November 24, 2025 • 34 mins
Hello!
Welcome to our exciting new series, She’s Not Next She’s Now. Over the next eight weeks, we’ll dig into eight different new and emerging women’s sports, discussing the history of how we got here, the current state of the game, and what comes next.
And it’s not just co-hosts Ellen Hyslop and Lauren Tuiskula driving the conversation; we’ll also be chatting with the executives, players, and fans who make these leagues and sports what they are.
For our debut episode, we’re taking it to the ice to discuss the PWHL, which begins its inaugural season on Friday. You’ll hear from Team USA captain and Seattle Torrent star Hilary Knight, Vancouver Goldeneyes and Team Canada stalwart Sarah Nurse, PWHL VP of Business Operations Amy Scheer, and women’s hockey superfan/The GIST of It co-host Steph Rotz. Happy listening!
Show notes:
The PWHPA acquires the PHF to form a joint North American League
The details of the brand new PWHL
PWHL growth stats
More on The GIST:
🎧 Subscribe: thegistsports.com/subscribepod
✉️ Email: pod@thegistsports.com
📷 Instagram: @thegistca @thegistusa
🐦 X: @thegistpod
Welcome to our exciting new series, She’s Not Next She’s Now. Over the next eight weeks, we’ll dig into eight different new and emerging women’s sports, discussing the history of how we got here, the current state of the game, and what comes next.
And it’s not just co-hosts Ellen Hyslop and Lauren Tuiskula driving the conversation; we’ll also be chatting with the executives, players, and fans who make these leagues and sports what they are.
For our debut episode, we’re taking it to the ice to discuss the PWHL, which begins its inaugural season on Friday. You’ll hear from Team USA captain and Seattle Torrent star Hilary Knight, Vancouver Goldeneyes and Team Canada stalwart Sarah Nurse, PWHL VP of Business Operations Amy Scheer, and women’s hockey superfan/The GIST of It co-host Steph Rotz. Happy listening!
Show notes:
The PWHPA acquires the PHF to form a joint North American League
The details of the brand new PWHL
PWHL growth stats
More on The GIST:
🎧 Subscribe: thegistsports.com/subscribepod
✉️ Email: pod@thegistsports.com
📷 Instagram: @thegistca @thegistusa
🐦 X: @thegistpod
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
What is up, gisters, and Happy Monday. That's right, The
Gist of It is back in your feed on Mondays
because we are here with an exciting new series. We
are launching something called She's Not Next, She's Now breaking
down the gist of get it, emerging women's sports and
emerging women's sports leagues. We are going to be here
(00:32):
for the next eight Mondays and we are so excited
about it. We are your co hosts.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
I'm Ellen Hisislap and I'm Lauren Tuscala, the Gist Associate
Managing editor. Yeah, we are so pumped to be here
breaking down these new and exciting women's sports leagues together.
Speaker 1 (00:46):
Yes, and podcast listeners will know that I'm also the
co host of The Gist of It and co founder
of The Gist. And Laura and I we were chatting
about how we could I don't know, serve our audience
us better talk about women's sports more, do all of
that good stuff, and we really settled in on in
(01:06):
our entire team settled in on this eight part series
where each week we're going to be discussing different new
and emerging women's sports leagues, where we're breaking down the
history of how we got here, the current state of
the game, what comes next. And I think the reason
why we wanted to cover this law is we have
been sports fans for so long, and we grew up
(01:29):
watching men's sports because, surprise, surprise, that was a lot
of the only pro sports that we could watch. And
those men's sports come with so much lore and so
much history and a century ago, and in some cases
centuries ago, they've already kind of gone through their growing
pains and changes and league amalgamations. But we're actually experiencing
(01:51):
that on the women's sports side live right now, and
sometimes it can be really hard as a fan to
navigate through all of that.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Definitely, I feel like it comes up a lot wet
the WNBA, where you get these benchmarks of, oh, the
NBA was here in its fifteen season, the NBA was
here in its twentieth season. That's a comp that's easy
to do because the leagues are so closely tied together.
But you don't get that as much across the women's
sports landscape, where you feel like there's a new record.
I feel like every week there's a new headline of
(02:18):
this record and this record in attendance. So we wanted
to come together and really recognize that we're witnesses to
this real time change and we want to kind of
capture that evolution as it was happening, break it down
and we hear toss around all the time.
Speaker 3 (02:30):
It's not a moment, it's a movement.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
So we just wanted to add to that movement here
and really dig into these conversations as they're happening.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
It's going to be so much fun, especially because there's
so many headlines to your point, Lore, but there's also
so many new leagues.
Speaker 4 (02:42):
Yes, it feels like popping up almost every year.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
It feels like we have a new league to talk.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
About with so many acronyms to keep track of.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
Yes, and each sport has a different landscape associated with it,
and so we're going to be digging into eight different
sports and how all of their landscape are different over
the course of the eight weeks. And what I'm excited
about in this, Lauren, is that, like, yes, we're going
to be having a conversation, but it's not just going
to be us driving the combo.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
Definitely, we had the chance to sit down with executives,
players and even the fans who make these leagues in
sports what they are. So we really got into different
stakeholders in each of these sports, and we're going to
get their unique perspective on the past of these sports,
what's happening right now, and where they're going next. So
it was so cool to chat with these different stakeholders
and really get multiple different perspectives. Sometimes they agreed, sometimes
(03:32):
they disagreed, and we're going to put them all together
in this conversation.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
I love key loved it. When there is a disagreement.
Speaker 3 (03:39):
You love drama.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
I love the drama.
Speaker 4 (03:42):
I go, oh my goodness. The executive and the fan
are on two different pages. What are they going to
do exactly? So we might be emailing some of these
executives after the fact and say, hey, wait a minute
before our debut episode, we are starting with one of
my absolute favorite sports.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
So Lauren, thank you for choosing this episode.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
Welcome.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
We are taking it to the ice to discuss the
best game you can name, and that is hockey.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
So we're going to have a conversation between the two
of us, and as we mentioned, we brought together some
really exciting stakeholders for this conversation. So Ellen and I
will kick it off, but then you're going to hear
from Living Legend, Seattle, Torrent Star TSA Captain Hillary Knight,
Vancouver Golden Eyes, and Team Canada star Sarah Nurse, the
PWHL Senior VP of Business Operations, Amy Shear, And of
(04:28):
course we had to bring in Steph Rots for this conversation.
She is the Gist of It, co host and most
notably a women's hockey super fan, So we knew we
had to grab stuff for the fan perspective on this conversation.
Speaker 3 (04:39):
And with that we're going to get into it.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
All right. We have to start today's conversation with a
quick history of pro women's hockey in North America to
truly set the scene of how the PWHL came to be.
I'm very passionate about this topic. We have this topic
extensively at the Gist. We founded the Gist way back
in twenty seventeen was when we saw launch Laura, I
(05:08):
cannot believe that. And then twenty eighteen was when we
launched in Canada. Twenty nineteen in the US, and that
was a months the time when, for lack of a
better term, shit was going down in women's hockey. And
so we've been in the mix since then. So we're
going to go through basically what happened. It will include
some resources in the show notes because it's definitely necessary,
(05:30):
but lore we wanted to give like a little bit
of a quick and dirty recap of what women's hockey
was like and then how we got to the PWHL.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Yes, I think we wouldn't do this conversation justice if
we didn't kind of look backwards and see the foundation
of where the peter HL came from. And I joined
the Gist in twenty twenty, and I remember my very
first article that just was digging into the women's hockey history.
I was so scared to send it to you because
I knew that you were so passionate about this topic.
But I had kind of seen the headlines. I wasn't
a huge women's hockey fan growing up. It wasn't as
(06:01):
accessible as we will get into. But I remember digging
into the research and so I think this foundation is
really important.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
So I think to start, let's set the scene of
what was happening in women's hockey basically in the mid
twenty tens. I'd say, unlike the men's league, like an
NHL that's across Canada, in the US or the NBA
that's across Canada. In the US, women's hockey had two
different leagues, so there was the Canadian Women's Hockey League
(06:28):
and then the National Women's Hockey League. The Canadian Women's
Hockey League, of course was in Canada, and then the
NWHL was in the US, and they operated very differently,
and the talent across North America was separated amongst these leagues.
So the Canadian Women's Hockey League glore actually operated as
a nonprofit or not for profit, which was a really
(06:50):
interesting setup in women's hockey, which I don't think did
them any favors. But the CWHL featured some of the
best players in the world, and I think a lot
of people consider the CWHL the better league in comparison
to the NWHL. The NWHL was the league that actually
paid players first, which was really exciting. But all together,
(07:13):
these players were made anywhere between six thousand dollars to
twenty thousand dollars a year to play hockey. They were
professional women's hockey players that had to have jobs on
the side just to sustain themselves, and a lot of
issues with the league was that there wasn't resources for marketing,
There wasn't resources for these players to play like the
(07:36):
pro athletes that they were. And these were Team Canada
and Team USA athletes who didn't have a place to
play essentially from a pro perspective, and so they had
to go to the CWHL or NWHL. But there was
a lot of kind of issues, i would say, in
both leagues. So that's the setup of like what the
mid twenty tens kind of looks like in women's hockey,
(07:57):
which was really not great.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
So that brings us to twenty nineteen. That's the backstory.
And in twenty nineteen, the CWHL folds, so as Elle said,
not for profit league folds, and that's when North America's
best players opted not to join the NWHL. It might
feel like a no brainer of oh, this league folded,
obviously we're going to go to the other pro women's
league and play there, But that was a moment for
(08:21):
them to make an impact and stand tall, and they
did not want to join the NWHL because it wasn't
a sustainable cross border league.
Speaker 3 (08:28):
That's the key, that's the cruxier.
Speaker 2 (08:30):
They wanted a sustainable cross border league to play in
so they opted not to join the NWHL.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
And there was also a little bit of mistrust in
leadership and how the leagues on both sides were being governed,
which is a key to what we're going to get
into later as part of why the PWHL has been
so successful now, so exactly what you said, Laura, the
CWHL folds. None of them go down to the States
to play. And actually, at the same time, a lot
(08:55):
of the folks who were playing in the States said,
you know what, I'm also going to stop playing for
the NWHL and instead, let's create something where we can
have this sustainable cross border league that not only benefits us,
but generations to come in hockey. And that's when they
went on to create the PWHPA. That's a throwback acronym
(09:16):
just a professional win in Hockey players Association and it
was basically a players association without a league and a
player's association that was working together to try to develop
a league. So they created the PWHPA. They mostly played
showcase tournaments across the continent to promote their game and
(09:36):
their mission, but really what they were doing on the
side was how can we finally create a league together
that we all want to play in.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
Definitely.
Speaker 2 (09:45):
I remember the PWHPA days there were there was a
lot of like inspiring moments with the PA. They got
great sponsorships and like you said, they had those showcase
tournaments and it was just you got to see the
best players competing.
Speaker 3 (09:55):
But it wasn't a league atmosphere. It's just exhibition games.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
Exactly at the same time too, that the PWPA is
happening lore the NWHL's not like they folded when some
of their top players left. They actually rebranded and became
the Premier Hockey Federation. So the PHF, there was a
lot of great athletes who played in that league, but
they weren't at the same caliber as a Team Canada
(10:20):
or Team USA athlete, or the same caliber as the
PWHL players who we see today. They did a great
job though, at increasing salaries, at getting more women into
the game. They had some really big stars i'd say,
who did stay with the league for a little bit.
But what was really tough with the PHF, and where
I really struggled with the PHF and NWHL low is
(10:41):
that they were moving alongside the PWHPA but without the
top talent, and they were getting some really cool broadcast
deals and ways to get women's sports on TV. But
it was really hard because that wasn't the best hockey
that was going on TV, and so as a fan,
it was so great that this league is doing okay,
(11:02):
but that's not the hockey we should be putting in
front of everyone because that's not the best hockey out there.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
Yeah, I remember the newsletter. We would cover them side
by side. So there was a local Boston team in
the PHF, so we'd cover them in the Boston Regional.
We'd cover it when there was PHF championships. But it
was just we were maintaining both of them and trying
to give equal coverage and cover it. But we always
had that caveat of the best talent wasn't in the PHF,
so we have to also include the PWHPA here.
Speaker 1 (11:26):
Yes, And it made it really tough having the two
leagues because the NHL essentially said, hands up, we do
not want to be involved in something where we have
to buy another league, and so if the PHF exists,
then we're not going to do anything with the PWHPA,
which made it really really difficult for the ecosystem. So
it took a couple years. But then finally our savior,
(11:51):
Billy Jing King of Villaging King, a famous lore who
created equal pay and tennis, came along her and her
partner Mark Walters, who has the Mark Walter Group and
Billy jan King Enterprises. But they were a four mole
partner of the PWHPA. They said, you know what, we're
going to acquire the PHF no problem, We're going to
(12:14):
roll them right under this new league that we are
going to be creating. And this new league that we're
creating with the PWHPA is the PWHL and it's a
cross border sustainable league featuring the world's best talent.
Speaker 2 (12:29):
I wish we got to go back and find the
slack channel screenshots of our just slack the night that
that news came down. It was just the number of
exclamation points and our Slack channel was through the roof.
We were all the excitement was palpable through the internet,
across the internet.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
It was everything. When that news finally came down, it
was amazing.
Speaker 1 (12:44):
Yeah, and let's hear I think this is a great
time for us to pause and to hear from some
of our guests on their moment, because hearing about it
from the fans side versus the player side is really
cool and so interesting. So we'll take a minute here.
Speaker 5 (12:59):
I remember the day that the CWTL folded, so that
was one of the precursor leagues. I was on the
Go Train, and this was a year after I found
out that this league even existed, and became so emotionally in.
I was all in. I was bringing friends, I was
bringing everybody who would want to come to that game
I would go to. And then I remember being on
(13:19):
the Go train, which is a train system where I'm from,
and reading that Instagram post and being so grateful that
I was in a solo car where there was no
one else in it, because I just started to cry,
and I thought, where do we go from here? How
long is this going to take?
Speaker 1 (13:36):
And then years and years and years past.
Speaker 5 (13:39):
And then I started to become so cynical and so
jaded because so much time had passed that I had
just accepted that this might not ever happen. And then
we get the message, we get the announcement, and I
immediately just started crying happy tears, and I just that's
(13:59):
why I connected it back to the CWHL folding because
I remember being so gutted and then just so lated,
and both of them ended up in tears.
Speaker 6 (14:10):
I have more memories of it internally being announced to
our group and just feeling like, wow, we finally got there,
and so just speaking to like teammates and staff members
who had been through many iterations of you know what
Professional Women Talkeey looked like pre PWHL because there were
many iterations, and so I just remember like a huge
(14:33):
sense of relief and a huge sense of like, wow,
we're finally going to do this the right way. And
then I mean for my family, for my friends from
youth hockey players, like it just really sparked like a
newfound dream in them, Like so many young girls like
obviously saw Team Canada Team USA play and obviously wanted
to be on that team. But now like professional women
(14:54):
talking and elite level of women Talkeey feels so much
more within reach for all of us.
Speaker 7 (15:01):
Honestly, just really excited and also relieved because you know,
we carried an organization for many years to get our
players to that the final product, which is PWHL, and
you know, you go through the CBA negotiations and stuff,
and I think negotiations are always tough for both sides,
and so finally when we came to an agreement and
(15:21):
the PWHL was more of a sure thing versus just
like an idea, it was just awesome.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
So the excitement is through the roof. You just heard
the reactions people taking us back to that moment when
the news came down, and that brings us to exactly
how the PBHL is set up, because it's pretty unique
set up, so we want to dig into it here
had really spotlight it. The league, of course started with
six teams, the original six, but all of them were
owned by the Mark Walter Group, which is different compared
to other sports. Typically it's one owner owns a team
(15:52):
and they're part of the league. Every single team was
owned by the Mark Walter Group and with that no
individual owners, every team had the same resources, so of
course same number of players, but they have the same
resources to build their team. They're all under the same umbrella.
Of course there's a different in playing facilities and kind
of arena size, but it's the same resources for each
team because it's that no individual owner setup.
Speaker 1 (16:16):
It's so smart. I don't know if we've really seen
this before and seen it done in such an incredible way.
So they started with their six teams, all owned by
the Mark Walter Group, and recently this year they announced
that they're moving to eight teams. So at the beginning
of this season they have two additional teams in Vancouver
(16:38):
and Seattle, and they also have future plans to expand.
They've done what they've called takeover tours over the year
where they're testing out essentially new markets, seeing how the
fans respond, where the fans show up, and they're being
so intentional from there, also choosing their expansion teams off
of that, and they're doing a massive takeover tour this year.
(16:59):
I can't wait to go check out one of the games.
But it's so awesome lare seeing this model work out
so well. And I also think coming to the way
that the NWHL and CWHL was created before, I do
get the sense that the players, because they helped create this,
have so much trust also in the Billie Jean King
(17:20):
and Mark Walters group because they approached each other and
they work together on it. And I think when you
have someone a millionaire, billionaire, whatever capital M or capital B,
it is who is actively investing in a league that
wants to see every single team do well and everyone grow.
(17:44):
That just makes the player so much more invested too.
And it's so awesome to see.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
Definitely, and you talk about the player first experience, I mean,
it's Billy and Jane King leading the way. She's the
one that was in all of those fights. She knows
what she was fighting for, so she's going to know
exactly how the players are feeling and what they want.
Have someone like that in your corner advocating for you,
that's all you can ask for. And PWHL Senior VP
of Business Operations, Amy sheer We mentioned at the top
she discussed this dynamic a little bit, so we'll kick
(18:10):
it to her quote.
Speaker 8 (18:10):
Now, Oh, I think it's the way we're set up,
being single entity. It allows us to move fast. It
allows us to have control over our product and not
just on the ice, but how do we show up
every market in terms of our brand, our creative, our graphics,
our video, our presentation. It allows us for all of
(18:31):
the teams within our league to show up evenly. There's
no difference in resources. And so I think the way
we're set up and our model is our secret sauce
and how we build efficiencies and how we build and grow.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
And then I'd also add a note from Stephan here too.
I thought that this was a very astute comment about
the growth of the PWHL and why it's different because
of this setup.
Speaker 5 (18:55):
I truly am a huge fan of how the p
TOVHL operates. The fact that each team is not owned
individually but is owned by the league at large. I
think that that's a huge advantage and I think they
really need to lean into that advantage. And I think
the fact that they are able to do takeover tours
and travel all around the US and Canada into different
markets I think would not have been able to happen
(19:16):
if they were individually owned teams. So I think continuing
to do that and to just grow the fandom and
grow and expose women's hockey to different markets that don't
have teams, I think is the key to the success.
And I think they're doing that brilliantly.
Speaker 1 (19:31):
Two very smart women to hear from. I love that
so much. I also like the original six and the
PWHL being similar to the original six in the NHL.
I think that that's a cool ode to hockey and
each other, and I'm excited to see what that what
that entails moving forward. Speaking about success though, Lore, I
think people think hockey lore and they do think Canada,
and so the PWHL the NHL has been so successful
(19:56):
in Canada. But what has been really cool and also
really surprising to me is seeing the success of the
league also in the US and also seeing how many
more girls and women are watching and playing hockey, I
think thanks to the PWHL and also thanks to the NHL,
and seeing a lot more fandom for the NHL and
(20:17):
the league there, especially coming off of the four nations.
The PWHL because of the amazing team and players and
just the way that they set up this league had
some incredibly impressive numbers through their first two seasons.
Speaker 2 (20:31):
Yeah, we'll rattle off a few of them here. We'll
put a full link in our show notes to kind
of the fulsome article that they shared at the end
of their second season, But just a few numbers to
frame us up. One point two million fans attended games
across their first two seasons. And to your point L
about the region of the United States, I love this stat.
Every single US state and every single Canadian province was
(20:53):
represented in ticket buyers for the p DOHL isn't that
so cool? So that's so cool, even though it's only
in say cities, with the takeover tour and just the
popularity of the game people, even if you're in Texas,
you can still buy a ticket and go attend a
P to BHL game.
Speaker 3 (21:08):
Like, I just love that.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
That incredible reach that they had across every single seat
in every single province.
Speaker 3 (21:13):
It's such a neat stat. And just one more to
throw in here.
Speaker 2 (21:17):
In the twenty twenty four to twenty five season, which
is their second season, they drew a total of seven
hundred and thirty seven four hundred and fifty five fans
across one hundred two games, So that was an increase
of fifty two point five percent from their debut season.
Speaker 3 (21:30):
So we're just seeing that number tick up up up.
Speaker 2 (21:32):
Of course, there's a little bit of an increase in games,
but just to see that that metric increase is a
great stat to see and we're going to probably see
it trend even more upward with eight teams in this
year three.
Speaker 1 (21:43):
It's so awesome. And this is not us even digging
into season ticket sales. For some of the mass markets
for US seeing change in venues facilities, there's still work
that the PWHL has to do, and Steph gets into
it here actually where she's talking about what she thinks
is a gross hindrance right now, or like where they
need to go that I think is worth getting into.
(22:06):
And just before we get to Steph though too, Laura,
you also mentioned the the WNBA average attendance was six
six hundred and fifteen for last year, the PWHLS was
five four hundred and forty eight. This is in their
second year. In comparison to the WNBA that's been around
for over twenty years, that's very impressive Historically.
Speaker 5 (22:27):
If you had asked me this a couple of years ago,
I think the answer would have been obvious and it
would have been a sincere, wholehearted investment in women's hockey.
But we are seeing that in the PWHL. So I'm
not sure what the major hurdle that they're going to
face is other than maybe expansion and how hockey markets,
the ones that are truly true, really passionate, and I
think the ones that will show up like a Halifax
(22:49):
are so geographically far apart, and how that will play
into the overall growth of the league. I do wonder
about that a lot.
Speaker 2 (22:58):
And we just heard from Steph, but I also want
to in Amy's perspective here because she had some comments
about the growth of the league and just their mindset
in year three, of course, and let's pull in what
she had to say here.
Speaker 8 (23:08):
You know, I think when you are in growth mode,
you start to work really fast. So I think for
us it's almost really important when you think you should
be speeding up, is to slow down and really just
make sure that you're not compromising any of the level
of work that you need to put out there, and
(23:28):
especially the work that is public facing. So I think
that's just one is to try to be in control
of the speed that you're working at so you're not
compromising any of your work product. I think ensuring that
we've got the proper resources right, Like I don't ever
want our deliverables and our fan experience, our fan engagement,
(23:50):
any of those things to be impacted. So just making
sure that we're putting the right resources against the things
that are really really very important, you know. I think
we want to always try to stay innovative and not
let sort of the trappings of the traditional sports leagues
get in our way. So okay, we're expanding, we're growing,
(24:11):
but try not to just think like traditional sports weeks.
Try to stay innovative, you know, we want to try
to continue our creativity with our team names, like we think,
you know, we love our team names and think we've
continued to sort of think out of the box as
we start to build brand and team identities, and you know, listen,
(24:31):
while we're expanding and while we're growing, it's also really
important to focus on out of market as well. How
do we expand across two very large countries and internationally,
and so not to lose focus of the bigger picture
as well. While you're kind of you know, working team specific,
just also try to manage the bigger picture as well.
A lot.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
Well, we're in growth mode, as Amy was saying, and
with that, we wanted to look ahead as well. So
not just if we look ahead to season, which is
just underway, the puck's just starting to drop, but we
want to look to the years ahead because this is
that sustainable cross border league that the players have been
wanting for so long. So we wanted to look into
the crystal ball fast forward, and we asked each of
(25:12):
our stakeholders what they think the Peter Mitchell is going
to look like in five years time, So let's kick
it to those clips.
Speaker 6 (25:18):
Now there are so many talks of more expansion, and
so I hope that five years from now, the league
has kind of settled into what, you know, each market
looks like, each team, each fan base looks like, and
we're able to not necessarily grow maybe more teams, but
I truly think, like grow globally. I think that we've
(25:38):
done such a great job, like initially about like with
our broadcast rights for example, or our partnerships, and I
think that we've done really great jobs up until now.
But I think being able to grow the game on
a real global level will be really important. So I mean,
we talked about like takeover tour games, like who's to
say we don't do a takeover tour game, and somewhere
(26:01):
in Scandinavia, you know, somewhere in Asia where they're also
looking to grow women's hockey, and I really think that
we can be a leader for women's hockey around the world.
Speaker 8 (26:13):
We are a healthy, robust league that is selling out
the majority of our games. We've got a youth hockey,
you know, business or a youth hockey that is booming,
that these young girls have equal access to the rinks
and equal access to facilities. I'd love to see us
continue to grow internationally and have more players come over
(26:34):
from you know, abroad. Would it would be great that
there's no more women's first, right, We're just we're not
women's hockey. We're just hockey, and that's how we're referenced to.
It would be great to see venues pop up that
fit the women's game better, you know, not just like
NHL sized buildings, but maybe buildings that fit to where
we are or that or we're selling out NHL size buildings,
(26:56):
and so we think in five years from now we
will have a very healthy, robust league.
Speaker 5 (27:03):
I would love to see each one of these teams
have their own home ice with their logo at home
ice year round and to have that belong to them.
And I love that about the expansion in Vancouver is
that they from the get go have their own arena
and we're seeing some troubles now I think with Ottawa
to with where they're going to play in the capacity,
(27:24):
and so I would love some sort of investment into
the facilities and just the ownership over that for each
one of these these teams. And I think five years
from now, I think that would be probably the next
step in professionalization for the pwhow Oh my.
Speaker 7 (27:39):
Gosh, I don't even know. I haven't thought that far ahead,
to be honest. No, I think we're going to see
a level of play that we've never seen before, and
that's super exciting. And the level of professionalism is only
going to continue to grow. There's going to be more teams,
the pipelines to facilitate you know, pro development are going
(28:03):
to be greater, and I mean we're just going to
see a completely different product in the best way, which
is super, super exciting.
Speaker 1 (28:13):
Lower I'm curious for what you think the league's going
to look like in the next five years.
Speaker 2 (28:18):
Oh, this is fun. I think that we're going to
see pretty rapid expansion. I feel like two new teams
this season. I think that maybe we'll be at twelve
or sixteen in five years time. And that's compared to
leagues like the WNBA, where we're seeing slower expansion, like
they're cautious with the expansion. It feels like Peter Bhl
is full throttle. So I feel like, yes, somewhere in
(28:40):
that twelve to sixteen mark, we might be there. And
I think that it's going to be a league that's
in the everyday conversation we're We're already starting to see
that in Boston where everyone's talking about the PETERHL. I
went on a hike yesterday with my friends and they
were already like, Oh, when's the Petero jail season start.
It's already in that conversation and they're not even hockey fans.
So that's what I see for It's going to be
(29:00):
like the NHL, where it's oh, just people are in
the rhythm of the calendar and just talking about it
as a household occurrence.
Speaker 3 (29:08):
Yeah, what about you?
Speaker 1 (29:09):
I really like that. I think I think that there's
a lot of parallels for me between the PWHL and
the NWSL, A lot of it having to do with
both of these sports are actually anchored by their national teams,
if that makes sense. So I feel like the US
women's national team and the Canadian women's national team are
(29:30):
so beloved across North America, and those are the superstars
that are really driving league growth and fandom. And I
think with the PWHL because the league got started way
after the Canadian women's hockey team and the American women's
hockey team, we're kind of already stars in their own
right that this like Olympic World Championship, continuation and change
(29:56):
will be so good for the PWHL. And I think
I think once we get to that five year mark,
it's actually going to change from us saying Hillary Knight
Team USA Star to we're actually going to start with
their PWHL name first. And I think when we saw
Vladimir Guerrero Junior enter Game seven of the World Series
(30:17):
wearing a Mae Filipplant Team Canada jersey instead, I would
think in five years maybe the Jays will be back
in the World Series when we love that. I don't
know if Pulam will be playing at that point either,
but let's just say for comparison's sake, I would love
to see Vladdie winning Game seven after having worn a
(30:41):
Pulam Victoire jersey instead. And so I think I'm really
really hoping that the culture moves from the national team
side of things to the domestic side of things, because
I think that's where, at least to me, the women's
side sometimes falters in comparison to the men's side. I
think when men in sports on the professional arena enter
(31:02):
the Olympics, you think of Okay, Brad Marshaw Florida Panthers first,
and then you think, oh, is he American or Canadian?
Like you don't actually know, And I think that's in
such benefit of the sport, and so I want that
to happen for the PWHL too.
Speaker 2 (31:18):
I love that and it'll be really interesting with the
Olympics coming up how that plays out, because typically when
you go to that stage, yeah, you have the association
with their club team, So it'll be so cool to
hear people talking about these players with their pter BHL reference.
Speaker 3 (31:33):
Of course, it's the.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
First time they're playing at the Olympics as PHL players,
so to see that association will be really interesting on
that global stage.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
And with that, I think that marks the end of
today's episode. Thank y'all so much for tuning into She's
Not Next, She's Now with us again. This was She's
Not Next, She's Now the gist of Pro Women's Hockey.
That is our first one. We are going to be
back in your feed with a another edition of she's
not next, she's now next, and we are going to
be talking about all things women's soccer because that landscape
(32:04):
is changing all of the time and we need to
break it down for you. In the meantime, we'd love
for you to rate, review, and subscribe, share this series
with someone who you think would enjoy it. We will
still be in your feed every Tuesday and Thursday with
the regular just a Bit with Me and Steph. We're
so excited to see you there in addition to seeing
you and chatting with you every Monday.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
This episode was edited by Savannah Held and produced by
myself and Ellen Again.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
I'm Lauren Tuscola and I'm Ellen Hisslov, and we can't
wait to chat with you again next week
Speaker 5 (33:00):
At a
What is up, gisters, and Happy Monday. That's right, The
Gist of It is back in your feed on Mondays
because we are here with an exciting new series. We
are launching something called She's Not Next, She's Now breaking
down the gist of get it, emerging women's sports and
emerging women's sports leagues. We are going to be here
(00:32):
for the next eight Mondays and we are so excited
about it. We are your co hosts.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
I'm Ellen Hisislap and I'm Lauren Tuscala, the Gist Associate
Managing editor. Yeah, we are so pumped to be here
breaking down these new and exciting women's sports leagues together.
Speaker 1 (00:46):
Yes, and podcast listeners will know that I'm also the
co host of The Gist of It and co founder
of The Gist. And Laura and I we were chatting
about how we could I don't know, serve our audience
us better talk about women's sports more, do all of
that good stuff, and we really settled in on in
(01:06):
our entire team settled in on this eight part series
where each week we're going to be discussing different new
and emerging women's sports leagues, where we're breaking down the
history of how we got here, the current state of
the game, what comes next. And I think the reason
why we wanted to cover this law is we have
been sports fans for so long, and we grew up
(01:29):
watching men's sports because, surprise, surprise, that was a lot
of the only pro sports that we could watch. And
those men's sports come with so much lore and so
much history and a century ago, and in some cases
centuries ago, they've already kind of gone through their growing
pains and changes and league amalgamations. But we're actually experiencing
(01:51):
that on the women's sports side live right now, and
sometimes it can be really hard as a fan to
navigate through all of that.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Definitely, I feel like it comes up a lot wet
the WNBA, where you get these benchmarks of, oh, the
NBA was here in its fifteen season, the NBA was
here in its twentieth season. That's a comp that's easy
to do because the leagues are so closely tied together.
But you don't get that as much across the women's
sports landscape, where you feel like there's a new record.
I feel like every week there's a new headline of
(02:18):
this record and this record in attendance. So we wanted
to come together and really recognize that we're witnesses to
this real time change and we want to kind of
capture that evolution as it was happening, break it down
and we hear toss around all the time.
Speaker 3 (02:30):
It's not a moment, it's a movement.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
So we just wanted to add to that movement here
and really dig into these conversations as they're happening.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
It's going to be so much fun, especially because there's
so many headlines to your point, Lore, but there's also
so many new leagues.
Speaker 4 (02:42):
Yes, it feels like popping up almost every year.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
It feels like we have a new league to talk.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
About with so many acronyms to keep track of.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
Yes, and each sport has a different landscape associated with it,
and so we're going to be digging into eight different
sports and how all of their landscape are different over
the course of the eight weeks. And what I'm excited
about in this, Lauren, is that, like, yes, we're going
to be having a conversation, but it's not just going
to be us driving the combo.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
Definitely, we had the chance to sit down with executives,
players and even the fans who make these leagues in
sports what they are. So we really got into different
stakeholders in each of these sports, and we're going to
get their unique perspective on the past of these sports,
what's happening right now, and where they're going next. So
it was so cool to chat with these different stakeholders
and really get multiple different perspectives. Sometimes they agreed, sometimes
(03:32):
they disagreed, and we're going to put them all together
in this conversation.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
I love key loved it. When there is a disagreement.
Speaker 3 (03:39):
You love drama.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
I love the drama.
Speaker 4 (03:42):
I go, oh my goodness. The executive and the fan
are on two different pages. What are they going to
do exactly? So we might be emailing some of these
executives after the fact and say, hey, wait a minute
before our debut episode, we are starting with one of
my absolute favorite sports.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
So Lauren, thank you for choosing this episode.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
Welcome.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
We are taking it to the ice to discuss the
best game you can name, and that is hockey.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
So we're going to have a conversation between the two
of us, and as we mentioned, we brought together some
really exciting stakeholders for this conversation. So Ellen and I
will kick it off, but then you're going to hear
from Living Legend, Seattle, Torrent Star TSA Captain Hillary Knight,
Vancouver Golden Eyes, and Team Canada star Sarah Nurse, the
PWHL Senior VP of Business Operations, Amy Shear, And of
(04:28):
course we had to bring in Steph Rots for this conversation.
She is the Gist of It, co host and most
notably a women's hockey super fan, So we knew we
had to grab stuff for the fan perspective on this conversation.
Speaker 3 (04:39):
And with that we're going to get into it.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
All right. We have to start today's conversation with a
quick history of pro women's hockey in North America to
truly set the scene of how the PWHL came to be.
I'm very passionate about this topic. We have this topic
extensively at the Gist. We founded the Gist way back
in twenty seventeen was when we saw launch Laura, I
(05:08):
cannot believe that. And then twenty eighteen was when we
launched in Canada. Twenty nineteen in the US, and that
was a months the time when, for lack of a
better term, shit was going down in women's hockey. And
so we've been in the mix since then. So we're
going to go through basically what happened. It will include
some resources in the show notes because it's definitely necessary,
(05:30):
but lore we wanted to give like a little bit
of a quick and dirty recap of what women's hockey
was like and then how we got to the PWHL.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Yes, I think we wouldn't do this conversation justice if
we didn't kind of look backwards and see the foundation
of where the peter HL came from. And I joined
the Gist in twenty twenty, and I remember my very
first article that just was digging into the women's hockey history.
I was so scared to send it to you because
I knew that you were so passionate about this topic.
But I had kind of seen the headlines. I wasn't
a huge women's hockey fan growing up. It wasn't as
(06:01):
accessible as we will get into. But I remember digging
into the research and so I think this foundation is
really important.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
So I think to start, let's set the scene of
what was happening in women's hockey basically in the mid
twenty tens. I'd say, unlike the men's league, like an
NHL that's across Canada, in the US or the NBA
that's across Canada. In the US, women's hockey had two
different leagues, so there was the Canadian Women's Hockey League
(06:28):
and then the National Women's Hockey League. The Canadian Women's
Hockey League, of course was in Canada, and then the
NWHL was in the US, and they operated very differently,
and the talent across North America was separated amongst these leagues.
So the Canadian Women's Hockey League glore actually operated as
a nonprofit or not for profit, which was a really
(06:50):
interesting setup in women's hockey, which I don't think did
them any favors. But the CWHL featured some of the
best players in the world, and I think a lot
of people consider the CWHL the better league in comparison
to the NWHL. The NWHL was the league that actually
paid players first, which was really exciting. But all together,
(07:13):
these players were made anywhere between six thousand dollars to
twenty thousand dollars a year to play hockey. They were
professional women's hockey players that had to have jobs on
the side just to sustain themselves, and a lot of
issues with the league was that there wasn't resources for marketing,
There wasn't resources for these players to play like the
(07:36):
pro athletes that they were. And these were Team Canada
and Team USA athletes who didn't have a place to
play essentially from a pro perspective, and so they had
to go to the CWHL or NWHL. But there was
a lot of kind of issues, i would say, in
both leagues. So that's the setup of like what the
mid twenty tens kind of looks like in women's hockey,
(07:57):
which was really not great.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
So that brings us to twenty nineteen. That's the backstory.
And in twenty nineteen, the CWHL folds, so as Elle said,
not for profit league folds, and that's when North America's
best players opted not to join the NWHL. It might
feel like a no brainer of oh, this league folded,
obviously we're going to go to the other pro women's
league and play there, But that was a moment for
(08:21):
them to make an impact and stand tall, and they
did not want to join the NWHL because it wasn't
a sustainable cross border league.
Speaker 3 (08:28):
That's the key, that's the cruxier.
Speaker 2 (08:30):
They wanted a sustainable cross border league to play in
so they opted not to join the NWHL.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
And there was also a little bit of mistrust in
leadership and how the leagues on both sides were being governed,
which is a key to what we're going to get
into later as part of why the PWHL has been
so successful now, so exactly what you said, Laura, the
CWHL folds. None of them go down to the States
to play. And actually, at the same time, a lot
(08:55):
of the folks who were playing in the States said,
you know what, I'm also going to stop playing for
the NWHL and instead, let's create something where we can
have this sustainable cross border league that not only benefits us,
but generations to come in hockey. And that's when they
went on to create the PWHPA. That's a throwback acronym
(09:16):
just a professional win in Hockey players Association and it
was basically a players association without a league and a
player's association that was working together to try to develop
a league. So they created the PWHPA. They mostly played
showcase tournaments across the continent to promote their game and
(09:36):
their mission, but really what they were doing on the
side was how can we finally create a league together
that we all want to play in.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
Definitely.
Speaker 2 (09:45):
I remember the PWHPA days there were there was a
lot of like inspiring moments with the PA. They got
great sponsorships and like you said, they had those showcase
tournaments and it was just you got to see the
best players competing.
Speaker 3 (09:55):
But it wasn't a league atmosphere. It's just exhibition games.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
Exactly at the same time too, that the PWPA is
happening lore the NWHL's not like they folded when some
of their top players left. They actually rebranded and became
the Premier Hockey Federation. So the PHF, there was a
lot of great athletes who played in that league, but
they weren't at the same caliber as a Team Canada
(10:20):
or Team USA athlete, or the same caliber as the
PWHL players who we see today. They did a great
job though, at increasing salaries, at getting more women into
the game. They had some really big stars i'd say,
who did stay with the league for a little bit.
But what was really tough with the PHF, and where
I really struggled with the PHF and NWHL low is
(10:41):
that they were moving alongside the PWHPA but without the
top talent, and they were getting some really cool broadcast
deals and ways to get women's sports on TV. But
it was really hard because that wasn't the best hockey
that was going on TV, and so as a fan,
it was so great that this league is doing okay,
(11:02):
but that's not the hockey we should be putting in
front of everyone because that's not the best hockey out there.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
Yeah, I remember the newsletter. We would cover them side
by side. So there was a local Boston team in
the PHF, so we'd cover them in the Boston Regional.
We'd cover it when there was PHF championships. But it
was just we were maintaining both of them and trying
to give equal coverage and cover it. But we always
had that caveat of the best talent wasn't in the PHF,
so we have to also include the PWHPA here.
Speaker 1 (11:26):
Yes, And it made it really tough having the two
leagues because the NHL essentially said, hands up, we do
not want to be involved in something where we have
to buy another league, and so if the PHF exists,
then we're not going to do anything with the PWHPA,
which made it really really difficult for the ecosystem. So
it took a couple years. But then finally our savior,
(11:51):
Billy Jing King of Villaging King, a famous lore who
created equal pay and tennis, came along her and her
partner Mark Walters, who has the Mark Walter Group and
Billy jan King Enterprises. But they were a four mole
partner of the PWHPA. They said, you know what, we're
going to acquire the PHF no problem, We're going to
(12:14):
roll them right under this new league that we are
going to be creating. And this new league that we're
creating with the PWHPA is the PWHL and it's a
cross border sustainable league featuring the world's best talent.
Speaker 2 (12:29):
I wish we got to go back and find the
slack channel screenshots of our just slack the night that
that news came down. It was just the number of
exclamation points and our Slack channel was through the roof.
We were all the excitement was palpable through the internet,
across the internet.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
It was everything. When that news finally came down, it
was amazing.
Speaker 1 (12:44):
Yeah, and let's hear I think this is a great
time for us to pause and to hear from some
of our guests on their moment, because hearing about it
from the fans side versus the player side is really
cool and so interesting. So we'll take a minute here.
Speaker 5 (12:59):
I remember the day that the CWTL folded, so that
was one of the precursor leagues. I was on the
Go Train, and this was a year after I found
out that this league even existed, and became so emotionally in.
I was all in. I was bringing friends, I was
bringing everybody who would want to come to that game
I would go to. And then I remember being on
(13:19):
the Go train, which is a train system where I'm from,
and reading that Instagram post and being so grateful that
I was in a solo car where there was no
one else in it, because I just started to cry,
and I thought, where do we go from here? How
long is this going to take?
Speaker 1 (13:36):
And then years and years and years past.
Speaker 5 (13:39):
And then I started to become so cynical and so
jaded because so much time had passed that I had
just accepted that this might not ever happen. And then
we get the message, we get the announcement, and I
immediately just started crying happy tears, and I just that's
(13:59):
why I connected it back to the CWHL folding because
I remember being so gutted and then just so lated,
and both of them ended up in tears.
Speaker 6 (14:10):
I have more memories of it internally being announced to
our group and just feeling like, wow, we finally got there,
and so just speaking to like teammates and staff members
who had been through many iterations of you know what
Professional Women Talkeey looked like pre PWHL because there were
many iterations, and so I just remember like a huge
(14:33):
sense of relief and a huge sense of like, wow,
we're finally going to do this the right way. And
then I mean for my family, for my friends from
youth hockey players, like it just really sparked like a
newfound dream in them, Like so many young girls like
obviously saw Team Canada Team USA play and obviously wanted
to be on that team. But now like professional women
(14:54):
talking and elite level of women Talkeey feels so much
more within reach for all of us.
Speaker 7 (15:01):
Honestly, just really excited and also relieved because you know,
we carried an organization for many years to get our
players to that the final product, which is PWHL, and
you know, you go through the CBA negotiations and stuff,
and I think negotiations are always tough for both sides,
and so finally when we came to an agreement and
(15:21):
the PWHL was more of a sure thing versus just
like an idea, it was just awesome.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
So the excitement is through the roof. You just heard
the reactions people taking us back to that moment when
the news came down, and that brings us to exactly
how the PBHL is set up, because it's pretty unique
set up, so we want to dig into it here
had really spotlight it. The league, of course started with
six teams, the original six, but all of them were
owned by the Mark Walter Group, which is different compared
to other sports. Typically it's one owner owns a team
(15:52):
and they're part of the league. Every single team was
owned by the Mark Walter Group and with that no
individual owners, every team had the same resources, so of
course same number of players, but they have the same
resources to build their team. They're all under the same umbrella.
Of course there's a different in playing facilities and kind
of arena size, but it's the same resources for each
team because it's that no individual owner setup.
Speaker 1 (16:16):
It's so smart. I don't know if we've really seen
this before and seen it done in such an incredible way.
So they started with their six teams, all owned by
the Mark Walter Group, and recently this year they announced
that they're moving to eight teams. So at the beginning
of this season they have two additional teams in Vancouver
(16:38):
and Seattle, and they also have future plans to expand.
They've done what they've called takeover tours over the year
where they're testing out essentially new markets, seeing how the
fans respond, where the fans show up, and they're being
so intentional from there, also choosing their expansion teams off
of that, and they're doing a massive takeover tour this year.
(16:59):
I can't wait to go check out one of the games.
But it's so awesome lare seeing this model work out
so well. And I also think coming to the way
that the NWHL and CWHL was created before, I do
get the sense that the players, because they helped create this,
have so much trust also in the Billie Jean King
(17:20):
and Mark Walters group because they approached each other and
they work together on it. And I think when you
have someone a millionaire, billionaire, whatever capital M or capital B,
it is who is actively investing in a league that
wants to see every single team do well and everyone grow.
(17:44):
That just makes the player so much more invested too.
And it's so awesome to see.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
Definitely, and you talk about the player first experience, I mean,
it's Billy and Jane King leading the way. She's the
one that was in all of those fights. She knows
what she was fighting for, so she's going to know
exactly how the players are feeling and what they want.
Have someone like that in your corner advocating for you,
that's all you can ask for. And PWHL Senior VP
of Business Operations, Amy sheer We mentioned at the top
she discussed this dynamic a little bit, so we'll kick
(18:10):
it to her quote.
Speaker 8 (18:10):
Now, Oh, I think it's the way we're set up,
being single entity. It allows us to move fast. It
allows us to have control over our product and not
just on the ice, but how do we show up
every market in terms of our brand, our creative, our graphics,
our video, our presentation. It allows us for all of
(18:31):
the teams within our league to show up evenly. There's
no difference in resources. And so I think the way
we're set up and our model is our secret sauce
and how we build efficiencies and how we build and grow.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
And then I'd also add a note from Stephan here too.
I thought that this was a very astute comment about
the growth of the PWHL and why it's different because
of this setup.
Speaker 5 (18:55):
I truly am a huge fan of how the p
TOVHL operates. The fact that each team is not owned
individually but is owned by the league at large. I
think that that's a huge advantage and I think they
really need to lean into that advantage. And I think
the fact that they are able to do takeover tours
and travel all around the US and Canada into different
markets I think would not have been able to happen
(19:16):
if they were individually owned teams. So I think continuing
to do that and to just grow the fandom and
grow and expose women's hockey to different markets that don't
have teams, I think is the key to the success.
And I think they're doing that brilliantly.
Speaker 1 (19:31):
Two very smart women to hear from. I love that
so much. I also like the original six and the
PWHL being similar to the original six in the NHL.
I think that that's a cool ode to hockey and
each other, and I'm excited to see what that what
that entails moving forward. Speaking about success though, Lore, I
think people think hockey lore and they do think Canada,
and so the PWHL the NHL has been so successful
(19:56):
in Canada. But what has been really cool and also
really surprising to me is seeing the success of the
league also in the US and also seeing how many
more girls and women are watching and playing hockey, I
think thanks to the PWHL and also thanks to the NHL,
and seeing a lot more fandom for the NHL and
(20:17):
the league there, especially coming off of the four nations.
The PWHL because of the amazing team and players and
just the way that they set up this league had
some incredibly impressive numbers through their first two seasons.
Speaker 2 (20:31):
Yeah, we'll rattle off a few of them here. We'll
put a full link in our show notes to kind
of the fulsome article that they shared at the end
of their second season, But just a few numbers to
frame us up. One point two million fans attended games
across their first two seasons. And to your point L
about the region of the United States, I love this stat.
Every single US state and every single Canadian province was
(20:53):
represented in ticket buyers for the p DOHL isn't that
so cool? So that's so cool, even though it's only
in say cities, with the takeover tour and just the
popularity of the game people, even if you're in Texas,
you can still buy a ticket and go attend a
P to BHL game.
Speaker 3 (21:08):
Like, I just love that.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
That incredible reach that they had across every single seat
in every single province.
Speaker 3 (21:13):
It's such a neat stat. And just one more to
throw in here.
Speaker 2 (21:17):
In the twenty twenty four to twenty five season, which
is their second season, they drew a total of seven
hundred and thirty seven four hundred and fifty five fans
across one hundred two games, So that was an increase
of fifty two point five percent from their debut season.
Speaker 3 (21:30):
So we're just seeing that number tick up up up.
Speaker 2 (21:32):
Of course, there's a little bit of an increase in games,
but just to see that that metric increase is a
great stat to see and we're going to probably see
it trend even more upward with eight teams in this
year three.
Speaker 1 (21:43):
It's so awesome. And this is not us even digging
into season ticket sales. For some of the mass markets
for US seeing change in venues facilities, there's still work
that the PWHL has to do, and Steph gets into
it here actually where she's talking about what she thinks
is a gross hindrance right now, or like where they
need to go that I think is worth getting into.
(22:06):
And just before we get to Steph though too, Laura,
you also mentioned the the WNBA average attendance was six
six hundred and fifteen for last year, the PWHLS was
five four hundred and forty eight. This is in their
second year. In comparison to the WNBA that's been around
for over twenty years, that's very impressive Historically.
Speaker 5 (22:27):
If you had asked me this a couple of years ago,
I think the answer would have been obvious and it
would have been a sincere, wholehearted investment in women's hockey.
But we are seeing that in the PWHL. So I'm
not sure what the major hurdle that they're going to
face is other than maybe expansion and how hockey markets,
the ones that are truly true, really passionate, and I
think the ones that will show up like a Halifax
(22:49):
are so geographically far apart, and how that will play
into the overall growth of the league. I do wonder
about that a lot.
Speaker 2 (22:58):
And we just heard from Steph, but I also want
to in Amy's perspective here because she had some comments
about the growth of the league and just their mindset
in year three, of course, and let's pull in what
she had to say here.
Speaker 8 (23:08):
You know, I think when you are in growth mode,
you start to work really fast. So I think for
us it's almost really important when you think you should
be speeding up, is to slow down and really just
make sure that you're not compromising any of the level
of work that you need to put out there, and
(23:28):
especially the work that is public facing. So I think
that's just one is to try to be in control
of the speed that you're working at so you're not
compromising any of your work product. I think ensuring that
we've got the proper resources right, Like I don't ever
want our deliverables and our fan experience, our fan engagement,
(23:50):
any of those things to be impacted. So just making
sure that we're putting the right resources against the things
that are really really very important, you know. I think
we want to always try to stay innovative and not
let sort of the trappings of the traditional sports leagues
get in our way. So okay, we're expanding, we're growing,
(24:11):
but try not to just think like traditional sports weeks.
Try to stay innovative, you know, we want to try
to continue our creativity with our team names, like we think,
you know, we love our team names and think we've
continued to sort of think out of the box as
we start to build brand and team identities, and you know, listen,
(24:31):
while we're expanding and while we're growing, it's also really
important to focus on out of market as well. How
do we expand across two very large countries and internationally,
and so not to lose focus of the bigger picture
as well. While you're kind of you know, working team specific,
just also try to manage the bigger picture as well.
A lot.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
Well, we're in growth mode, as Amy was saying, and
with that, we wanted to look ahead as well. So
not just if we look ahead to season, which is
just underway, the puck's just starting to drop, but we
want to look to the years ahead because this is
that sustainable cross border league that the players have been
wanting for so long. So we wanted to look into
the crystal ball fast forward, and we asked each of
(25:12):
our stakeholders what they think the Peter Mitchell is going
to look like in five years time, So let's kick
it to those clips.
Speaker 6 (25:18):
Now there are so many talks of more expansion, and
so I hope that five years from now, the league
has kind of settled into what, you know, each market
looks like, each team, each fan base looks like, and
we're able to not necessarily grow maybe more teams, but
I truly think, like grow globally. I think that we've
(25:38):
done such a great job, like initially about like with
our broadcast rights for example, or our partnerships, and I
think that we've done really great jobs up until now.
But I think being able to grow the game on
a real global level will be really important. So I mean,
we talked about like takeover tour games, like who's to
say we don't do a takeover tour game, and somewhere
(26:01):
in Scandinavia, you know, somewhere in Asia where they're also
looking to grow women's hockey, and I really think that
we can be a leader for women's hockey around the world.
Speaker 8 (26:13):
We are a healthy, robust league that is selling out
the majority of our games. We've got a youth hockey,
you know, business or a youth hockey that is booming,
that these young girls have equal access to the rinks
and equal access to facilities. I'd love to see us
continue to grow internationally and have more players come over
(26:34):
from you know, abroad. Would it would be great that
there's no more women's first, right, We're just we're not
women's hockey. We're just hockey, and that's how we're referenced to.
It would be great to see venues pop up that
fit the women's game better, you know, not just like
NHL sized buildings, but maybe buildings that fit to where
we are or that or we're selling out NHL size buildings,
(26:56):
and so we think in five years from now we
will have a very healthy, robust league.
Speaker 5 (27:03):
I would love to see each one of these teams
have their own home ice with their logo at home
ice year round and to have that belong to them.
And I love that about the expansion in Vancouver is
that they from the get go have their own arena
and we're seeing some troubles now I think with Ottawa
to with where they're going to play in the capacity,
(27:24):
and so I would love some sort of investment into
the facilities and just the ownership over that for each
one of these these teams. And I think five years
from now, I think that would be probably the next
step in professionalization for the pwhow Oh my.
Speaker 7 (27:39):
Gosh, I don't even know. I haven't thought that far ahead,
to be honest. No, I think we're going to see
a level of play that we've never seen before, and
that's super exciting. And the level of professionalism is only
going to continue to grow. There's going to be more teams,
the pipelines to facilitate you know, pro development are going
(28:03):
to be greater, and I mean we're just going to
see a completely different product in the best way, which
is super, super exciting.
Speaker 1 (28:13):
Lower I'm curious for what you think the league's going
to look like in the next five years.
Speaker 2 (28:18):
Oh, this is fun. I think that we're going to
see pretty rapid expansion. I feel like two new teams
this season. I think that maybe we'll be at twelve
or sixteen in five years time. And that's compared to
leagues like the WNBA, where we're seeing slower expansion, like
they're cautious with the expansion. It feels like Peter Bhl
is full throttle. So I feel like, yes, somewhere in
(28:40):
that twelve to sixteen mark, we might be there. And
I think that it's going to be a league that's
in the everyday conversation we're We're already starting to see
that in Boston where everyone's talking about the PETERHL. I
went on a hike yesterday with my friends and they
were already like, Oh, when's the Petero jail season start.
It's already in that conversation and they're not even hockey fans.
So that's what I see for It's going to be
(29:00):
like the NHL, where it's oh, just people are in
the rhythm of the calendar and just talking about it
as a household occurrence.
Speaker 3 (29:08):
Yeah, what about you?
Speaker 1 (29:09):
I really like that. I think I think that there's
a lot of parallels for me between the PWHL and
the NWSL, A lot of it having to do with
both of these sports are actually anchored by their national teams,
if that makes sense. So I feel like the US
women's national team and the Canadian women's national team are
(29:30):
so beloved across North America, and those are the superstars
that are really driving league growth and fandom. And I
think with the PWHL because the league got started way
after the Canadian women's hockey team and the American women's
hockey team, we're kind of already stars in their own
right that this like Olympic World Championship, continuation and change
(29:56):
will be so good for the PWHL. And I think
I think once we get to that five year mark,
it's actually going to change from us saying Hillary Knight
Team USA Star to we're actually going to start with
their PWHL name first. And I think when we saw
Vladimir Guerrero Junior enter Game seven of the World Series
(30:17):
wearing a Mae Filipplant Team Canada jersey instead, I would
think in five years maybe the Jays will be back
in the World Series when we love that. I don't
know if Pulam will be playing at that point either,
but let's just say for comparison's sake, I would love
to see Vladdie winning Game seven after having worn a
(30:41):
Pulam Victoire jersey instead. And so I think I'm really
really hoping that the culture moves from the national team
side of things to the domestic side of things, because
I think that's where, at least to me, the women's
side sometimes falters in comparison to the men's side. I
think when men in sports on the professional arena enter
(31:02):
the Olympics, you think of Okay, Brad Marshaw Florida Panthers first,
and then you think, oh, is he American or Canadian?
Like you don't actually know, And I think that's in
such benefit of the sport, and so I want that
to happen for the PWHL too.
Speaker 2 (31:18):
I love that and it'll be really interesting with the
Olympics coming up how that plays out, because typically when
you go to that stage, yeah, you have the association
with their club team, So it'll be so cool to
hear people talking about these players with their pter BHL reference.
Speaker 3 (31:33):
Of course, it's the.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
First time they're playing at the Olympics as PHL players,
so to see that association will be really interesting on
that global stage.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
And with that, I think that marks the end of
today's episode. Thank y'all so much for tuning into She's
Not Next, She's Now with us again. This was She's
Not Next, She's Now the gist of Pro Women's Hockey.
That is our first one. We are going to be
back in your feed with a another edition of she's
not next, she's now next, and we are going to
be talking about all things women's soccer because that landscape
(32:04):
is changing all of the time and we need to
break it down for you. In the meantime, we'd love
for you to rate, review, and subscribe, share this series
with someone who you think would enjoy it. We will
still be in your feed every Tuesday and Thursday with
the regular just a Bit with Me and Steph. We're
so excited to see you there in addition to seeing
you and chatting with you every Monday.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
This episode was edited by Savannah Held and produced by
myself and Ellen Again.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
I'm Lauren Tuscola and I'm Ellen Hisslov, and we can't
wait to chat with you again next week
Speaker 5 (33:00):
At a
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