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The PWHL will add a franchise in San Jose ahead of next season, bringing the league to 12 teams.
San Jose joins Detroit, Hamilton and Las Vegas as the four expansion teams heading into the league’s fourth season.
It’s the latest step in the PWHL’s rapid growth, as the league looks to secure a major U.S. broadcast rights deal.
The bid to add the team was submitted by the City of San Jose and Sharks Sports & Entertainment, which owns the NHL’s San Jose Sharks. The team will share facilities with the Sharks, playing at SAP Center, which is nicknamed “The Shark Tank,” and training at Sharks Ice at San Jose.
All 12 teams in the league, including the expansion teams, are owned and operated by The Walter Group. Billionaire Mark Walter is also the majority owner of the MLB’s Los Angeles Dodgers and the NBA’s Los Angeles Lakers.
“Between a deeply rooted hockey culture, rapidly booming women’s sports scene, and a community known for growth and innovation, San Jose offers a dynamic stage for the PWHL to expand its reach and build lasting momentum,” Amy Scheer, the PWHL’s executive vice president of business operations, said in a statement.
PWHL San Jose adds another presence on the Pacific coast, where the league already has teams in Vancouver and Seattle. Las Vegas is also in the Pacific time zone, which should help with travel and game scheduling.
It also creates the possibility of two separate conferences, something The Associated Press has reported the league is considering for next season.
A growing hockey market
The PWHL has never played a game in California, but is confident that it will support women’s hockey.
California ranks sixth in the country in girls’ hockey participation, behind five states with colder climates, according to the PWHL. Seattle Torrent defender Cayla Barnes, Torrent forward Brooke Bryant and Minnesota Frost forward Dominique Petrie are all from California.
Outside of hockey, the Bay Area has embraced women’s sports teams in other leagues, including the WNBA’s Golden State Valkyries, which joined the league in 2025, and the National Women’s Soccer League’s Bay FC, which was added in 2024.
PWHL San Jose’s colours will be orange, blue and white, “inspired by the San Jose flag and reflecting the Bay Area’s optimistic energy,” the league says. The orange is also a nod to the Sharks “and the region’s historic orange groves, while blue evokes the beauty of California’s ocean coastline and sky.”
“We are honoured the PWHL has chosen San Jose as the site of its latest expansion team, joining the NHL’s San Jose Sharks and the AHL’s San Jose Barracuda,” Jonathan Becher, the president of Sharks Sports & Entertainment, said in a statement.
“From its humble beginnings with an NHL expansion team in 1991, San Jose is now truly a ‘hockey city.’ Boasting three professional hockey teams and Sharks Ice, a six-sheet public recreational ice facility, San Jose hosts one of the largest collection of boys, girls, and adult hockey players in the U.S.”
The team will be officially announced at a press conference in San Jose later on Tuesday.
League-wide roster reset coming
San Jose completes the PWHL’s goal of growing to 12 teams.
It’s a number the league wanted to get to sooner rather than later. The belief is that a 12-team league will draw more interest from corporate sponsors and potential U.S. broadcast partners.
“For the market, for sponsors, for media and an eight-team league isn’t that exciting, that enticing,” PWHL advisory board member Stan Kasten told CBC Sports earlier this season. “We need to have a bigger footprint to get the kind of deals we need to make this pay off for our players. And so if we know where we’re going, let’s not waste time getting there.”
CBC Sports insider Karissa Donkin sets the scene for the Walter Cup final in Montreal and gives her insight on the PWHL expansion decisions.
On the ice, four new teams sets the stage for a league-wise roster reset this summer.
A memo distributed to players by the PWHL Players Association earlier this month said the league doesn’t plan to hold an expansion draft, like it did to build new teams in Seattle and Vancouver last season. A significant number of players in the league are on expiring contracts, which makes an expansion draft difficult to pull off.
Instead, the league will follow a complex multi-stage process to fill out the new teams, beginning with each existing team protecting three players, the memo said.
The goal was finding a way to maintain “competitive balance” across the league while also making sure players have a say in the process, Jayna Hefford, the PWHL’s executive vice president of hockey operations, told CBC Sports earlier this month.
“Those are difficult things sometimes to match, so it’s been ongoing collaborative work with the [players’ association],” she said.
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