The story of professional women’s hockey is one of enormous talent underserved: of poorly funded, fractured pro leagues whose players couldn’t make a living doing what they were born to do.Â
Thank goodness that story is swiftly being rewritten with the emergence of the Professional Women’s Hockey League — the new women’s pro league backed not only by the world’s top female hockey talent but with major funding and support from billionaire Mark Walter and Stan Kasten, of the Los Angeles Dodgers.
"To have the backing of people like that, that bring experience, that bring resources, that bring capital, that bring a commitment to doing it right at the ground level, that's a difference maker," Jayna Hefford, Olympic Gold medalist and senior vice president of hockey operations at the PWHL told the CBC in August.
Though thrown together miraculously in a matter of months and though it is still without official team names and logos, the PWHL has hit the ice sprinting. (So far, its six teams go by the names of their home cities: Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal, Boston, New York and Minnesota).
Its inaugural season launched New Year's Day amid intense media coverage and fan interest. Not only did Toronto’s team sell out its home-opener against New York at the Mattamy Athletic Centre, it sold out its entire first season of home games (and in perfect Toronto fashion, the home team — wearing blue and white no less — lost 4-0).
Hefford joined tennis star Billie Jean King, who helped bring the league to life, for the ceremonial puck drop at that first game. "New year, new era in women's sports. So proud of these athletes and the history made on the ice today," King said on social media.
At its home opener against Montreal, Ottawa’s team set a record for the largest crowd ever to watch a professional women’s hockey game as roughly 8,300 spectators were rewarded with a game that went into overtime.
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But perhaps most special of all are the many photos to emerge from the opening games of young girls in PWHL gear leaning over the stands to take a selfie or get the autograph of their favourite players — an image we typically associate with boys and men.
Indeed, it’s thrilling to think that young girls are now dreaming about a career in hockey beyond the college level and beyond the Olympics. No professional women’s league prior to this one has had such robust funding and marketing, not to mention the centralized talent that will create fierce rivalries like those seen at the Olympics.Â
Players in the PWHL will make between $35,000 to $80,000 U.S. to start, which though far from ideal, exceeds the status quo of the past in which Olympic medallists were struggling to pay for their own equipment.
Sexist naysayers often argue that professional women’s hockey hasn’t succeeded with the general public because female players simply aren’t exciting enough to watch. But not only is this assertion laughably false; the numbers don’t bear it out.
At the 2022 Beijing Olympics nearly three million people in Canada tuned in to watch the Olympic Gold Medal game between bitter rivals Canada and the U.S.A. According to the Athletic, that gold medal game averaged more viewers in the United States than any NHL contest that season. The PWHL boasts many of the same household names who make the Olympics worth watching: superstars like Canadian Olympians Natalie Spooner, Sarah Nurse, and Marie-Philip Poulin and American Olympians Hilary Knight and speed demon Kendall Coyne Schofield. Â
All of which is to say that when top talent is on display and the teams are evenly matched, women’s hockey is a huge draw and exhilarating to watch. And now, finally, there is a league where we can watch the top calibre of play all season round. It’s a watershed moment not only for the women’s game and for young girls in the sport, but for any fan of good hockey.
We wish the league the best of luck. We'll be watching.Â
