Montreal Victoire fans stayed to watch their team celebrate the franchise’s first Walter Cup long after the final buzzer sounded and the confetti had fallen at Ottawa’s Canadian Tire Centre.
It was a celebration of what the Victoire had accomplished, three seasons into the PWHL’s creation.
It was also the last chance to see this team together on the ice, before a massive roster shake-up changes the landscape of the PWHL this off-season.
Victoire forward Abby Roque, who was traded to Montreal from New York on draft day last year, described it as “a gift” to play on a line with Marie-Philip Poulin and Laura Stacey — a trio that fans dubbed “the Wife Line.”
In her first PWHL playoff run, Roque became a champion and tied Poulin for the scoring lead among all skaters, scoring eight points in nine games.
“Everybody is truly an incredible person,” Roque said about the Victoire. “They leave their heart on the line every game, and I love everybody so much.”
The three-year contract Roque signed three seasons ago is due to expire, and like so many players across the league, it’s not clear where she will be playing next year.
In the next two weeks, the league will begin a player distribution process that will help stock the rosters of four new expansion teams in Detroit, Hamilton, Las Vegas and San Jose.
According to a memo sent to players earlier this month from the PWHL Players Association, the league doesn’t plan to have an expansion draft. Instead, the league has been planning a multi-phase process that begins with teams each protecting three players.
Here’s a preview of what’s ahead in a busy PWHL off-season.
Roster reset
With so many players on expiring contracts and more players set to depart to expansion teams, the GMs of the existing eight teams will have a chance to reset their rosters this season.
The teams that will be the most successful will be the ones who can get creative with patching the holes left from departing players. Montreal might provide the best blueprint.
After a successful 2025 draft, the Victoire lost defenders Cayla Barnes and Anna Wilgren, plus forwards Abby Boreen and Jennifer Gardiner, to expansion teams in Seattle and Vancouver.
The Victoire won the Cup largely because of the depth Montreal GM Danièle Sauvageau was able to add despite those departures.
It started with drafting Nicole Gosling in the first round. The rookie defender blossomed into a powerplay quarterback, replacing what was lost with Barnes’ departure. By the end of the season, she seemed like a steal at sixth overall.
With a 4-0 win over the Ottawa Charge, the Montreal Victoire became the first Canadian team to win the Walter Cup. After the game, players, their loved ones and fans talked about the achievement.
Then, Sauvageau traded for Roque, who added grit, offence and another ace in the faceoff circle, all qualities that helped propel Montreal to a championship.
Finally, Sauvageau signed forward Hayley Scamurra and defender Maggie Flaherty in free agency. Scamurra added much-needed forward depth and was invaluable to the team while Poulin was sidelined with an injury.
Flaherty, meanwhile, scored two massive goals for the Victoire in the playoffs, including the Game 2 overtime winner in the Walter Cup final. Montreal targeted Flaherty not just because she was a two-time champion with the Minnesota Frost, but also because they felt she had more to give offensively.
It took creativity and sacrifice — three of Montreal’s stars took salary cuts to make it possible for Sauvageau to add the right pieces during the offseason. But it’s a blueprint for how to weather expansion and come out a champion on the other side.
“No matter what’s going to happen, this team is going to be together forever, even if they play elsewhere due to what the expansion will bring us,” Sauvageau said on the ice just after her team hoisted the Walter Cup.
Building new teams
The league’s four new teams will change the look of the league on the ice, on top of expanding the PWHL’s reach into new places.
The decision to add four teams so quickly came after the success of Seattle and Vancouver last season, two teams that surpassed expectations at the box office and in merchandise sales.
It’s official: The Professional Women’s Hockey League (PWHL) is expanding, with a team coming to Detroit next season. For hockey fans and female hockey players in Windsor, it’s an exciting time, with more support for women’s hockey. The CBC’s Emma Loop reports.
The bigger picture is the PWHL’s leaders believe a 12-team league has a better chance of securing more corporate partnerships and a major U.S. broadcast rights deal.
It means four new teams will be busy over the next few weeks quickly adding staff and creating a vision for how the new teams should look and feel. Two teams already have GMs in place (Manon Rhéaume in Detroit and Dominique DiDia in Las Vegas). The other two GMs are expected to be named shortly.
“That’s the fun part of the league continuing to grow is it’s more job opportunities for women athletes and everyone in all of our different roles,” Ottawa Charge head coach Carla MacLeod said after San Jose was announced as team number 12.
Last season, Seattle and Vancouver amassed riches through the expansion draft. But it didn’t immediately translate on the ice, proving that it can take a while to build systems, culture and cohesion in new markets.
How Detroit, Hamilton, Las Vegas and San Jose apply those lessons from Seattle and Vancouver will be something to watch over the next few weeks.
A generational draft
More than 230 players declared for the upcoming PWHL entry draft, which will be held in Detroit on June 17.
The top of the draft is particularly strong.
“The top-end talent coming through the draft this year are players who are going to immediately impact this league in a significant way across multiple markets,” the PWHL’s executive vice president of hockey operations, Jayna Hefford, told CBC Sports earlier this month.
That starts with Caroline Harvey, the dynamic defender who was named MVP at the most recent Olympic tournament in Italy. Should the Vancouver Goldeneyes select Harvey with the first overall pick, the team will add a defender who can tilt the ice against top competition.
Assuming the Goldeneyes protect defender Sophie Jaques in the expansion process, Vancouver will have two of the most talented young defenders on the planet next season.
Other top prospects include Abbey Murphy, a skilled forward who can agitate her opponents, and Laila Edwards, a forward with size and the ability to play defence, too.
There’s also a pipeline of talent coming over from Europe, including Finnish stars Elisa Holopainen, Petra Nieminen and Viivi Vainikka.
The product on the ice will look different with a much-expanded player pool next season, though Hefford seemed confident the talent won’t take a hit.
“The game’s been growing for some time and internationally, we’ve seen the gap start to close between countries,” Hefford said. “To see more and more of those players that are wanting to come to the PWHL is something that we’re incredibly excited about and it’s something that gives us a lot of confidence as we look to expand.”
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