Did you feel like you were the best in the world after you won gold in 2002?I felt like we were on top of the world. I felt pretty darn good. All I cared about is that we won. Losing in Nagano [in 1998 at the Olympics], I remember watching the Americans celebrate and thinking, “I’m not going to cry and I never want to feel this way again.”

Did you cry?No, I didn’t. But I went into almost an Olympic hangover depression for about a year after. My coach at the time, Wally Kozak, he gave me a quote that said: “A gold medal is a wonderful thing, but if you’re not enough without it, you’ll never be enough with it.” I had no perspective because everything I thought I was, was wrapped up with who I was as a hockey player. I’ve kept this quote in my wallet. I’ve put it up in my stall at every Olympics, at every world championships since. It serves to remind me that it’s just a game, which is easy to say but harder to do in the moment.

Your timing was great in that you got to play in the first Olympics to include women’s hockey. But do you ever think about what your career might look like if you were 10 years old now?I came at a great time. Now the young girls coming in are at a great time. There’s going to continue to be great times, I think. It’s exciting, it’s the way it should evolve. I had a lot of opportunities, and a lot of opportunities to be the first at things, to push the game and challenge and demand that people give it the respect it deserves.

What do you want people to think of when they think of your career and what you’ve done for the game?It’s a tough question to answer, I guess. What I’d want people to think about is that I truly love the game. I loved to play for copyright and represent the country, and I hope that my impact makes it easier for little girls now to play the game. And that they’ll have a chance to love it the way I did.

People call you a legend all the time. Are you comfortable with that title?Now that I’m retired I guess I’ll be more comfortable with that, but it was really quite annoying when I get called that.

It made you think of your age?It’s flattering, but yeah, when they’re calling you a legend, you know that you’ve been around a long time.

You did break in at 15…I did. I’m a legend in my own way. [Laughs.] As many of my teammates would attest to. It’s flattering, it’s a nice compliment.