So what's her first love now?
"Oh, I'll have to say hockey but surfing is a very close second," she says, comfortable in the knowledge surfing is something she can still partake in while carving out a niche in the code.
"I used to be a competitive surfer but I've been out of home for three years now so I've definitely adjusted."
Ratcliffe recalls how excited she was on leaving home for the first time when she embarked on her hockey career but after a few weeks a bout of homesickness got hold of her.
"You don't have your mum or your dad or the rest of your family to complain to all the time," she says of Rebecca and Chris Ratcliffe who are university researchers in the state of Victoria.
Growing up in Warrnambool it was predominantly surfing for Ratcliffe in a sporting community of a picturesque tourist location with 28,000 inhabitants where females outnumber males by 52 per cent if internet projections are anything to go by.
A former state-level hockey representative, her father introduced her to the sport when she was 12.
"I was too busy surfing," she says, taking hockey seriously two years later on making her maiden state team.
She and her mother, who will be here to watch her play for five days, sat down and, in a jocular vein, mapped out a five-year hockey plan but, as it transpires, it's anything but a joke.
"It turns out that five-year plan is going exactly the way we planned it."
That entailed continuously making the state teams, gaining national recognition and culminating with an invite to Perth. Reassuringly, it's gone swimmingly well.
"I can't even reflect on how it's happened because everything has fallen into place so I'm so stoked."
On reflection it's going scaringly too smoothly. She got a national call-up last year to make her debut against Great Britain in Perth but had only recovered from a broken right ankle a couple of weeks before.
"That's probably the only thing that's gone wrong for me since I was 14 but it's all good now."
It's an opportune time to be in the squad with "the girls super accommodating", as well as coach Paul Gaudoin and his stable of support staff, to enable them to build a rapport.
"We try to have lots of fun off the field and we're certainly gelling as a team with a lot of positives coming into our first tournament."
But "a sucker for team sport", Ratcliffe gravitated towards hockey and built some long-lasting relationships along the way.
"I think it's so much better than an individual sport."
Representing her country at an Olympics and biting a gold medal on the rostrum to the tune of Advance Australia Fair is her ultimate dream but plying her trade as a professional in Europe, provided it fits in with her other goals, will be great, too.
Having arrived at Auckland airport, the team took in the scenic drive to the Bay, soaking it all up.
"It's so pretty," she says of the Bay in her first trip across the ditch.
Better than Warrnambool?
"Oh, I'm pretty biased but we get a bit more waves. It looks nice and I haven't been here before so, apparently , the water's nice," she says of the excursions they have made from their Napier hotel so far to nice cafes.
Ratcliffe has ambitions to graduate with a degree in commerce.
