Women’s Hockey: PWHL Begins Second-Ever Season

Last year, the Professional Women’s Hockey League (PWHL) embarked on its widely successful inaugural season. Under the motto of “Ice time. Earned,” the league set the record for the most fans in attendance at a professional women’s hockey game and promptly broke its own record three more times. Now, the record sits at 21,205 attendees at a game between the Toronto Sceptres and Montreal Victoire, acting as a proof-of-concept that women’s hockey has an audience.

The league was introduced in June 2023 after years of inconsistency in women’s hockey. The PWHL became the only professional league in North America, replacing the Premier Hockey Federation (PHF) and the National Women’s Hockey League (NWHL). This new, unified league was driven by the work of star players from the U.S. and Canadian national teams from the Professional Women’s Hockey Players’ Association in collaboration with the Mark Walter Group — Walter is chairman of the L.A. Dodgers — and Billie Jean King Enterprises. In a remarkably short time frame, the league was assembled, launching six original teams in Boston, New York, Minnesota, Toronto, Ottawa, and Montreal.

Because of the accelerated development of the league, team branding was not prioritized last season. All six teams played 24 games — plus playoffs — wearing temporary jerseys without mascots or logos and were simply referred to by their geographic location (e.g. PWHL Minnesota). This season, the teams have a new look with official team names, logos, and jerseys. This change will allow the Boston Fleet, Minnesota Frost, Montreal Victoire, New York Sirens, Ottawa Charge, and Toronto Sceptres to continue to develop their team identities and fan bases.

The league also announced a “Takeover Tour” for the 2024-25 season, where teams will travel across the U.S. and Canada to play in neutral-site locations. As Amy Scheer, the league’s senior vice president of business operations, described in a press release: “The PWHL Takeover Tour lets us showcase our game and exceptional athletes across a wider North American footprint — an exciting moment for our players and an important move for our business as we consider expansion.” Record-breaking attendance numbers have expedited the consideration surrounding adding new markets to the league, with the chance of expansion possible by as early as the 2025-26 season. Exposure for the PWHL is also coming through EA Sports as NHL 25 — launching Dec. 5 — will integrate the six women’s teams into the game.

The first games of the second season started Dec. 1, and so far, each team has played three games.

(Note: the PWHL follows the 3-2-1-0 system in which a regulation win is worth three points, an overtime win two points, an overtime loss one point, and a regulation loss zero points, that differs from the 2-1-0 system that the NHL follows where an overtime and regulation win are both equivalent to two points.)

The Frost — the reigning Walter Cup winner — are currently leading the standings with seven points from two wins and an overtime loss. The Sirens — who ended last season with the worst record — are in the second spot, finding success with Sara Fillier, the first overall draft pick they added to their roster in the 2024 PWHL draft during the off-season. With each team now playing 30 regular season games, there is more time for each team to find their footing.

As the novelty of the league has worn off, the biggest hope for the rest of this season is for continued momentum. Marie-Philip Poulin, a star player for the Victoire, emphasized that “[t]here were a lot of firsts last year and a lot of emotional moments — moments that were bigger than hockey. This year is about making it normal that we play in bigger buildings that sell out, [and] that people are excited [to attend games]. And now we’re just going to play hockey because that’s our job.”