Canadian goaltender Shannon Szabados has signed with the National Women’s Hockey League’s Buffalo Beauts.
The team made the announcement Wednesday on Twitter.
The 31-year-old from Edmonton has backstopped the Canadian women’s hockey team in three straight Olympic finals, winning gold in 2010 and 2014.
READ MORE: Shannon Szabados pro debut set for Saturday night
But Szabados has spent most of her career playing for and against men’s teams in the Alberta junior and college leagues, as well as the Southern Professional Hockey League.
The NWHL is the first women’s league for Szabados.
WATCH: Goalie Shannon Szabados talks about hitting the ice for Edmonton Oilers practice
The five-foot-eight, 146-pound netminder stopped 40 of 42 shots in regulation in February’s Olympic women’s hockey final in Pyeongchang, South Korea.
Canada fell 3-2 to the U.S. in a shootout.
READ MORE: Team Canada goaltender Shannon Szabados returns to Alberta with Olympic silver medal
The U.S.-based NWHL, which was established in 2015, will expand to five teams next season with the addition of the Minnesota Whitecaps.
The Beauts won the Isobel Cup in 2017 and lost in this year’s final to the Metropolitan Riveters.
The NWHL started out paying players between $10,000 and $26,000, but salaries were reduced the following season to sustain the league.
The league competes with the Canadian-based CWHL for players. The seven-team CWHL began paying players between $2,000 and $10,000 this past season.
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