Lindenwood's women's ice hockey program stems back more than two decades. Founded in 2003 and moving to NCAA Division 1 in 2010, the program has a long history, but it hasn't been one filled with winning. That's something head coach Taylor Wasylk hopes begins to change this season.
"I'm kind of hoping it's a turning point year, we've got a lot of new players this year," said Wasylk. That incoming class includes nine NCAA rookies and three transfers.
Since becoming eligible as a program for the NCAA tournament in 2015, the program has yet to qualify for an NCAA tournament, and has never won a College Hockey America or Atlantic Hockey America title. In Wasylk's first season with the school, they won a program record 11 games before slipping to a 5-26-2 record last season.
But the goal remains to gain respect nationally both among their competition, and while recruiting. To expedite that process, Wasylk and her staff have looked abroad for talent, targeting top players in Europe that are sometimes overlooked by North American recruiters. In order to begin winning the attention of top North American players, Wasylk knows her team needs to win more often, and to do that, they'll go wherever needed to find top players.
This season that includes Slovakia's Michaela Paulinyova and Tatiana Blichova, Spain's Claudia Castellanos, and Sweden's Ellen Wigermo and Pusle Dyring-Andersen. With their recruits, Lindenwood will be the only team in NCAA Division 1 hockey with players from Slovakia and Spain.
"It's not something we go out looking for like we prefer these players over American of Canadian...we have a reputation that we're trying to build back up," said Wasylk.
"To get better quicker, we've looked abroad just because there's a ton of talented players that maybe fly under the radar, people don't know about them because they don't play in North America."
Castellanos and Paulinyova are already members of their senior national teams, and are key components of the present and future success of their nations. The same is true for the Lindenwood Lions where both players can be part of helping the program win now, and develop into an annual contender.
"For us it's just a matter of 'where can we get the best players' and 'where can we get them now,'" says Wasylk.
This season Lindenwood will enter with players on their roster from Canada, USA, Sweden, Slovakia, Spain, Norway, France, and Hungary.
Lindenwood opens their 2025-26 schedule against strong competition playing two game series' against non-conference competition including St. Cloud State, St. Thomas, Minnesota State, and Merrimack College. They open their AHA schedule October 24 against the back-to-back reigning conference champions, Penn State.