Goaltender Callie Shanahan (CAS’25) has endured setbacks during her tenure on the women’s hockey team, but she has used adversity to reach new heights. Photo by Kaeli Talora/BU Athletics

After a Career of Ups and Downs, Callie Shanahan Is Playing the Best Hockey of Her Life

Terrier senior goaltender has sights set on playing for the Professional Women’s Hockey League

When Callie Shanahan was growing up, she had a sign in her room with her life’s goal written on it: First NHL Women’s Player.

Since then, the Boston University women’s ice hockey goaltender has witnessed a whirlwind evolution in women’s hockey and in her own game as she prepares to make the jump to the next level.

The NHL “is obviously not possible, but now these younger girls can actually have a career in hockey,” Shanahan (CAS’25) says. “It’s been cool for me, seeing that progression growing up and just hoping that I can eventually play pro hockey too.”

Before that, however, Shanahan will anchor the BU women’s hockey team in the Hockey East tournament, which begins February 26, with the Terriers the No. 2 seed. The team is in the midst of an impressive push back to relevance, earning the most wins in a season since 2019-2020. The tournament concludes March 8. 

Shanahan has had a BU career marked by “lots of ups and downs,” as she puts it—early success, followed by setbacks and injuries. This season, she has been key to the team’s turnaround.

“It’s cool to see when you can put a body of work together like that,” says head coach Tara Watchorn (Sargent’12). “There’s no doubt that we wouldn’t be having the season we’re having without her. She’s a big part of it, in net and as a leader.”

Shanahan’s dreams of professional hockey were born in her hometown of Commerce, a township in the southeast corner of Michigan—roughly 35 miles from Detroit, the self-proclaimed “Hockeytown.” She grew up in a setting where ponds and lakes seemingly outnumber residents and ice skates are as common as boots and scarves. Top U.S. goaltender Connor Hellebuyck once called Commerce home.

She first laced up and hit the ice at age three, guided by her father, Dan Shanahan, who grew up playing hockey and still plays beer league. “He gets butterflies sometimes before beer league games, and that’s because he’s just so competitive,” Shanahan says. “He’s such a student of the game and he loves hockey, and I think that’s where I got that love and passion for the game.”

His daughter started out as a figure skater, but was “far from graceful,” she says. She felt much more comfortable after switching to hockey skates at age seven. Playing two years as a skater, Shanahan decided to follow in her father’s footsteps and become a goaltender.

He knew what it entailed—his response: “Oh, jeez.”

“Something pulled me towards being a goalie,” his daughter says. “I was like, it can’t be that hard. It’s a small puck, but the net’s not that big. It can’t be that hard. Little did I know—it’s really hard.”

Despite her passion for ice hockey, Shanahan didn’t want to concentrate on one sport and get burnt out. Throughout high school, she ran cross country and track and played soccer in addition to hockey.

She hadn’t planned to play hockey at the collegiate level. A tough year of hockey nearly convinced her to pursue collegiate soccer—but then she was named to Team USA for the IIHF Women’s World Under-18 Championship.

Playing amongst her most talented contemporaries was surreal, she says, but it also “lit a fire” under the then-17-year-old netminder. When she returned home from the championship in Slovakia, it was with a gold medal and a new attitude towards hockey.

“It totally opened my eyes to how talented the girls around me were at that age,” she says. “It gave me motivation to train even harder and work harder, so it was a very humbling experience for sure, but it was an honor and a privilege.”

With the decision to play collegiate hockey made, Shanahan looked out of state, since Michigan has no Division 1 women’s hockey programs. She had been to Boston for tournaments in the past, and BU was everything she was looking for. When the Terriers began to recruit her, she says, “it was a no-brainer.”

It didn’t take long for her to make an impact at BU. By October of freshman year, the netminder had earned the starting spot for the Terriers. In just her second start, she had her first shutout—a 5-0 win over New Hampshire. 

Shanahan wasn’t expecting to play meaningful minutes so early in her BU career. “I went into the season having low expectations, knowing that I had to work my way up, as any freshman does,” she says. “It was super cool getting to play in a playoff game my freshman year and getting the nod as a starter in the second half of the season.” She was unanimously named to the Hockey East All-Rookie Team at season’s end.

Injuries and mental strength 

In her sophomore season, however, Shanahan lost her starting position in net, which she attributes to a “dip in confidence.” She says she wanted to “work her butt off the following summer” in order to win back her starting spot. 

“It was so cool to hear her reflections when [she lost her starting position] and how she struggled with that and how she grew from that,” Watchorn says. “The mental strength that she really grew with throughout the entire experience you see in her game today.”

Watchorn first met Shanahan while she was an assistant coach at BU, as part of the goaltender’s recruiting process. By the time Shanahan made her way to Comm Ave, Watchorn was head coach at Stonehill. When she was named BU’s head coach in 2023, the two were reunited. 

“She is just so passionate and outgoing when you first meet her,” Watchorn says, recalling that recruiting meeting. “To see her after a few years and how she settled into such a leadership role and was someone who was respected by her teammates…spoke to her maturity and growth.”

The summer before her junior season, Shanahan dislocated her knee at a USA Hockey goalie training camp. She opted for physical therapy as opposed to surgery—a six-week solution over a six-month one. When she returned to BU for training, she reinjured the knee on the third skate of the season. This time there was no choice.

The months spent on the sidelines were the longest Shanahan had ever been off the ice. Watchorn notes that the Terrier junior continued to be a great teammate, acknowledging the isolation and “silent work ethic” involved with such an injury. “It was a really tough pill to swallow,” Shanahan says. “The thing that kept me going is that I knew I would eventually get my time to shine.”

The first time she put her skates back on, the entire team stood on the other side of the glass, banging on it and cheering for their goaltender. She finally made her return to competition on January 12, 2024. Four days later, she led the team to a statement win over Boston College in the Beanpot semifinal.

“It was really cool to see her work for those months after the surgery and work through her feelings and the setback,” says teammate and best friend Liv Haag (CAS’25). “It was like she never had those months off.”

Now in her senior and final season at BU, Shanahan is playing some of the best hockey of her career. She’s played the most games of her collegiate career, posting a career-best 1.78 goals-against average and a tie for her career-best save percentage at .925. On top of that, she is an assistant captain for a team making an unprecedented turnaround. 

Her father has now reached the point where he takes pointers from her on how to improve his own game.

“One day you can be on the ice and the next it can be taken away from you,” Shanahan says. “I’m just trying to soak up every day and every moment I’m with my team on and off the ice because someday it’s going to be over.”

She now has the opportunity to put an extra exclamation point on her BU career, starting with Saturday’s Hockey East quarterfinal game. After that, she hopes to be drafted to the Professional Women’s Hockey League, with the ultimate goal: the Olympics. Eventually, she wants to go to graduate school, but she acknowledges that she’s not yet ready to give up hockey.

“I just appreciate her energy every day… I’m grateful for every day, and I can say she brings the best out of me,” Watchorn says. “She’s a model for the way this program needs to go.”

Fans can catch Callie Shanahan in action when the BU women’s hockey team takes on Vermont in the Hockey East quarterfinals on Saturday, March 1, at Walter Brown Arena. Puck drop is slated for 4 pm. The quarterfinals will be streamed live on ESPN+. Follow the women’s team @TerrierWHockey on X.