USA Hockey and women’s players ‘made progress’ in Monday meeting

USA Hockey and the women’s national team say their marathon meeting Monday was productive and they hope to have an agreement this week that will end their ongoing wage dispute and avoid a boycott of the upcoming world championships.

The sides met for more than 10 hours Monday in Philadelphia and will continue discussions later this week.

Players announced last week they would boycott the upcoming world championships in Michigan unless significant progress was made toward a labour agreement.

USA Hockey and some players released statements Monday night saying they hoped a deal would be reached in time for the tournament, which begins March 31.

Players said they were hopeful to get an agreement in time to have a training camp and prepare to defend their world championship gold medal on home ice.

“We feel like we made progress today,” star forward Jocelyne Lamoureux-Davidson said by phone. “They were productive, and we are hopeful that we can come to a timely agreement that would get us to Plymouth (Michigan) in time to prepare as a team so we could compete in worlds.”

In its statement, USA Hockey said its goal remains to have the team it selected for the world championships still represent the U.S. later this month.

The meeting Monday, which LamoureuxDavidson said lasted from 9 a.m. to 7:30 p.m., was positive on the verge of training camp, which was scheduled to begin Wednesday.