The goal was notorious before the puck even went in.
As Abbey Murphy skated across the blue line her coach, Brad Frost, knew exactly what she was going to do.
Two weeks earlier, the hockey world couldn’t stop talking — and arguing — about Ridly Greig’s emphatic slap shot into an empty net in the dying seconds of a one-goal game between the Ottawa Senators and Toronto Maple Leafs. Frost, the longtime head coach of the University of Minnesota women’s hockey team, knew that Murphy, women’s hockey’s preeminent pest, had found some inspiration.
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So, in the dying seconds of a one-goal February game against rival Minnesota-Duluth, Murphy skated into the offensive zone, wound-up, and took a slap shot into the empty net.
“Yep, there it is,” Frost said.
Murphy immediately turned around, smirked, and put her hands up to welcome the challenge from Bulldogs forward Clara Van Wieren.
“That’s what is awesome about Murph is, she does that and goes to the corner and knows somebody is going to be coming after her,” Frost said. “She was almost like come on, go on, give it to me.”
#Gophers get one more! pic.twitter.com/epBmAKvGSQ
— Minnesota Women's Hockey (@GopherWHockey) February 24, 2024
Murphy said she’d seen the goal from Greig and when she entered the zone thought, Should I do it?
“Then it just happened,” she said in an interview with The Athletic. “I’m just trying to bring some more eyes to the women’s game and make people smile, make people laugh.”
That goal coming from Murphy should be no surprise. She’s the kind of player opponents hate to play against — and would love to have on their team. Murphy plays a hard-nosed game, is a constant trash-talker, and isn’t afraid to mix it up or defend her teammates on the ice.
But calling her a pest doesn’t do Murphy enough justice.
She’s a dynamic offensive player, with excellent hands, quick feet and an elite goal-scoring ability. She made the senior U.S. roster for the 2021 world championship when she was 19 years old and was one of two teenagers on the Olympic roster that won silver in Beijing. And, after one year off the national team, won a world championship in 2023.
At the University of Minnesota this season, Murphy scored almost 25 percent of her team’s goals and — with 62 points in 39 games— factored in on 46 percent of the 135 goals the Gophers scored. She was named a top-10 finalist for the Patty Kazmaier Award, given to the top player in women’s college hockey. Nobody in the nation had more goals (33) or penalty minutes (118) than Murphy.
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“She is one of the most dynamic and skilled players I’ve ever coached, and we’ve had a lot of good ones at the University of Minnesota,” said Frost, who has coached the team since 2007. “But she also brings a competitive nature to her play that I’ve also really never seen out of a female hockey player.”
In the gold medal game at last year’s world championship, Murphy scored the first U.S. goal, then drew the penalty that set the table for the go-ahead goal scored on the power play. As Team USA continues its title defense at worlds in Utica, N.Y., there’s little doubt that Murphy will play a key role in the American attack, especially against Canada in an expected gold medal rematch.
Said U.S. teammate Caroline Harvey: “There is truly no one like her.”
Murphy’s tough style of play can be easily traced back to her roots.
She grew up in Evergreen Park, Ill., a blue-collar suburb on the south side of Chicago, where Murphy said “we go through a lot of stuff, but we’re raised a different way.” Her dad, Ed, was a United States Marine. Her mom, Lynne, is a level 1 trauma nurse. She has two older brothers; Her oldest brother, Patrick, played football at DIII Carthage College in Wisconsin; Dominic is an All-American DII wrestler at St. Cloud State.
“My older brothers, they just beat me up growing up. That’s obviously where the toughness part comes from,” Murphy said. “As well as my parents, they raised us to be tough, to deal with stuff on our own. I’m extremely grateful for that aspect of me.”
Growing up, Murphy was always competing with her older brothers. Whether it was baseball, wrestling or football — which was “obviously tackle,” she said — Murphy was right in the thick of it with them. Sometimes they’d fight, as siblings do.
“Dad always let those fights play out, but mom always got pretty upset,” Murphy said. “I think having the two older brothers makes me a little bit feisty and stand on my own and not take crap from anyone.”
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Murphy started playing hockey when she was six, the first person in her family to take up the sport. She remembers sitting in the front window of her home and watching her neighbor, Tom Pratl, rollerblading and playing outside. Eventually, she asked her parents if she could play and Pratl helped teach her.
“He’s the one to blame for spending all the money, the parents say,” Murphy said.
Filthy 🤢
Absolutely filthy, @Abbey18Murphy #SCTop10 pic.twitter.com/eg77EiY53C
— Minnesota Women's Hockey (@GopherWHockey) March 12, 2023
She took to the sport well, eventually moving up the ranks of the Chicago Mission girls hockey program. Kendall Coyne Schofield, an alumnus of the Mission, said she remembers when Murphy was on the under-12 team and “how amazing” she was already.
“I have followed her career ever since and have been such a big fan of hers,” said Coyne Schofield. “You could see it in her as a kid, it was just a matter of time when she was going to make the Olympic team.”
Murphy played in three-straight under-18 world championships for Team USA, winning two gold medals. Her teammates will tell you that young Abbey Murphy was the same player we see today.
“She was just as electric as she is now and she was rolling through kids,” said American teammate Taylor Heise, who first played with Murphy when she was 16 years old. “She was someone who was small, but wasn’t fazed by contact.”
“She’s always had that fire in her and that fight,” said Harvey, who played with Murphy at two U18 tournaments.
Murphy committed early to the University of Minnesota and was named to the WCHA All-Rookie team in 2020-21. She made her first senior national team at 19 years old and won silver at the world championships in Calgary, A.B. In 2021-22, she took a year off from school to try out for the Olympic team. During exhibition games against Canada in the lead-up to the Olympics, Murphy was a constant threat and annoyance with her chippy, in-your-face style. In one game, she started a massive scrum after Canadian Claire Thompson hit American forward Dani Cameranesi from behind, which Murphy took exception to.
“She’s someone that will stand up for her teammates no matter what,” said Heise. “I know she’s on my line, if I ever get hit, I know someone’s going to be crumbling next to me because she’s taken them down.”
In Beijing, Murphy only had one point, but she was a spark plug for Team USA the entire tournament with her dynamic offensive ability and physical play. She was welcomed home to Chicago with a commemorative “Abbey Road” street sign in her neighborhood.
When John Wroblewski took over as coach of the U.S. team from Joel Johnson in May 2022, he watched the Olympic games closely and didn’t see a team going to the upcoming world championships without Murphy due to her “electric” play.
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But, Murphy was a surprising cut after a short selection camp ahead of the August tournament.
Wroblewski says now that he initially misunderstood Murphy. “You see some of her brash play, it’s right on the edge, and I misinterpreted some of her intentions,” he said. “That’s something she and I have ironed out.”
Murphy called the cut a wake-up call for her; a bump in the road that helped motivate her to improve and get back on the national team. And while her teammates went to the 2022 world championship — which the U.S. lost to Canada in the gold medal game — Murphy played in the collegiate series and scored three goals and six points in three games to beat the Canadian team.
That season back at Minnesota, Murphy finished second in the NCAA in goals (29) and hit 50 points as a sophomore. In the WCHA playoffs, Murphy scored back-to-back game-winning goals to help Minnesota win the conference and was named the tournament’s most outstanding player.
She was back on the national team for the 2022-23 Rivalry Series and the 2023 world championship team.
“You are so lucky to have (Abbey Murphy) on your team. She is so skilled, she is so fast and she plays the game with so much heart,” Wroblewski said. “She learned a little bit, she got better because of it, to her credit, and I got to learn a lot about her too and I appreciate her even more.”
What is it exactly that makes Abbey Murphy so annoying to play against?
“She’s just constantly in your face,” Frost said. “She goes to areas that not a lot of people go to. She says things that maybe other people wouldn’t say. But then she has the ability to back it up, with her speed and skill.”
“She’s not afraid. It doesn’t matter if it’s a veteran on Canada, she’ll take it to them and she will not hold back,” Harvey explained. “It changes the whole dynamic of the game.”
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Murphy’s style of play has been likened to the Boston Bruins’ Brad Marchand: She’s physical, hard to play against, and can offensively lead her team. Her skill alone would make her one of the best young players in the game, but the edge she plays with puts Murphy in a tier of her own. In women’s hockey, she’s one-of-one.
She’s also one of the sport’s greatest trash-talkers.
“She definitely has words that come out of her mouth that surprise me every here and there,” Heise said. “If you fall or something, she’ll let you have it. I love to sit there and just laugh.”
Unlike Heise, who was a star on the Gophers, Harvey has to play against Murphy in college with the Wisconsin Badgers. She said “luckily” Murphy doesn’t trash talk her too much. Usually, Harvey said, she’s trying to be the mediator between Murphy and her Badgers teammates. That can be a dangerous job, though.
“I’ll be holding her back and she’s about to punch me and I have to be like ‘Murph, it’s me,’” Harvey said.
“They’re not my friends on the ice,” Murphy said. “Obviously there’s no intent to be rude or be mean or to hurt someone. But you step on the ice and there’s no friendship.”
Murphy describes herself as a competitor who likes to mix her grit and sandpaper with her offensive skill set. Murphy is fast, with elite hands and a great shot. She also goes hard into corners, takes shots where she can, and gets under people’s skin. A benefit to Murphy’s instigation is that she draws a lot of penalties, particularly against Canada. But in the NCAA this year, she had 118 penalty minutes, which was 42 minutes more than the next player. That part of her game, at least in college, is a work in progress.
“Because she’s so dynamic, she is way more effective when she’s on the ice,” Frost said. “And so it’s kind of this dance of allowing her to be her so that she can be most effective, but staying out of the box.”
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When she plays right up to the line — she’s gotten better at not crossing it, despite what her penalty minutes might suggest — Murphy is a lot to handle.
Take this season at Minnesota for example. With Heise, Grace Zumwinkle and Abby Boreen all graduated to the Professional Women’s Hockey League, the Gophers lost a lot of offense and star power. Murphy stepped up.
She finished tied for the lead in goals (33) and third in points (62) in the NCAA. She factored in on almost 50 percent of the goals the Gophers scored.
“Her ability to one-time the puck, her ability to see the ice, set people up, her speed, she’s a threat every time she’s on the ice,” Frost said. “We wouldn’t have been the same team (without her).”
Now, according to Coyne Schofield, there’s a softer side to Murphy that others don’t usually get to appreciate when they’re facing off against her.
“She’s competitive and she plays that hard-nosed game but you get her off the ice and she’s the first one in the community giving back to the kids,” she said. “She has a special place in my heart and will always when I’m long gone from this game and she’s still in the prime of her career. I’m just so proud of her.”
Murphy helps coach at Coyne Schofield’s hockey camp every year and goes on the ice with the Chicago Mission girls teams when she can. Giving back, Murphy said, is something she learned from Coyne Schofield.
“It’s extremely cool and fun that I get to learn from her because I still look up to her as a player and a person,” Murphy said. “Just seeing everything she does makes me want to do the same thing and give back to all these little girls who have a dream the same as us.”
Murphy won’t head back to Chicago until after world championships are over, though. And if Team USA is back in Sunday’s gold medal game against Canada, you can bet she’ll be the most hated American on the ice — and Murphy knows it too. Those are the moments when she really shines.
“I love it,” she said. “I’m going to use that to my advantage any way that I can.”
With reporting from Utica, N.Y.
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(Illustration: Sean Reilly / The Athletic. Photos: Derek Leung, Dennis Pajot / Getty Images)
