A showcase event in a year to remember
A marquee matchup in a youngmajor women’s hockey league is coming to Pittsburgh.
The Professional Women’s Hockey League’s top two teams in the standings, Toronto and Montreal, will take the ice at 12:30 p.m. Sunday at PPG Paints Arena with bad blood brewing, playoff positioning on the line and a point to prove about the future of women’s hockey in North America.
This isn’t women’s hockey’s first foray into Pittsburgh. On March 12, 2022, PPG Paints Arena hosted a “Rivalry Rematch” game featuring the United States and Canada national teams after the Beijing Olympics. Multiple players from each PWHL team played in that game, which was a partnership between the Penguins and the PWHPA.
Jayna Hefford, the PWHL’s senior vice president of hockey operations, said they didn’t know coming into this season how many neutral-site games like these they would be able to do but that Pittsburgh “was one of the teams that put their hands up right away.”
“They want to be supportive,” Hefford said of the Penguins. “They want to help grow the women’s game. ... We’ve seen research after research that suggests women’s sports and the demand is just real and it’s huge. And we felt like we knew that, but then to experience in real time is totallydifferent.”
That demand is being seen inreal time. The record for the most-attended women’s hockey game in history has been broken by the PWHL three times in its inaugural season — 8,318 for Ottawa’s first home game at TD Place Arena on Jan. 2; 13,316 for Minnesota’s first home game at the Xcel Energy Center on Jan. 6; and 19,285 for the inaugural “Battle on Bay Street” between Toronto and Montreal at Scotiabank Arena on Feb.16.
The league anticipates an attendance close to 8,000 Sunday.
“It’s far exceeded our expectations,” Montreal forward Laura Stacey said. “We dreamt of this. We thought of this, but I don’t think what’s happeningis actually what we thought was gonna happen, especially Year 1. ... Having a franchise, having a team in the city you’re living in, going to the rink every single day ... it’s the little details that go unnoticed that make this league far and above the best I’ve everplayed in.”
Local connections on the teams include Toronto forward Brittany Howard, who starred at Robert Morris and was the first Colonial to win the CHA Player of the Year award. Howard has two goals and three assists in 16 games for Toronto, but she’ll miss Sunday’s game after being suspended a game for an illegalcross-check.
Behind the bench, Montreal coach Kori Cheverie also has ties to the Penguins and Mike Sullivan. Cheverie served as a guest coach for the Penguins during development camp prior to this season.
“Pittsburghhasalwayshad such an amazing history of growingthe game, and the legacy they’ve built over the years has been absolutely amazing,” Cheverie said. “Even how they made me feel as a coach coming into their organization was something I’llnever forget.”
Toronto has had Montreal’s number, winning each of their three matchups thus far this season. The teams played on March 8, a 3-0 Toronto win, in a physical contest during which tempers flared.
The teams evenly split 10 penalties in the game, secondmostin a PWHL game this season.Sixofthosepenaltiescame from one incident, as a fracas near the boards resulted in three players apiece from each team packing into the penalty box. Star Montreal player Marie-Philip Poulin left the game with an injury and reportedly might miss the game inPittsburgh because of it.
The style of play in the PWHL cleared up some misconceptions about physicality in women’s hockey. Body checking isn’t allowed in women’s hockey, per the International Ice Hockey Federationand Olympics rules. It is, however, allowed in the PWHL— and they use it.
“With the new rules, it allows us to be more physical and build that rivalry, and that’s also something we’ve been enjoying as players,” said Montreal goaltender Ann-ReneeDesbiens, who featured in the “Rivalry Rematch” game in Pittsburgh and won Olympic gold with Team Canada the same year. “It’s good for the fans, as well. It does get heated pretty quickly out there and can get prettyfeisty, but we like it.”
Aside from the roughhousing, fans can look forward to high-quality hockey. Both rosters are stacked with Olympic medalists and world champions. Poulin, second in the league in points, is famous for scoringwinning goals in three of the four Olympic goldmedal games in which she played. Toronto’s Natalie Spooner leads the league with 12 goals, and teammate Sarah Nurse graced the cover of EA Sports’ “NHL 23” video game, thefirst woman to do so.
While the founding members of the PWHL are definitely trying to prove that they belong, they aren’t doing so with any gimmicks or novelty given to the fact that they’re women playing major professional hockey. They’re traveling to PPG Paints Arena, but this isn’t a road show. They’re proving they belong by putting an exciting, fast-paced, enjoyable product on the ice, and they want as many people as possible to be ableto see it.
So far, so good, and players and coaches from both teams are excited to give Pittsburgh ataste Sunday.
“Every single game, no matter who you’re playing, you have to show up,” Stacey said. “... The amount of skill, the players in this league, it’s the best in the world. That’s what we wanted to create four years ago when we set out — to get every single person, whether you’re from Canada, the U.S., across the world, the very best players all in one league playing against each other and with each other everysingle night.”