Yard talks about her road from Houston to the 1998 Winter Olympics in her father’s native country of Japan and about her job orchestrating some of the NHL’s marquee events throughout the year.
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With a gold medal for the United States women’s ice hockey team and the men’s teams headed for their medal games this weekend, Olympic hockey has been thrilling fans in Milan this month.
Someone who knows plenty about Olympic hockey is Chie Chie (Sakuma) Yard. In 1998, she became the first native Houstonian to play Olympic ice hockey, doing so for her father’s native country of Japan at the Nagano games. Yard also played pro hockey in Japan after a college career at Brown University.
These days, Yard is the group vice president of events for the National Hockey League and a key figure behind the league’s popular outdoor games. Next month, she’ll be inducted into the Houston Hockey Hall of Fame during its annual banquet on March 20, which kicks off Hockey Day in Houston festivities the following day.
In an interview with Houston Matters host Craig Cohen (an avid hockey fan, who’ll once again emcee the induction banquet), Yard joins us from the Winter Games in Milan and talks about how she got into hockey in a city that had few rinks at the time and what it was like playing in the Olympics.
Plus, she talks about her job orchestrating some of the NHL’s marquee events throughout the year.
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