All eyes on the PWHL Takeover Tour™ and PWHL Playoff Picture in final week of March
NEW YORK AND TORONTO (March 25, 2025) – A closer look at highlights on and off the ice from around the Professional Women’s Hockey League (PWHL) with just 16 games remaining in the schedule.
LAST STOP, ST. LOUIS
The PWHL Takeover Tour™ will make its ninth, and final, stop in St. Louis on Saturday, Mar. 29 at Enterprise Center where the Boston Fleet will take on the Ottawa Charge at 1 p.m. CT. Fans have the opportunity to see both teams in action before puck drop with an open practice and autograph session scheduled on Thursday evening with the Charge and Friday afternoon with the Fleet. The eighth game of the Takeover Tour™ in Detroit set an attendance record for a professional women’s hockey game in the United States with 14,288 fans and boosted total tour attendance to 115,023 through the first eight games. Click here for more.
PWHL PLAYOFF PICTURE
Montréal (10-6-3-6) remains atop the PWHL standings with 45 points and can clinch a playoff berth with a regulation win against fourth-place Minnesota (7-5-4-9) on Wednesday. The Frost have 35 points and sit behind second-place Toronto (11-2-5-7), who have 42 points, and third-place Boston (8-6-4-6), who have 40 points. The Sceptres and Fleet go head-to-head on Wednesday and also have weekend matchups that may have playoff-clinching scenarios. Ottawa (9-1-4-10) is in fifth-place with 33 points—just two points behind the Frost with a game in hand— and New York (5-4-4-12) has 27 points in sixth. With five games remaining, the Sirens have a maximum point potential of 42 and can no longer surpass the Victoire or the Sceptres. Click here for full PWHL standings and here for the tiebreaking procedures.
BOSTON BEST IN YEAR-OVER-YEAR ANALYSIS
All six teams have now played at least 24 games which matches the duration of the inaugural season’s 72-game schedule. Boston showed the most significant improvement year-over-year with five more points (40 points, 8-6-4-6, up from 35 points, 8-4-3-9) and a goal differential of plus-18 (+11 in 2024-25 vs. -7 in 2024), largely attributed to 16 more goals scored offensively. Montréal bettered their point total by four (45 points up from 41), both Ottawa (33 points up from 32) and New York (27 points up from 26) showed one-point improvements in the standings, and Minnesota stayed even at 35 points. Toronto is the only team to show regression in terms of points, going from 47 in the inaugural season to 39 in their first 24 games.
ATTENDANCE UP 35 PERCENT YEAR-OVER-YEAR
The first 72 games of the 2024-25 PWHL season had a total attendance of 529,844, capped by a sold-out crowd of 8,351 at Toronto’s Coca-Cola Coliseum on Wednesday. The per-game average of 7,359 is a 35 percent increase from the 5,448 per-game average generated from 392,259 fans in 72 games during the inaugural season. New York’s season-high crowd of 4,767 at Prudential Center on Saturday, and Montréal’s fourth sold-out crowd of 10,172 at Place Bell on Sunday, brings the season’s attendance through 74 games to 544,783 – an average of 7,362 per game.
SECOND HAT TRICK FOR VANIŠOVÁ
Ottawa’s Tereza Vanišová made history on Saturday becoming the first player to record two hat tricks in a single season. Her three goals propelled the Charge to a 5-2 win over the Sirens and followed her three-goal performance on Feb. 13 as part of an 8-3 win over the Frost. The Czech forward has scored two of the league’s four hat tricks this season with Fleet captain Hilary Knight (Mar. 5) and Victoire captain Marie-Philip Poulin (Jan. 29) tallying the others. Poulin is the only other player with two hat tricks in her career after scoring her first last season (Jan. 10, 2024).
WHEN JENNER SCORES, OTTAWA WINS
Charge captain Brianne Jenner also scored in Saturday’s win to continue an impressive streak that has seen Ottawa win all 11 games in team history, including four this season, in which she’s scored a goal. Her three previous goals this season contributed to Charge wins over Minnesota. Poulin had a similar run of eight straight games this season where her goals contributed to Montréal wins, with the team now having won nine of the 11 games where their captain has scored. In Boston, the Fleet are a perfect 5-0-0-0 when Sophie Shirley records a point and 7-0-0-0 when Shay Maloney is on the scoresheet with either a goal or an assist.
MICHIGAN’S ROQUE SCORES ‘THE MICHIGAN’
New York’s Abby Roque scored a highlight-reel goal on Saturday that made headlines across the hockey world, including nhl.com and espn.com, cracked the SportsCenter Top 10, and was a ‘Must-See Moment’ on TSN. The goal, affectionately known as ‘The Michigan’, was the first of its kind in the PWHL and fittingly scored by one of the league’s six Michigan-born players. The Sault Ste. Marie, MI, native lifted the puck onto her stick while skating behind the net and placed it into the top corner of the net on a high wraparound. Roque joined NHL Network’s NHL Now program on Monday to talk about the goal, and more, in a special ‘Players Only’ segment with hosts Mike Rupp and Michael Del Zotto. Click here to watch.
PWHL: SKATING TO SUCCESS
Last week, league executives joined a WISE (Women in Sports + Events) Symposium in New York. Amy Scheer, Executive VP of Business Operations, Jayne Bussman-Wise, VP of Growth, Strategy & New Ventures, and Mandy Gutmann, VP of Communications & External Affairs, were on a panel hosted by Sarah Spain talking about the league’s innovative business model and how the PWHL approaches audience growth through content and community relations. Click here for more.
WISCONSIN WINS NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP
The University of Wisconsin Badgers won the 2025 National Collegiate Championship on Sunday, defeating Ohio State 4-3 in overtime. Junior Kirsten Simms scored both the game-tying goal on a penalty shot with 18.9 seconds left in regulation and the overtime winner. The win is the Badgers’ fourth national championship in six seasons and a record eighth in program history. Ten current PWHL players were part of previous Wisconsin titles, including Boston’s Knight (2009/11) and Shirley (2019/21/23), Minnesota’s Natalie Buchbinder and Britta Curl-Salemme (2019/21/23), Montréal’s Dara Greig (2021), New York’s Roque (2019), Ottawa’s Emily Clark (2019), Toronto’s Kristen Campbell (2019), Daryl Watts (2021) and Jesse Compher (2023). Click here for more.
BISHOP’S GAITERS CROWNED U SPORTS CHAMPS
The Bishop’s Gaiters won their program’s first Golden Path Trophy as U SPORTS National Champions in just their fourth year of existence with a 3-0 victory over the University of Waterloo Warriors on Sunday. Ericka Gagnon posted a 27-save shutout and Gabrielle Santerre, the tournament’s MVP, scored a goal and two assists in the final. Of the PWHL’s seven former U SPORTS players, three won national championships including New York’s Emmy Fecteau (Concordia, 2022/24), and Montréal’s Catherine Dubois and Alexandra Labelle (Montréal, 2016). Click here for more.
CASEY O’BRIEN WINS PATTY KAZMAIER MEMORIAL AWARD
Wisconsin forward Casey O’Brien was named the winner of the 2025 Patty Kazmaier Memorial Award on Saturday before a capacity crowd at the McNamara Alumni Center on the campus of the University of Minnesota. The award is presented annually by The USA Hockey Foundation to the top player in NCAA Division I women’s ice hockey. The fifth-year forward recorded 88 points (26G, 62A), leading the nation with an impressive 2.20 points per game. She is the sixth player from the University of Wisconsin to win the honor, including Montréal’s Ann-Renée Desbiens (2017). Minnesota’s Kendall Coyne Schofield and Taylor Heise, both former Patty Kaz winners, attended the event and signed autographs for fans. Click here for more.
GRACE ELLIOTT WINS BRODRICK TROPHY
UBC Thunderbirds forward Grace Elliott was named Player of the Year in U SPORTS Women’s Hockey and the 2025 recipient of the Brodrick Trophy. The announcement was made on Wednesday night at the All-Canadian Awards Ceremony in Waterloo, ON. The fourth-year forward led the country in goals (22) and points (42) and became her program’s first player to win a major U SPORTS award. Previous Brodrick Trophy recipients include New York’s Jade Downie-Landry (McGill, 2022). Click here for more.
LEAGUE LEADERS
Five players have exceeded the 20-point plateau heading down the stretch in the league’s scoring race. Knight (13G, 13A) leads the way with 26 points, followed by Sirens rookie Sarah Fillier (10G, 15A) with 25 points. Toronto’s Hannah Miller (10G, 13A) and Watts (8G, 15A) are tied for fourth with 23 points each, and Coyne Schofield (10G, 11A) rounds out the top five with 21 points. Poulin leads the league with 15 goals and became the first player to reach 20 points in back-to-back PWHL seasons. Toronto’s Renata Fast (5G, 15A) leads all defenders in scoring. In goal, Desbiens leads the league in wins (13), goals-against-average (1.85) and save percentage (.932). Click to see PWHL stats.
THIS WEEK’S SCHEDULE
Five games are on this week’s schedule, beginning tonight with New York at Ottawa at The Arena at TD Place. All four other teams are in action on Wednesday night, including Toronto at Boston in the Fleet’s second of two games hosted at Agganis Arena, and Montréal at Minnesota for the Frost’s Women’s Empowerment Month Unity Game at Xcel Energy Center. The Frost will also host the Sceptres on Sunday afternoon for the team’s Pride Unity Game. On Saturday afternoon, it’s the ninth and final stop of the PWHL Takeover Tour™ featuring the Fleet and Charge at St. Louis’ Enterprise Center.
Tuesday, March 25, 2025
7 p.m. ET – New York Sirens at Ottawa Charge (The Arena at TD Place)
Prime Video (Canada), MSGSNHD/Z1
Wednesday, March 26, 2025
7 p.m. ET – Toronto Sceptres at Boston Fleet (Agganis Arena)
NESN, TSN 1
8 p.m. ET – Montréal Victoire at Minnesota Frost (Xcel Energy Center)
FanDuel Sports Network North, TSN+, RDS
Saturday, March 29, 2025
2 p.m. ET – PWHL Takeover Tour™ - Ottawa Charge at Boston Fleet (Enterprise Center, St. Louis)
NESN, CBC Gem
Sunday, March 30, 2025
1 p.m. ET – Toronto Sceptres at Minnesota Frost (Xcel Energy Center)
FanDuel Sports Network North, TSN 5
All PWHL games will be streamed on the league’s YouTube Channel and at thepwhl.com, and are available to watch worldwide outside of Canada, and in Czechia and Slovakia where games are available via Nova Sport.