The PWHL is only weeks away from hitting the road for a barnstorming tour across North America, which will prompt even more intrigue and speculation around expansion.
The league will play nine regular-season, neutral-site games as part of the PWHL Takeover Tour, which begins Jan. 5 at Climate Pledge Arena in Seattle. The final stop on the tour will be March 29 at the Enterprise Center in St. Louis — home of the St. Louis Blues.
“We’re really looking forward to the neutral-site game and learning more about how our market responds,” said Chris Zimmerman, the St. Louis Blues CEO of business operations. “The launch last year of the PWHL and bringing together women’s hockey under one professional league, these are all things that we completely endorse and believe in.”
The PWHL, now in its second season, has teams in Toronto, Montreal, Minnesota, Ottawa, New York and Boston. After a record-breaking inaugural year, the league is already preparing to add up to two teams, potentially as early as the 2025-26 season. League officials have been tight-lipped about where teams could land but will be examining everything from market size, the fan base, youth hockey participation, facilities and the economic opportunities in each market.
“It’s about finding the best market, the best fan base and the best partners,” Jayna Hefford, the PWHL’s senior vice president of hockey operations, told The Athletic in October.
While many expansion lists have typically led with Detroit, Pittsburgh or attractive Pacific Northwest cities such as Seattle or Vancouver, what about St. Louis?
Zimmerman said the Blues’ focus has been on hosting a good event in March and being “as good of a women’s hockey market that we can be,” not so much on securing an expansion franchise. Still, St. Louis checks a lot of boxes the PWHL might be looking for in a destination.
Over the last several years, the city has hosted tentpole women’s hockey events, including the 2017 NCAA Women’s Frozen Four. In 2021, the U.S. and Canadian women’s national teams played two Rivalry Series games at Centene Community Ice Center, the Blues’ practice facility, in nearby Maryland Heights, Mo., in preparation for the 2022 Olympics. The Blues also hosted showcase events with the Professional Women’s Hockey Players’ Association, the player-led precursor to the PWHL.
The organization has shown a commitment to growing girls and women’s hockey at the grassroots level, too. In 2020, the Blues launched the Girls Hockey Development Program, which is designed to provide low-cost opportunities for girls to start playing hockey. Last season, more than 250 girls participated in the program. The organization is also finalizing plans to launch and host an all-girls 12U Tier 1 tournament beginning next year.
“We’ve been consistent over the last five years, making St. Louis a priority for girls and women’s hockey,” Zimmerman said. “We’ve been focused on bringing this game here and continue to build the energy around women’s hockey and be as good of a market that we can be.”
Missouri doesn’t have the same female hockey registration numbers as other (more populous) potential expansion markets, like Michigan or Pennsylvania. But it is steadily growing in the state. Around 1,300 girls registered to play in 2023-24, up from only 492 ten years ago in 2013-14, according to USA Hockey.
One of those players was Jincy Roese (née Dunne), who grew up in O’Fallon, Mo. Roese played youth hockey for the St. Louis Lady Blues, as well as the AAA boys team that, in 2013, included Toronto Maple Leafs goalie Joseph Woll and Ottawa Senators captain Brady Tkachuk.
“Growing up, everyone asked me if I wanted to play in a professional league and I was like, ‘That wasn’t an option. I didn’t even dream about that,’” said Roese, now a defender for the Ottawa Charge, which will play in the March 29 game in St. Louis. “This opportunity is a reality for them now. … I’m so excited for them because when you can dream big from an early age, the sky is truly the limit.”
There are three additional girls youth hockey associations in St. Louis, along with the AAA Lady Blues. As well as an NCAA Division I women’s hockey team: Lindenwood University, which plays at the Blues’ Centene Community Ice Center.
“I think St. Louis is magnificently positioned, having Lindenwood, multiple club college teams and the programs that we’re putting together to continue to help grow (youth girls hockey),” Zimmerman said. “All of these things are coming together to make us a real leader in terms of North American girls hockey.”
Perhaps the two strongest arguments in favor of St. Louis are its location and venues.
The PWHL’s teams are mostly clustered in Northeastern U.S. cities and in Eastern Canada, save for the Minnesota Frost — the league’s only team in the American Midwest. The New York Sirens are the closest to Minnesota with around 1,200 miles separating the two venues. A team in St. Louis — less than 600 miles away from Minneapolis — could help connect the Frost to the rest of the league. And give Minnesota a natural rival.
The city has also two potential venues for a club to play: Enterprise Center, which has a capacity of 18,096 for Blues’ games, and CCIC, which held 3,100 for NCAA men’s regionals last year.
Centene might be too small, considering the PWHL’s average attendance last season was over 5,000 and some teams — such as Toronto and Montreal — moved into bigger buildings due to demand for tickets. It could also be a fine starting point for a new franchise.
Enterprise would be one of the larger home venues in the PWHL, and one of the only primary rinks shared with an NHL team, along with the Xcel Energy Center in Minnesota.
The Frost averaged over 7,000 fans at home games last season — including one game at 3M Arena at Mariucci — and surpassed 13,000 fans at its home opener and during Game 4 of the PWHL Finals at Xcel. If a PWHL team played at Enterprise, they could opt to only open the lower bowl to make the venue feel less cavernous and have the option to open up more seats if there’s demand.
What a women’s professional hockey game could draw at Enterprise remains to be seen, but the game in March will likely show how feasible (or not) that venue — and St. Louis as an expansion option — could be.
“Like any new professional sports league trying to establish itself, the league is learning and we’re thrilled to see how our market is going to get the chance to respond,” Zimmerman said. “It’s a really great opportunity.”
How expansion might work in the PWHL remains to be seen. All six teams, as well as the league, are owned by Mark Walter — the billionaire owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers — and his wife, Kimbra. There is no plan to move away from that single-entity ownership model at this time, meaning it’s unlikely the league sells expansion teams to outside investors who would own and operate the franchises — like we’d typically see with NHL expansion.
Even if they didn’t own a PWHL franchise, the Blues could still play a critical role in supporting the team, either through marketing, leveraging the club’s loyal fan base or sharing a venue.
“If we keep supporting and help create the opportunity, we have lots of confidence that St. Louis will show well,” Zimmerman said. “The results from the big-time events that we’ve had, and the feedback that we get from the stakeholders, have helped clarify that our plans and our goals are all attainable.”
(Photo: Dilip Vishwanat / Getty Images)
