’t touched it in the first 10 seconds….

‘if you’re not going to eat that I will’ while she stared at me with that ‘don’t mess with me’ look. A
look her opponents would later become verrrrry familiar with. This quality is better translated into
Field Hockey speak as her “exceptional vision” and “extreme quickness”.

So you see the signs were there immediately & all along, she was destined to leave her mark on
every team, on field hockey across Canada, and on Prince Edward Island.

Bakes didn’t start out as a field hockey star, she was an outgoing kid who enjoyed many sports
& activities. She actually grew up first playing ice hockey in Argyle Shore. It wasn’t until she was
in grade 9 that she switched from the ice to the field. Despite being new to the sport, Baker’s
natural ability, work ethic and drive to improve eventually led her to the international stage.
Katie was recruited by Saint Mary’s University after she had captained Bluefield High School to
provincial titles, and while at SMU she continued to stand out, winning AUS and all-Canadian
honors, as well as helping her team win a bronze medal.

Baker’s journey with Team Canada began in 2004, when she began touring with the Women’s
Junior National Team, where she was the only athlete east of Ontario to make the team. In
2005, she competed in the FIH Junior World Cup in Chile. Baker’s first cap and first
international appearance for the Canadian Senior Team was in 2006 in Cardiff in a match
against Wales. While playing on the national team Katie represented PEI in a variety of
competitions, the 2001 & 2005 Canada Summer Games and many national championships.
Throughout her career for Canada, she competed in 114 games. She represented Canada in
two Pan American Games (2007, 2011), the 2010 Commonwealth Games, the 2010 World Cup
Qualifier, and the 2012 FIH Road to London. Katie became the captain of the Women’s
National Team in 2010, and led the team until retiring in Sept 2012.

She was selected to the Pan American Elite Team in 2009 and 2011, a prestigious selection of
the top Athletes in the Pan American geography. Once Katie retired she continued to give back
to her community in PEI with young field hockey players; whether through running clinics,
coaching TEAM PEI or mentoring.

The accolades speak for themselves but I want to highlight what type of Player Katie was.

Those who have played with her today will agree with me, Bakes is a competitor. She’s known
for turning it ON the minute the game whistle starts. She’d make sure in the first couple minutes
of the game that she’d given her opponent a ‘gentle shove’ or an ‘ice hockey nudge’. It was her
way of saying ‘game on’. This competitiveness translated to intensity for 70 minutes of every
game. She demanded the ball and when she got it she would quickly and masterfully make an
attacking play happen.

She had a dynamic & natural flow to her game- one that let her creatively read & dominate the
field ahead of her. She played by instinct.

Now combine that with her natural athleticism, her strength, her fitness and her stamina and you
can see how she was a playmaker, a relied upon midfielder to defend the best in the world, and
score goals. Now combine that with her grit, resilience, and sheer determination. She’s a force
to be reckoned with.

Perhaps though, what separates her from being simply an amazing athlete and puts her in the
echelon of Hall of Famer, is her off field character. When you speak with her teammates,
coaches, staff, and players she’s coached there’s a consistency in how they describe her: She
brought me in, She united us, She pushed us to bring the best of ourselves, She brought us
together, She took time to help me, She lifted me up when I was down, She gave back, and She
inspired me. All of this combined and you see why she’s so fitting of the Sports Hall of Fame.
So I’d like to wrap with some Thank You’s.

First, thank you to PEI and I do mean the entire province. For providing the training ground,
quite literally for her to thrive. Training in Argyle shore during our breaks, in the snow, running
with the cows, instilling resilience and determination with the perfect amount of community &
support. Katie represented this beautiful province and community so perfectly, both in the way
she embodied what it meant to be an islander in every interaction, challenge, and success and
by giving back to the community that has given her so much.

Thank you to Bluefield Highschool for introducing her to Field Hockey and planting the seed for
her love of the game. Thank you to SMU for recruiting her & making sure she pursued a career
of Field Hockey and not Ice Hockey. Selfishly, I can’t skate so I certainly wouldn’t be here today
if she had stayed on the ice.

Thank you to the PEI Sports Hall of Fame for recognizing and
honoring one of Canada’s greatest field hockey athletes, and thank you Nick for repeatedly
instructing me this should be a nice speech and not a roast despite my numerous attempts.

Thank you to Katie’s Family; Richard & Lorraine, Jean, Josie, Kate, and Hannah for wearing ice
hockey jerseys, bringing goose callers, and waving flags, for post game hugs, for crying on your
shoulders, cooking us meals, believing in us and celebrating with us.

And finally, Bakes to you: Thank you.

Thank you for leading with yourself, you always demand the best of yourself before looking at
anyone else, and that’s the thing about leadership- it’s not awarded through a captains band or
by being the best player, it’s earned and entrusted by those who want to follow you.
Bakes you understood this so naturally. You worked harder than everyone, you believed in a
vision that you brought to life one small step at a time until you built a path that everyone could
follow.
You built bonds that could endure the stress of a high performance team. You created unity &
brought people in. You pushed yourself and us, and you made sure we celebrated- especially
the goals!
On behalf of all who were fortunate enough to have played with you (many who are here and
many who wish they could be here today). Congratulations, we are so proud to be your
teammates, we were so lucky to have experienced your leadership and we’re so grateful to be your friend.

Inducted by friend and teammate, Tyla Flexman