Years later she realized that, although not the most appropriate words for a goalie, her childhood cry may have hinted at the on-ice success that lay ahead.
Bennion, who plays centre for UBC's varsity women's ice hockey team, and Mike Dalziel, a pillar of the men's volleyball team, both developed their love of sports at a young age. A further similarity is the fact that while excelling in their sport of choice, Bennion and Dalziel have also excelled as students, consistently earning Academic All-Canadian status for maintaining academic averages of better than 80 per cent.
"It's remarkable for a varsity athlete to pull that off," says men's volleyball coach Dale Ohman, noting the amount of time the athletes have to spend practising and travelling.
Within days of returning from competition in Finland and Estonia, Dalziel was hitting the books at the beginning of his fourth year in Mechanical Engineering. Since graduating among the top four B.C. high school students in his year, Dalziel has continued to earn grades in the high 80s and 90s.
"Mike's not your typical All-Canadian, he's a phenomenon," says Ohman. "Mike's combination of athleticism and scholarship is outstanding and unique among the athletes I've coached."
Dalziel is also taking on a leadership role on the team. His game has improved each year to the point where he is now a formidable player at offense and defence. At 6-7, Dalziel is able to attack from any position on the court, with a spike serve and the ability to spike from the front row and back.
Dalziel downplays his dual successes citing "a few late nights here and there." Volleyball practices take up at least three hours a day, six days a week, and Saturdays are "a total write-off" with the best part of the day spent competing and travelling.
Last year he was involved with the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) Heavy Lift team, a group of students who design and build a remote-controlled aircraft to certain specifications yet able to lift as heavy a load as possible in competition with entries from across North America. This year his design tasks are smaller and more numerous. He and fellow student Geoff Dosman, a keen mountain biker, are currently designing a light and strong carbon fibre brake booster to improve bicycle braking power.
Bennion's accomplishments are equally remarkable.
She played on her first team at age eight after her mother signed her up for boys' hockey as Larry rather than Laura. The team coach was a willing accomplice and the parents who grew wise to the deception stayed quiet. By the next year there were more opportunities for girls to play.
A Vancouver native and graduate of Lord Byng High School, Bennion enrolled in Arts at UBC and played junior varsity basketball until shoulder injuries forced her to stop.
Deciding to pursue an interest in journalism, she switched to Northeastern University in Boston after second year and skated back into the world of competitive hockey. While completing her journalism degree, Bennion played varsity hockey, practising six days a week for three years and earning consecutive athletic scholarships.
After graduation she returned to Vancouver and UBC where, while working as editor of UBC's sports newspaper The Point, she founded UBC's women's varsity ice hockey team. She also decided to change careers.
Now in third-year medicine at UBC, Bennion is well on her way to becoming a doctor. And, with grades consistently in the 80s, she also qualifies as an Academic All-Canadian.
"It's not at all unusual for medical students to have interests beyond their studies," she says. "A lot of students have varied interests, from dance, to sports, to the arts. You really need it just to keep your sanity."
Bennion coached the hockey team for its first two years, initially because she wasn't a student, and for two more years while the team progressed to the Division 1 level. Last season she turned over the coaching to Steve Mathias and hit the ice as centre. The team made the playoffs before being knocked out by Bennion's old club team, Britannia. This season she's even more optimistic about the team's chances.
"We've got a lot of first-year players from Vancouver Island and the Fraser Valley," she says. "I think our team is going to challenge to win Division 1 this year."
Like Dalziel, Bennion doesn't have a lot of time for activities other than athletics and studies during the school year. And, like Dalziel, she takes the demands of varsity sports and academia in stride.
"My time is pretty well structured," she says. "I think the ability to do that came from my experience at Northeastern because we were on the ice six days a week. You couldn't afford to spend your free time watching TV or goofing around. If I wasn't playing hockey I would be involved in some other sport or recreational activity."
There are roughly 625 varsity athletes at UBC who spend many hours practising in their sport while also fulfilling the requirements of a range of degree programs. At the end of the 1996-97 academic year, 79 of those athletes were awarded Academic All-Canadian status.