For all the red on the Canadian flag, it sure could have used a bit more crimson.

While her fellow Canadians will be training up north for the Women’s World Hockey Championship, junior forward and Thornhill, Ontario native Nicole Corriero will remain right here in Cambridge where she likes it.

Hockey Canada released the roster for the women’s national team on Tuesday, announcing the 20 skaters and two alternates who will represent the country at the tournament held in Dartmouth and Halifax, Nova Scotia from March 30 to April 6.

Just four players, all forwards, currently playing for American colleges were invited to join the squad—Minnesota Duluth’s Caroline Ouellette, St. Lawrence’s Gina Kingsbury and Dartmouth’s Cherie Piper and Gillian Apps.

Harvard alum Jennifer Botterill ’02-’03, also a forward, will be the sole Harvard representative on the team.

Noticeably missing from the list was Corriero, a forward herself and the nation’s leading goal scorer (1.22 goals pers game) and third-highest point scorer (2.13 points per game).

In the latter statistic, she sits only behind UMD’s one-two punch of Ouellette and forward Jenny Potter, a member of the American national team.

Corriero is also one of ten finalists for the prestigious Patty Kazmaier Memorial Award—a distinction presented every year to the most outstanding player in women’s U.S college hockey.

In spite of all this, however, Corriero was not even offered a spot on Team Canada’s selection camp roster in January—something that is hard to explain based on the numbers.

Old-Fashioned Snubbery

The Canadian national press calls the decision a “testimony to Canada’s depth,” but Corriero offers a different perspective on the situation.

“I think that they’re looking at a lot of different things,” she says. “Initially, I was pretty disappointed, but last year when I was invited to join [the Under-22 team] I didn’t go, and that may have had a bit of an effect on their decision. Maybe they thought that I wasn’t planning on going even if I was going to be invited.”

Last February, Corriero declined the U-22 squad’s invitation to play in Germany after making the team and subsequently getting cut in August.

“After thinking long and hard about it, we had some pretty big games coming up, especially against Dartmouth and Mercyhurst,” she said of her decision. “And the second semester was just starting, so I didn’t think that leaving my team for 10 days when we had a stretch of important games would be the best decision for me, especially if I would have to go all the way out to Europe.

“I wasn’t going to play very much anyway—it wouldn’t be good for my game, my team or my confidence, so I turned down the opportunity.”