Tatyana Shatalova

Shatalova began playing ice hockey at the age of 6. Her parents had initially opposed her decision to start playing, but reversed their opinion after she told them she would start boxing instead.[2] Until she turned 11, she played on the Yunost Minsk youth boys teams, having to fill out paperwork every year to be allowed despite her gender.[3] At the age of 16, she contacted HC Tornado via their website, and was offered a try-out. The team assigned her to Biryusa Krasnoyarsk in the Russian Women's Hockey League (ZhHL). She scored 7 points in 19 games in her rookie professional season, earning a salary of 100$. Across the next three years in the ZhHL, she scored an additional 29 points points in 90 games.

In 2019, at the age of 19, she left Russia to move to North America, signing a contract with the Metropolitan Riveters of the National Women's Hockey League (NWHL), the fourth player from Russia to join the NWHL. She put up 12 points in 23 games in her rookie NWHL season, and was noted for her fast, aggressive and physical style of play, getting 29 penalty minutes and a one-game suspension for fighting.[4] During the season, she worked on overcoming the language barrier with fellow-Russian speaking Riveters rookie Bulbul Kartanbay.[5] She scored her first NWHL goal on the 28th of December 2019, the game-winning goal of the Buffalo Believes Classic, the first outdoors NWHL game, against the Buffalo Beauts. She had previously scored a shootout goal earlier in December, the game winner in a match against the Minnesota Whitecaps.[6]

She re-signed with the Riveters for the 2020–21 NWHL season, but ultimately had to opt-out of the COVID-19 bubble.

Shatalova competed for Russia in both the 2016 and 2017 IIHF U18 Women's World Championship, earning a bronze medal in 2017. In 2018, she was named to the senior Russian women's roster for the Olympics as a reserve player, but didn't appear in any games.[7]

Shatalova wears #17 after former Soviet star Valeri Kharlamov.[8] When asked about the possibility of introducing hitting into women's hockey, she stated "I think that just like in men’s hockey that women’s hockey has emotions too. Sometimes you want to use your hands and your body. On the ice, we don’t have to be ‘feminine’ – this is hockey."[9]

She played for Russia at the 2018 World Women's Ball Hockey Championship, winning gold.[10]

• Biographical information and career statistics from Eliteprospects.com