Cammi Granato celebrates after defeating Canada to win the Women's World Championships in April. Doug Benc/Getty Images

Associate Editor Richard Deitsch recently interviewed Cammi Granato, the U.S. women's hockey team's all-time leading scorer, for the magazine's Q&A. Here are excerpts from their conversation.

SI: Has anyone called you the Gordie Howe of women's hockey?
Granato: Just you, and thanks a lot [laughs]. That's going to stick, I bet.

SI: How close are you to retiring?
Granato: I'm going to keep playing as long as my body cooperates. My back was a major issue for me after the 2002 Games. I had battled spasms that year and I took inflammatories every day. I was even uncomfortable doing something as simple as drying my hair. I contemplated retiring because of that but I met an amazing trainer in Vancouver who worked with me through acupuncture, and my back just freed up a ton. Then another trainer worked on my core. It's like I'm a new person and new player.

SI: It's safe to say you and your husband, former NHL player, Ray Ferraro, own the record for most husband-wife goals in professional hockey history. Do you want to declare today that this record will never be broken?
Granato: Well, I know Ray has 408 goals because I hear it every day. But the minute you declare something will never be broken, you'll eat your words. My teammate Krissy Wendell is dating AHL player Johnny Pohl. She scores a lot of goals and so does he so I better watch what I say.

SI: Has the NHL strike affected the women's game?
Granato: It didn't affect our game in that we got a ton of opportunities. If we had some sort of tour or played some games around the U.S. in venues that were starving for hockey, it might have helped. But from a players' standpoint, I missed watching hockey. I consider myself a student of the game. I love NHL hockey and I learn from it. Obviously, with Ray [being an ESPN commentator]and my brother [Tony] being an assistant coach with the Avalanche, it affected our family.

SI: Security was an overwhelming issue during the Salt Lake Games, especially since they were held so soon after Sept. 11. What are you expecting for Turin?
Granato: We were still so raw as a country from what had happened on Sept. 11, we had no idea if there would even be an Olympics. Going into the Olympics we were very fearful of the whole terrorist thing but once we got to the Games, it was unbelievable how much security was there. You just felt safe. From helicopters to secret service, to all the stops you had to make just to get into the Olympic Village, I felt good about the security. As far as the concerns for Italy, none of that has come up yet but I expect the same things to start to happen. People will question security and the media will spin things into a frenzy about how scary it will be. But if [the State Department] does as good a job as they did in Salt Lake, I will feel comfortable. The government is really good about talking to us and answering our questions

SI: What's your schedule leading up to Turin?
Granato: Right now is the intense training phases. We'll get together in August for the [2006 Olympic team] tryout, and once the team is named we head to Finland for the Four Nations Cup tournament. Then, after a break, we reconvene on the East Coast and head to Turin for a preliminary tournament to get used to the venue. Once we return from Italy we get another 10 days off and then we reconvene in Minnesota and start playing games against college all-star teams, boys' teams, as well as a six-game series against Canada and four or five games against Finland. Then in late January we head to France for a week and then to the Olympics in Turin.

SI:  Do you still approach the tryouts as if you have to make the squad?
Granato: You have to approach that camp as something you're training for and you train so your on-ice performance peaks at that tryout. You just can't walk into the tryout expecting to make the team. You have to go in there and with the attitude that you're going to prove you belong. That's the way I approached it every time.

SI: The notion was floated  in Canada of awarding the Stanley Cup to the winner of a series involving the best female players of Canada and the United States. Thoughts?
Granato: My first inclination is that would be amazing because I grew up wanting to be a Chicago Blackhawk and I know what the Cup symbolizes. But that's exactly why I don't think it would be right. The NHL guys play an 82-game season and, after the grind of the playoffs, they hoist the Cup. The Cup represents, the journey that they took. For us to just play a three-game series and then hoist the Cup, it wouldn't feel the same. I don't really believe we would have earned it.