Marie-Philip Poulin (born March 28, 1991) is a Canadian professional ice hockey centre and captain for the Montreal Victoire of the Professional Women's Hockey League (PWHL). She is also the captain of the Canada women's national ice hockey team. She was named the IIHF Female Player of the Year in 2025.
Poulin is a three-time Olympic gold medalist and four-time World Champion with the Canadian national team. She scored the game-winning goal in the gold medal games in three out of five of the Olympics in which she competed (2010, 2014 and 2022), for which she was dubbed Captain Clutch by her teammates and the media. Following another game-winning goal at the 2021 IIHF Women's World Championship, she completed an unprecedented "golden goal hat trick" at major international championships. Since 2015 she has served as the captain of Team Canada, leading them to silver medals at the 2018 and 2026 Winter Olympics and a gold medal at the 2022 Winter Olympics. She is the first person to score 20 Olympic goals in modern ice hockey.
Raised in Beauceville, Quebec, Poulin started her career playing for the Montreal Stars in the now-defunct Canadian Women's Hockey League at the age of 17, while also playing college hockey for the Dawson Blues. She left the team in 2010 to join the Boston Terriers women's hockey team. In 2015, Poulin returned to and captained the Stars, by then re-named Les Canadiennes de Montreal, before joining the Professional Women's Hockey Players Association (PWHPA), a non-profit dedicated to increasing the professionalization of women's hockey, in 2019. The PWHPA's efforts culminated in the creation of the PWHL, and Poulin played a key role in the negotiation of the collective bargaining agreement. In 2023, at the inception of the PWHL, she signed with PWHL Montreal (later the Montreal Victoire) and became its captain.
While playing with Les Canadiennes, Poulin won the Clarkson Cup twice and was named CWHL MVP three times. With the Victoire, she was the Billie Jean King Most Valuable Player for the PWHL's 2024–25 season, and captained the team to win the 2026 Walter Cup, receiving the Ilana Kloss Playoff Most Valuable Player honour for her efforts. Poulin is the first female hockey player to win the Northern Star Award as Canada's top athlete of the year, and the second to receive the Bobbie Rosenfeld Award as The Canadian Press' female athlete of the year. She is widely considered to be one of the greatest hockey players of all time.
Early life Marie-Philip Poulin was born on March 28, 1991, in Quebec City, Canada, to Robert and Danye Poulin. Poulin has one sibling, her older brother Pier-Alexandre Poulin. She was raised in the city of Beauceville, Quebec. Poulin began figure skating at the age of four, before being inspired by her brother to switch to hockey at age five. In a 2017 interview, Poulin said playing hockey outdoors with her brother during her childhood was one of her best memories of growing up. She first saw professional women's hockey on television during the 2002 Olympic Winter Games, when the Canada women's national ice hockey team won the first gold medal for Canada in ice hockey in more than 50 years.
Playing career
Montreal Stars, 2007–09 Poulin spent 2007–08 with the Montreal Stars of the Canadian Women's Hockey League (CWHL). She appeared in only 16 games, but led rookies in scoring with 22 goals and 21 assists. So dominant was she in half a season as a 16-year-old rookie that she finished runner up in the CWHL Most Valuable Player (MVP) vote by club captains. She was also a recipient of the Montreal Canadiens scholarship program in January 2008. For the 2008–09 season, while attending Dawson College, she played both with the Dawson Blues and as an associate player with the Stars. At year's end in March 2009, she helped the Stars win the first Clarkson Cup over the Minnesota Whitecaps in Kingston, Ontario. In the championship game, she assisted on a goal by Caroline Ouellette.
Boston University Terriers, 2010–15 Poulin debuted with the Boston University Terriers women's program during the 2010–11 season. On October 2, 2010, she scored the first goal of her NCAA career in a 5–4 loss at North Dakota. With her third shorthanded goal of the season on October 15, she tied BU's single-season record for shorthanded tallies in just four games. She led all NCAA freshmen in goals (9) and points per game (2.00) during October 2010. In addition, she led all Hockey East freshmen in goals, assists, and points during the month. In the first seven games of her NCAA career, she had a seven-game point-scoring streak consisting of nine goals and seven assists.Hockeyeastonline.Com – Monthly Honors: Bc'S Kelli Stack Tabbed Whea Player Of The Month For October On December 7 and 10, two wins over Northeastern and Harvard, Poulin registered three goals. In both games, she had a total of 11 shots on goal and a +2 rating. On December 10, she scored two goals and a game-high eight shots as BU prevailed by a 5–3 mark over Harvard.
On January 15 and 16, 2011, Poulin recorded five points (2 goals, 3 assists) in BU's two wins over Boston College and Maine. Against BC, Poulin notched a power-play goal and two assists. Versus the Maine Black Bears, she registered a goal and an assist. On January 22, 2011, Poulin recorded a hat trick, including two power-play goals as BU prevailed over Vermont in a 4–0 win. The win was the Terriers' 100th win in program history. Poulin broke BU's single-season points record with her second goal of the game and later tied the single-season goals record with her third marker. She became the first Terriers player to be honoured as Hockey East Rookie of the Year in March 2011.HockeyEastOnline.com – BC'S KELLI STACK NAMED 2011 PURE HOCKEY PLAYER OF THE YEAR A fracture of the shoulder did not hold her from action for the 2011–12 season. La guigne s'acharne sur Marie-Philip Poulin
On May 11, 2012, Terriers head coach Brian Durocher announced that the captains for the 2012–13 campaign would be Poulin and Jill Cardella. For the 2014–15 season, Poulin was appointed team captain. As captain, she would lead the team to its fourth consecutive Hockey East championship. After the 2015 Hockey East tournament, she would join Shannon Doyle and fellow Montreal resident Kayla Tutino on the All-Tournament Team.
Les Canadiennes de Montréal, 2015–19 Poulin returned to the CWHL in the autumn of 2015 when she was selected third overall by the Stars in the 2015 CWHL Draft. Before the season began, the Stars announced a partnership with the NHL's Montreal Canadiens and re-branded as Les Canadiennes de Montréal. At the conclusion of the 2015–16 CWHL season, she was the inaugural winner of the Jayna Hefford Trophy as most valuable player; she also secured the Angela James Bowl as the league's top scorer.
Poulin captained the team to the 2017 Clarkson Cup championship, scoring two goals in the final in Ottawa, with Montreal defeating the Calgary Inferno by a score of 3–1. She won her second CWHL MVP award at the conclusion of the 2017 season.
Poulin decided not to return to Les Canadiennes after the Olympics for the run up to the 2018 Clarkson Cup. She helped lead the team back to contention ahead of the 2019 Clarkson Cup; however, Poulin missed the playoffs due to injury. She won the final MVP award in CWHL history, her third win of the award, for her 2019 performance.
Professional Women's Hockey Players Association (PWHPA), 2019–23
The CWHL abruptly collapsed after the 2018–19 season. In the wake of the collapse, Poulin joined the #ForTheGame movement that led to the creation of the PWHPA. Poulin captained one of four teams in the first PWHPA Dream Gap tour showcase in Toronto in September 2019, leading her team to a 2–0 record in the weekend round-robin tournament. As a member of the PWHPA, she took part in the Elite Women's Showcase at the 2020 NHL All-Star Game. She was afterwards voted as the best female hockey player in the world by NHL players, after having finished second in the vote the year before. In December 2019, she had been named among the top-4 Québecois athletes of the 2010s decade by the readers of La Presse.
Poulin was among several high-profile PWHPA members who reacted indifferently to the news of the National Women's Hockey League's 2020 expansion into Canada with the addition of the Toronto Six, stating that "I think there's a reason why many of us are not playing in that league."
At the 2021 Secret Cup, which was the Canadian leg of the 2020–21 PWHPA Dream Gap Tour, Poulin scored the third-period game-winner for Team Bauer (Montreal) in a 4-2 championship win over Team Sonnet (Toronto). She also recorded two assists for a three-point performance. Overall, Poulin was the scoring champion in the 2021 Secret Cup, with five goals and six assists in five games. In what would prove to be the final PWHPA season in 2023–24, Poulin led the Dream Gap Tour in scoring with 12 goals and 27 points in 20 games, and help lead Team Harvey's to the 2023 Secret Cup title.
Montreal Victoire, 2023–present
In 2023, the PWHPA bought out the rival Premier Hockey Federation and launched the new Professional Women's Hockey League (PWHL). Poulin, who was credited with an important role in pursuing a collective bargaining agreement in the new league, spoke of her desire to create "a viable professional league for the next generation, for ourselves." With each of the six new teams able to make three initial free agency signings, Poulin was widely assessed as the best player available, but it was generally assumed that she would sign with the Montreal team. The Athletic remarked that "it would be cool to see a bidding war between teams for Poulin," but acknowledged "we're just waiting for the Montreal signing announcement." On September 5, Poulin, along with Laura Stacey and Ann-Renée Desbiens, were reported as the Montreal team's first three players.
In 2023, Poulin was named Montreal's captain. PWHL Montreal finished in second in the PWHL's inaugural regular season, but were eliminated in the first round of the playoffs by PWHL Boston. Poulin missed three games of the regular season, but still finished tied for second in points, with 23 in 21 games played. She was named a First Team All-Star, and was a finalist for both the Billie Jean King Most Valuable Player and the Forward of the Year award.
Ahead of the 2024–25 PWHL season, all of the PWHL's franchises adopted new names, with PWHL Montreal rebranded to the Montreal Victoire. On January 29, 2025, Poulin scored the first hat trick of the season against the Ottawa Charge. The Victoire finished first in the league in the regular season, while Poulin claimed the PWHL Top Goal Scorer award with a league-leading 19 goals in 30 games (and 26 points total). She later received the Billie Jean King Most Valuable Player honour, the league's Forward of the Year award, and her second First Team All-Star designation. The Victoire faced the Charge in the semi-finals of the playoffs, and were ousted in four games. Poulin, described as "devastated" at the team's failure to reach the final for a second year, said "we're going to need to look in the mirror and see what we can do differently, how we can change and how we can get better."