🏒 The Women Who Built the PWHL

The PWHL just finished their second season, where Minnesota became the 2x (and only) champs. In the south, I've seen some hockey teams have some good runs and great popularity. The Carolina Hurricanes went to the playoffs again, a beloved franchise in Raleigh. My hometown, Columbus, GA, brought back a hockey franchise, the River Dragons. Even my college sister school, the University of Alabama at Huntsville, has had a thriving program for a few years (but it’s still Go Blazers). None of these are women's hockey teams, so I decided to do a little digging on the pro women's hockey league that seems to be not only sustainable but poised for expansion.

Six teams make up the PWHL: Minnesota, Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal, Boston, and New York. Only Minnesota plays in an NHL arena (the home of the Minnesota Wild). They will expand to include Seattle and Vancouver next season. The Mark Walter Group owns all six PWHL clubs and has in place an eight-year collective-bargaining agreement with the Professional Women’s Hockey Players Association, a players’ union formed in 2023, shortly after the PWHL bought out and disbanded the old Premier Hockey Federation.

There are currently four Black women athletes in the PWHL: Sophie Jacques (Boston), Mikyla Grant-Mantis (Ottawa), Sarah Nurse (Toronto), and Nikki Nightengale (Minnesota). The league is still young and recognizes that they have room for improvement in this area. Here's an excerpt from Togethxr, featuring an interview with the hosts of Jocks In Jills, Tessa Bonhomme and Julia Tocheri, on the current state of the league.

Women’s hockey has been around for a long time, but like many other women’s sports, it’s experienced incredible growth. What factors helped propel the women’s hockey boom?

Julia: The 2018 Olympics were so good and the PWHPA had just been founded — it really felt like there was momentum in 2018. It felt like we were really close to having a league. Then COVID happened and it felt like that was all stalled. Women's worlds got canceled — it felt like a tumultuous time. But then through that time, women's hockey was able to get on the same page, which was what it kind of always needed — folks getting into the same camp. Tessa could probably speak to it better because she played in different iterations of what was professional women's hockey before [the PWHL] existed.

I would say the biggest impact is having funds, and a financial backer that knows what it's going to take to have a professional league — because this league is professional. Not just in name, like the old ones were. This one is professional all the way through the way. The players are treated, like the day-to-day experience, and that just wasn't the case before.

Tessa: Yeah, it does feel like a long time coming, but I always say the appetite was always there. Whenever we went to events, or even after our games, people would ask how they could find out more about us.

But I think it was a female sports movement. When Megan Rapinoe and crew fought for their contract with U.S. soccer, and then in 2017 when Team USA hockey did the exact same thing, that was big. [USA Hockey] was going to boycott a home world championship tournament, and it literally came down to the last hour. There was a ton of pressure on them to say they weren't going to be playing and they managed to pull through, win that world championship, and then go on and win the first Olympic gold in 20 years. So I feel like that was momentum.

There was a lot of talk about the CWHL folding and wondering what was going on with the PHF and everything else — and everyone became interested all of a sudden. Julia’s right, [COVID happening] did allow the ladies a chance to really put their heads together, figure out how to do this the right way, and put a really good business plan together.

I feel like it was a matter of all the stars aligning, but the ladies needed to really come together and decide as one that it doesn't matter who's at the helm — we just need to have this happen. That’s where Kendall Coyne Schofield and Hilary Knight were the perfect leaders. Obviously, there are other ladies that were on the board with them, Liz Knox, Sarah Nurse, and Brianne Jenner were in a ton of boardrooms all the time. All the other players deserve the recognition as well for sticking with it and committing to keeping this PWHPA group together.

Then obviously the decision on Kendall Coyne Schofield to just call Billie Jean King on a whim and say, “Hey, how the hell do we do this?” And Billie said, “Here, let me show you.” The Mark Walter group, understanding that it's not gonna be a three to five year commitment of some type of money. He is committed long term and spending the money properly to make sure that it does look and feel like a true professional league, not only for the fans that are experiencing it, but for the players who are sacrificing a lot to make sure that it gets off the ground properly.

We've seen leagues fold and lose momentum before, but it seems like the PWHL has only been like climbing since its launch. What moment made you realize that this league is the real deal and here to stay?

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Tessa: Day one. The line was around the block and I asked a scalper what he was selling his ticket for, and he said $250, I thought: we made it. We don't have enough seats in here. There's way too much interest in this team, and then every subsequent game after that, it was just like, “Holy smokes, this is what everyone's been waiting for. Why hasn't this happened before?” Day one, that was it for me. Then on New Year's Day, [the PWHL] got like, Hockey Night in Canada viewership numbers on that game. It was so cool.

Julia: My favorite “You Made It” story isn’t mine, but it’s from Sarah Nurse. She said the first time somebody came up to her in Toronto, recognized her, and was so excited to see her. Then [the fan] immediately asked, ”What's going on with the power play?” It’s a great story.

P.S. In a future article and podcast episode, we’ll be speaking with the founder of Black Girl Hockey Club, so stay tuned!