Angela Ruggiero has been a part of some very special teams.

She captured the national championship with the ’98-’99 Harvard women’s hockey team her freshman year. She’s won Olympic gold and silver and a world championship with the U.S. national team.

But in this her final season at Harvard, Ruggiero shone individually like never before. She captured the Patty Kazmaier Memorial Award—awarded by the USA Hockey Foundation to the best player in women’s college hockey—after having been nominated in each of her four seasons in a Crimson jersey.

Only the second player in history to be named to the first-team All-America four times, Ruggiero was named Beanpot MVP and garnered both ECAC and Ivy Player of the Year Awards. She led all defensemen in scoring for the fourth time, and moved into fourth place on Harvard’s all-time scoring list with 253 points.

Six years after first donning a Crimson jersey, there isn’t much Angela Ruggiero hasn’t accomplished on the ice.

Despite the tremendous individual season she had, Ruggiero’s own numbers declined from one year ago.

“I had a lot more points last year. But at the end of the season last year I saw points aren’t going to win you a championship game. They’re sort of for yourself,” Ruggiero says.

“Last year being up for some awards, points seemed to make a difference in most voters’ heads, and at the end of last season I said points are silly because points don’t really determine how good of a hockey player you are and hopefully people see that.”

Considering the list of accolades she garnered this season, people undoubtedly did notice the impact Ruggiero had on the ice. Then again, she did score in 30 of the 32 games in which she played for a total of 55 points on the year, good for third on Harvard’s scoring charts and eighth best in the nation.

ALL 4 FUN

Yet this year more than ever, it was not Ruggiero’s individual performance that defined the team; instead “team” became the defining mark of Ruggiero.

“Our team did such a good job of playing as a team this year,” she says. “I think in the past maybe because we had more standout players there was a larger disparity in the scoring.”

With the scoring more evenly spread throughout the line-up and with total goals forced down from last season, the emphasis was placed on what Ruggiero knows best.

“We really clamped down on defense. I think that was the key to our success for most of the season,” Ruggiero says. “Starting at the beginning of the season we were saying ‘get your ass back. Play defense. Clear pucks in front of the net, don’t let people get second shots,’ and I think that was what allowed us to go so far.”

“People just did their jobs and didn’t worry about points and just played for the team,” she says.