For starters, the social life is a little slow compared to what the 17 year-old Missoula native is used to at home. In Warner - population 379 - a wild Saturday night for the locals usually consists of a rousing round or two of curling.
As for the girls of the Warner Hockey School, there is time for hockey and very little else.
The move means she's also traded Missoula for the picturesque village about 24 miles north of the border, where the streets are mostly unpaved and, aside from hockey, the claim to fame is something called the Devil's Coulee Dinosaur Heritage Museum.
“One thing about it, it's a very small town,” says Jamie Wood, head coach of the Warner Warriors. “So really the girls are here for hockey and that's really all they have time to do, at least during the hockey season.”
Four years ago shrinking enrollment put Warner at risk of losing its K-12 school entirely, Wood says. To avoid the closure, the town came up with the last-ditch measure of expanding the facility to include a female hockey academy.
It worked. The 23 girls who now comprise Warner's midget Triple A team amounted to roughly a 25 percent increase in students, which in turn amounted to new life for the school.
“Initially (keeping the school open) was the reason that they started the team,” says Wood, who came to Warner after leading Elmira College (N.Y.) to two NCAA Division III national titles. “I think we've moved past that at this point and into trying to just continue to have a good team and a good program.”
The Warriors draw girls in grades 9-12 from all across Canada, most of whom are looking to eventually score college scholarships. They practice six days a week, attend normal high school classes and play about 50 games in a season, all while living together in the school's dorm.
Hansen and two players from Great Falls are the only Americans.
Hansen grew up playing hockey in Missoula, pushed by an older cousin and a brother who also competed. By second grade she was playing with the organized boys' teams, a trend she kept up until seventh grade.
“Once I hit seventh grade all of the boys kind of started getting a little bigger than me,” she says. “The checking got harder to go with. That's when I started playing girls' hockey.”
As a middle schooler, she began playing with UM's women's club team and then the city's Powder Hounds squad.
“She had a good time, but the competition level wasn't really challenging her,” says Lauren's mom, Keli Hansen, who along with husband Toby owns a Missoula insurance company. “Every year when the season ended she would wonder ‘what am I doing with hockey?' I think she felt like her skills were plateauing, if not declining.”
The Hansens found out about the Warner school while attending a hockey camp in Montana. After visiting, meeting coach Wood and touring the school, Lauren decided she was willing to leave Hellgate - and her place on the school's soccer and tennis teams - to try hockey full-time, at least for a year.
Keli Hansen says it wasn't an easy decision to let her teenage daughter uproot and move out of the country, but it and the school's $16,000-$20,000 registration fees will be worth it to let Lauren decide if the hockey life is right for her.
“I just think you want (your kids) to live without regret ...,” she says. “When this opportunity came up, we were like, ‘Just go try it. You might decide that it's more hockey than you ever wanted to play in your entire life, or you might decide that this really is something you want to do.' ”
So far, Lauren says the rigors of increased ice, practice and game time aren't wearing on her. In fact, it's quite the opposite, as she says her hockey skills have already greatly increased.
“Oh, man, I was so nervous for our first practice,” she says. “I could tell that I was way, far behind everybody up here. But I'm faster now and skill-wise I've improved quite a bit. It just takes quite a bit of work to get to where these girls are up here.”
The biggest factors Lauren's had to adjust to are the speed and intensity of the Canadian game. She's also had to make the switch from defense to forward.
“It's a lot faster. The girls' teams rival the boys' teams, I think,” she says. “We fight a lot more than someone might imagine.”
Any homesickness is softened by the fact that her grandparents live within visiting distance and her parents often make the six-hour drive from Missoula to catch weekend games. She also got to come home for winter break, and for two Grizzly football games, Keli Hansen says.
In her first game back since returning to Canada from winter break, Lauren scored her first goal as a Warner Warrior. She downplays it now, saying it was a simple put-back after a teammate's shot was rejected, but her parents and coach both disagree.
“I think it was a pretty big thrill for her and for everybody on our team,” Wood says. “She's come a long way and has really turned the corner to becoming a contributing member of this team.”
The Warriors are 28-4-2 so far this season and are gearing up for a tour of the Maritimes next month. They'll play teams their own age as well as some college teams and put on a clinic for younger girls interested in pursuing their own hockey ambitions.
As for Lauren, she's not sure about her future in the game past her senior year, though the Warner Hockey School has an excellent track record for placing its players in universities.
“I'm just kind of leaving the door open,” she says. “If I end up having the chance to play college hockey I'll go for that. But even if I don't, it's not a big deal, I just want to keep playing.”
At least for now, she'll stick with the Warriors. And she's thinking about taking up curling.
“The kids at my school are starting up a club,” she says. “I've been thinking about joining it, even though I don't know how good I'll do at it.”
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