Current season, competition or edition: 2025–26 PWHL season | |
 | |
| Sport | Ice hockey |
|---|---|
| First season | 2023–24 |
| Owner | Mark Walter Group |
| No. of teams | 8 |
| Countries |
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| Most recent champion | Minnesota Frost (2nd) (2024–25) |
| Most titles | Minnesota Frost (2) |
| Broadcasters | |
| Official website | www |
TheProfessional Women's Hockey League (PWHL;French:Ligue professionnelle de hockey féminin,LPHF) is a women's professionalice hockey league inNorth America. The league comprises eight teams, four each from theUnited States andCanada. The teams play aregular season to earn one of four places in apostseason tournament that determines the winner of theWalter Cup. The PWHL is wholly owned and operated by theMark Walter Group.
Differences between the PWHL and other North American professional hockey leagues include a3-2-1-0 points system, terminations ofpenalties following ashort-handed goal, best-of-fiveshootouts, and greater restrictions onbody checking. The league's matches are broadcast nationally in Canada by theCBC andTSN, their French-language affiliatesRadio-Canada andRDS, and in both languages onAmazon Prime Video. In the United States, it is broadcast byregional sports networks based in each U.S. city with a team. It isstreamed onYouTube internationally, excluding Canada, as well as onNova Sport inCzechia andSlovakia.[1]
Thecollapse of the Canadian Women's Hockey League in 2019 led to the establishment of theProfessional Women's Hockey Players Association (PWHPA), a non-profit organization that advocated for greater professionalism in women's ice hockey. PWHPA members boycotted existing leagues, including thePremier Hockey Federation (PHF), with the goal of establishing a stable, unified professional league, and worked to build a collective bargaining agreement withMark Walter andBillie Jean King Enterprises. The Mark Walter Group acquired the assets of the PHF following its2022–23 season. Subsequently, the PWHPA worked with the Mark Walter Group to establish a unified league with new ownership and management. The league'sfirst draft took place in September 2023, and itsfirst season began in January 2024.
Top-level and professional women's hockey in North America has developed in starts and stops since the late twentieth century.[2] TheNational Women's Hockey League (NWHL) launched in 1999, featuring teams mainly inOntario andQuebec. Some teams fromWestern Canada competed intermittently, but aWestern Women's Hockey League was formed in 2004. TheCanadian Women's Hockey League (CWHL) effectively replaced the NWHL and ran for twelve seasons, from 2007 to 2019, with teams competing for theClarkson Cup.[3] The CWHL, which operated on a non-profit basis, did not pay player salaries, but it did at times offer stipends and bonuses as it aspired to become a professional league.[4] However, the league lacked financial stability and it abruptly folded in 2019.[5] A new National Women's Hockey League—later renamed thePremier Hockey Federation (PHF)—which did offer player salaries, was established in the United States in 2015, before expanding into Canada in 2020.[6] However, after the dissolution of the CWHL, hundreds of prominent women's players, including Canadian and American Olympians, founded theProfessional Women's Hockey Players' Association (PWHPA) and opted to boycott existing leagues in pursuit of a unified, financially stable professional league.[7] In the meantime, the PWHPA attracted partnerships with corporate sponsors andNational Hockey League teams, organizing exhibition tournaments to generate support for their goal.[8]
In 2022, the PWHPA entered a partnership with the Mark Walter Group and BJK Enterprises—led byLos Angeles Dodgers ownerMark Walter andBillie Jean King, respectively—with the intent to launch a new professional league.[9] In 2023, the two business partners purchased the assets of the PHF, which ceased operations.[10][11] The PWHPA negotiated acollective bargaining agreement ahead of the launch of the new professional league the union had been working towards.[12]
The establishment of the Professional Women's Hockey League (PWHL) was announced by the Mark Walter Group in August 2023, along with the location of its six charter teams: Boston, Minneapolis–St. Paul, Montreal, New York City, Ottawa, and Toronto.[13][14] Teams began constructing their rosters that summer, with an initial ten-dayfree agency period to sign three players.[15]Emily Clark,Brianne Jenner, andEmerance Maschmeyer became the league's first players when they signed withOttawa.[16] Theinaugural draft took place in September at theCanadian Broadcasting Centre in Toronto, whereMinnesota choseTaylor Heise as the first pick in a fifteen-round, ninety-player draft from a pool of 286 eligible players.[17] The league announced that, due to time constraints, the teams would not be given nicknames until after the inaugural season, and would wearjerseys featuring the name of the teams' locales in a diagonal wordmark.[18]
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Prior to the start of theinaugural season, all six teams congregated at theUtica University Nexus Center in early December for a five-day evaluation camp, including scrimmages used to experiment with new rules.[19][20] The first game took place on January 1, 2024, whenToronto hostedNew York at theMattamy Athletic Centre.[21] New York'sElla Shelton scored the league's first goal en route to a 4–0 win.[22] The game's Canadian television audience of 2.9 million viewers was the largest for a sports or entertainment broadcast that day, beating the2024 NHL Winter Classic.[23][24] The attendance record for a professional women's ice hockey match would be set multiple times during the ensuing season: 8,318 at Ottawa's first home game atTD Place Arena on January 2;[25] 13,316 at Minnesota's first home game at theXcel Energy Center on January 6;[26] 19,285 at the inaugural "Battle on Bay Street" match atScotiabank Arena on February 16;[27] and 21,105 at the "Duel at the Top" match at theBell Centre on April 20.[28][29] The latter two drew the largest ever crowds for women's ice hockey, surpassing the 18,013 that watched Canada play Finland at the2013 Women's World Championship.[27][29]
Toronto finished atop the standings at the end of the inaugural season—they chose to play fourth place Minnesota in the first round of the playoffs, leavingMontréal andBoston to play the other series.[30] Minnesota defeated Toronto in a five-game series, while Boston defeated Montréal in three straight games, with every decision coming in overtime.[31][32] In the final, Minnesota defeated Boston in a five-game series to capture the first Walter Cup championship.[33]Natalie Spooner was the league's first scoring champion and the inaugural winner of the league's Bill Jean King Most Valuable Player award, whileTaylor Heise led the playoffs in scoring and was given postseason MVP honours.[34][35]
Prior to the start of the 2024–25 season, the league announced that it was exploring expansion, opening up a process for proposals and stating that it would ultimately look to add two new teams when possible; by November 2024, the league had received more than two dozen expansion proposals.[36] On April 18, 2025, reports suggested that the first new expansion team would be inVancouver, withSeattle reportedly a top choice for the second.[37] On April 23, 2025, the league announced that Vancouver would receive the first expansion team in league history, with the team playing home games at thePacific Coliseum beginning in the 2025–26 season.[38] One week later, on April 30, the league announced that Seattle would receive the second expansion team for the 2025–26 season, with the team playing home games atClimate Pledge Arena, home of the NHL'sSeattle Kraken, who will have a supporting role with the team after supporting its expansion bid.[39] On May 21, the PWHL named Meghan Turner asgeneral manager for the Seattle team.[40][41]
The PWHL and all eight of its teams are owned by theMark Walter Group. The Advisory Board of the PWHL is formed byBillie Jean King,Ilana Kloss,Stan Kasten, and Royce Cohen.[42]Jayna Hefford is the Senior Vice President of Hockey Operations andAmy Scheer is the Senior Vice President of Business Operations.[43] Former hockey player and broadcasterCassie Campbell-Pascall is an advisor to the Board.[44][45] The league hired over 100 staff members to support league operations, distinguishing it from past women's hockey leagues that have lacked such operational support.[2]
The PWHPA organized a formal players' union in early 2023—thePWHL Players Association (PWHLPA)—that became the players' union representing all PWHL players.[46] Unique to professional women's hockey, the PWHL established an eight-year collective bargaining agreement (CBA) with the players' union.[47][48] The CBA establishes that each team must sign at least six players to a minimum salary of $80,000, and no more than nine players to a league minimum salary of $35,000, with teams instructed to achieve an average salary of $55,000. The base and average salaries are slated to increase 3% per season through the end of the agreement in 2031.[49] The CBA further outlines performance and team bonuses, including a $63,250 bonus for the championship-winning team, and other financial incentives, including housing stipends.[49]Brian Burke acts as the executive director of the players' union.[50]
| Pos | Team | W | OTW | OTL | L | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | A | 0 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 4 |
| 2 | B | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 3 |
| Example of the3-2-1-0 system: A leads B, as A earned points for their overtime losses (green), while B earned no points for their regulation losses (red). | ||||||
The inaugural PWHL season consisted of a 24-game schedule lasting from January to May.[51][52] For the 2024–25 season, the schedule comprised 30 games played from November to May, with each team facing the other five teams six times each.[53] The schedule included a mid-season break during the annualIIHF World Women's Championship in April.[51][53] For the 2025–26 season, the schedule will again comprise 30 games played, with each team facing the other seven teams a minimum of four times. The schedule includes a mid-season break for theWinter Olympics.[54] A3-2-1-0 points system is used for classification, whereby a team is awarded 3 points for a regulation win, 2 for an overtime or shootout win, and 1 for an overtime or shootout loss.[55] At the end of the regular season, the best four teams qualify for apostseason tournament that determines the champion, comprising two semi-finals and a final played asbest-of-five series.[56][57] The teams compete for theWalter Cup, a trophy named after the league's financial backers, the Walter family.[58]
PWHL rules closely follow National Hockey League andInternational Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) standards, with some notable innovations.[59] A "jailbreak" rule allows a team to terminate aminor penalty against by scoring ashort-handed goal.[55] During best-of-fiveshootouts, any player is eligible to shoot at any time, including taking multiple attempts.[59] Like theSwedish Women's Hockey League, the PWHL breaks women's ice hockey and IIHF conventions and allowsbody checking, with the rule-book outlining that checking is permissible "when there is a clear intention of playing the puck or attempting to 'gain possession' of the puck", allowed principally along the boards.[60][61] League executive Jayna Hefford has stated that body checking was included at the behest of the players.[60] There are two main factors which determine the legality of a body check. The first is being able to determine whether or not gaining possession of the puck is the sole purpose of the player initiating the body check—a blatant example of an illegal body check would be if a player is across the ice from the puck, and they initiate a body check against another player. The second factor is the movement of players. Under rule 52.1, "a player who is stationary is entitled to that area of the ice. It is up to the opponent to avoid body contact with such a player." If a player were to initiate a body check on a player who is stationary and without the puck, there would be grounds for a referee to assess a penalty.
Prior to the2024–25 season, the league announced the introduction of the "No Escape Rule", whereby when a team takes a penalty, all of the penalized team's players must remain on the ice until after the ensuing faceoff; this rule is similar to the existing rule which keeps players on the ice after their teamices the puck.[62][63]
As of the2025–26 season, eight teams compete in the league, the original six (Montreal Victoire,Ottawa Charge, andToronto Sceptres from Canada, andBoston Fleet,Minnesota Frost, andNew York Sirens from the United States) as well as expansion teamsSeattle Torrent andVancouver Goldeneyes.[64] The six original clubs have been described as the league's own "Original Six" and by the PWHL as its "Inaugural Six".[65][66] The teams' locations were chosen for being markets of National Hockey League franchises with "track records of supporting hockey and, specifically, the women's game."[67] The teams are located in five of the seven Premier Hockey Federation markets—theBuffalo Beauts andConnecticut Whale were not given PWHL replacements, while Ottawa gained a team.[64]Pittsburgh,Washington, D.C., andLondon, Ontario, were also considered for inaugural teams.[68]
Potential teamnicknames were registered with theUnited States Patent and Trademark Office in October 2023: Boston Wicked, Minnesota Superior, Montreal Echo, New York Sound, Ottawa Alert, and Toronto Torch.[69] However, the league ultimately opted to forgo unique club identities for the inaugural season, emphasizing league branding instead.[70] This meant that teams lacked nicknames,crests, and stylizedjerseys, and were identified by their city.[71][72] On September 9, 2024, ahead of the league's second season, team names and logos were announced, with none of them matching the trademarked names from 2023: the Boston Fleet, Minnesota Frost, Montreal Victoire, New York Sirens, Ottawa Charge, and Toronto Sceptres.[73]
Some teams experimented with multiple venues during the inaugural season, and the league also organized a number of neutral-site games. As of the 2025–26 season, Minnesota plays its home games at theGrand Casino Arena, the largest-capacity venue in the league at 17,954,[74] Seattle in the second largest atClimate Pledge Arena,[75] and New York in the third largest at Newark'sPrudential Center.[76] Boston hosts games atTsongas Center at theUniversity of Massachusetts Lowell,[77] Montreal atPlace Bell inLaval,[78] Ottawa atTD Place Arena inLansdowne Park,[79] Toronto atCoca-Cola Coliseum,[80] and Vancouver atPacific Coliseum.[81] The league has presented one-off matches at other large venues, including theBell Centre in Montreal andScotiabank Arena in Toronto in games dubbed the "Duel at the Top" and "Battle on Bay Street" rivalry matches between Montreal and Toronto.[28][82] Other one-off match venues have includedLittle Caesars Arena in Detroit;[83]PPG Paints Arena in Pittsburgh;[84] and thePrudential Center in Newark.[85] In November 2024, the league announced a "Takeover Tour" for the 2024–25 season that would see teams play nine neutral site matches in Seattle, Denver, Buffalo, Raleigh, Detroit, St. Louis, Quebec City, Vancouver, and Edmonton.[86] The league also suggested that it would consider games in Europe in future seasons.[87]
For its inaugural season, the PWHL announced that it would collaborate with the National Hockey League on its All-Star festivities, intending to host its own All-Star game in future seasons.[88][89] PWHL All-Stars participated in the "PWHL 3-on-3 Showcase" on February 1 during the2024 NHL All-Star weekend in Toronto; it featured 24 PWHL players divided between Team King and Team Kloss—named afterBillie Jean King andIlana Kloss, respectively—coached byCassie Campbell-Pascall andMeghan Duggan.[89]
| Season | Teams | Team awards | Individual awards | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Walter Cup champion | Regular season champion | Playoff MVP | Season MVP | Top scorer | Top goal scorer | ||
| 2023–24 | 6 | PWHL Minnesota (3–2 vsPWHL Boston) | PWHL Toronto (47 points) | Taylor Heise (PWHL Minnesota) | Natalie Spooner (PWHL Toronto) | Natalie Spooner (PWHL Toronto) (27 points) | Natalie Spooner (PWHL Toronto) (20 goals) |
| 2024–25 | 6 | Minnesota Frost (3–1 vsOttawa Charge) | Montreal Victoire (53 points) | Gwyneth Philips (Ottawa Charge) | Marie-Philip Poulin (Montreal Victoire) | Hilary Knight (Boston Fleet) /Sarah Fillier (New York Sirens) (29 points) | Marie-Philip Poulin (Montreal Victoire) (19 goals) |
| Team | Seasons | Walter Cup champion | Years | Regular season champion | Years | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Minnesota Frost | 2 | 2 | 2023–24,2024–25 | 0 | - | 2 |
| Toronto Sceptres | 2 | 0 | - | 1 | 2023–24 | 1 |
| Montreal Victoire | 2 | 0 | - | 1 | 2024–25 | 1 |
Production of all PWHL game telecasts are being handled in-house by the league, with Dome Productions (jointly owned byBell Media andRogers Sports & Media) handling host production for Canadian home games, andRaycom Sports handling production for U.S. home games.[90]
In Canada, the league reached agreements for the inaugural season with theCanadian Broadcasting Corporation (viaCBC Television andCBC Gem in English, andIci Radio-Canada Télé andIci TOU.TV in French),Sportsnet,TSN, andRDS (French) to carry packages of games throughout the season, with all other games available viaYouTube.[91][90] For the 2024–25 season, Sportsnet was replaced byAmazon Prime Video, which exclusively carries Tuesday night games, and holds rights to one semi-final series. The CBC primarily broadcasts Saturday afternoon games, while French-language coverage of Montreal Victoire games are split among the three broadcasters.[92]
Distribution of games in the United States would initially rely on partnerships withregional sports networks, with the PWHL partnering withNESN,Bally Sports North (now FanDuel Sports Network North), andMSG Network for Boston, Minnesota, and New York games respectively. In February 2024, the league announced a partnership with thefree ad-supported streaming television (FAST) platform Women's Sports Network as its first national media partner in the United States.[91][93][94] The Seattle Torrent partnered withKZJO andKONG.[95]
| Rank | Player | Games played | Shutouts |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  Corinne Schroeder | 35 | 5 |
| 2 |  Maddie Rooney | 29 | 4 |
| 3 | Kristen Campbell | 43 | 3 |
| 4 | Gwyneth Philips | 15 | 2 |
| Nicole Hensley | 25 | 2 | |
| Emerance Maschmeyer | 41 | 2 | |
| Aerin Frankel | 41 | 2 | |
| 8 |  Klára Peslarová | 4 | 1 |
| Kayle Osborne | 10 | 1 | |
| Ann-Renée Desbiens | 37 | 1 |
| Rank | Player | Games played | Goals | Assists | Points |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Marie-Philip Poulin | 51 | 29 | 20 | 49 |
| 2 | Daryl Watts | 54 | 22 | 22 | 44 |
| 3 | Alex Carpenter | 50 | 19 | 24 | 43 |
| 4 | Laura Stacey | 50 | 21 | 19 | 40 |
| Hilary Knight | 54 | 21 | 19 | 40 | |
| Kendall Coyne Schofield | 54 | 18 | 22 | 40 | |
| 7 | Hannah Miller | 52 | 17 | 21 | 38 |
| Jessie Eldridge | 54 | 16 | 22 | 38 | |
| 9 | Sarah Nurse | 45 | 17 | 20 | 37 |
| Ella Shelton | 48 | 15 | 22 | 37 |
But Friday night's draw of 19,285 fans at Scotiabank Arena is the largest crowd to watch women's hockey ever [...] The previous women's hockey attendance record was 18,013 fans at a preliminary round game between Canada and Finland at the 2013 Women's World Championship in Ottawa.
The 21,105 fans who attended the game broke the record for attendance at a female hockey game set in Toronto at the Scotiabank Arena...
The 21,105 attendance set a high-water mark for a women's hockey game [...] The previous record of 18,013 at the 2013 world championship in Ottawa stood for a decade before the PWHL started this year.
The PWHL has received more than 25 proposals for expansion, as the league looks at the possibility of adding two teams as early as next season.
The PWHL playoffs are set to take place in May and will follow a typical bracket format with two semifinal series setting up a championship series
The PWHL continues to innovate, creating unique rules to improve the flow of hockey in the league, including the implementation of a new "No Escape Rule" this season.
The six teams in the new Professional Women's Hockey League will be evenly divided between the United States and Canada, with teams in Boston, Minneapolis-St. Paul, the New York metropolitan area, Montreal, Ottawa and Toronto. With the start of the new league, Buffalo and Connecticut are losing their teams, while Ottawa is gaining one.
Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa, Boston, Minneapolis-St. Paul and the New York City area have been tabbed as the new league's Original Six.
The new league unveiled its Original Six franchises on Tuesday, putting each one of them in NHL markets with track records of supporting hockey and, specifically, the women's game.
That wasn't the original "original six," either. According to multiple PWHL sources, the league looked at Pittsburgh, Washington, D.C., and London, Ont., among others.
When the Professional Women's Hockey League (PWHL) starts its inaugural season on Jan. 1, the league's six teams won't have names and logos. For now, the players will be wearing simple jerseys that have the city name across the front.
However there are some missing pieces, such as names and logos for the six teams. "I don't, I don't," PWHL advisory board member Stan Kasten said Monday on whether he has a timeline for those key elements to be included.
Xcel Energy Center officially seats 17,954 for Minnesota Wild games...
...the PWHL announced Tuesday that its Boston team will play home games at UMass Lowell's Tsongas Center...
Ottawa's new professional women's hockey team will play its games at TD Place this season.
Toronto took the "Battle on Bay Street" over Montreal 3-0 in Professional Women's Hockey League action on Friday. The PWHL's first game at Scotiabank Arena...
A record crowd of 13,736 watched Boston beat Ottawa, 2-1, in a shootout at Little Caesars Arena.
Fans from all over Pittsburgh and Canada filled the lower bowl at PPG Paints Arena [...] as part of Professional Women's Hockey League Takeover Weekend.
PWHL Boston forward Lexie Adzija spoiled New York's inaugural party at the Prudential Center...
The league is also exploring the opportunity to hold neutral site games in Europe after this season.
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