The Professional Women’s Hockey League has unveiled the long-awaited names and logos for its six original franchises ahead of the 2024-25 season.
Teams have been named: the Boston Fleet, Minnesota Frost, Montréal Victoire, New York Sirens, Ottawa Charge and Toronto Sceptres.
“From where we started with this massive pool of names that was generated and to where we are today, I feel so proud of every single one of these team names and identities,” said Kanan Bhatt-Shah, the PWHL’s vice president of brand and marketing and the leader of the project. “We’ve ended up in a spot where we just couldn’t be more thrilled.”
Each team name was “inspired by the fans, players and cities in which the teams play,” according to Monday’s press release.
Per the league, “Fleet” represents Boston’s maritime history. “Frost” embodies Minnesota’s deep-rooted love for the ice and the sport in the State of Hockey. “Victoire” — which translates to victory in English — is meant to celebrate Montreal’s pursuit of sporting achievements. “Sirens” is an ode to New York City’s unique energy and speaks to the sound of the goal horn after the puck goes into the net. “Charge” is a reference to Ottawa’s official motto, “Advance – Ottawa – En Avant.” And “Sceptres” pays homage to Toronto’s “regal history” and refers to the old moniker Queen City and iconic places like Queen Street.
Merchandise is available through the league’s online shop, including a collaboration with Peace Collective, a Toronto-based Canadian clothing brand. However, redesigned jerseys from Bauer Hockey, the league’s first official jersey partner, will be unveiled closer to the start of the season.
For the inaugural season, the PWHL used temporary jerseys with a basic boilerplate design for all six teams. Each jersey had a color scheme and the name of the city (or state) displayed diagonally across the front of the sweater. The lack of nicknames and logos caused some consternation among fans, but league executives said team branding was too important to rush.
All teams are retaining the primary colors from those original jerseys, a deliberate decision by the league so fans could still feel connected with the team through the merchandise they might have bought in Year 1. Additional colors, though, have been added to each team’s palette.
“We didn’t want to pressure fans like, ‘Oh my god, Boston’s not green anymore,’” explained PWHL senior vice president of business operations Amy Scheer. “You can still have green merch.”
Bhatt-Shah joined the PWHL in November 2023 and quickly got to work developing the new names and branding. The PWHL also partnered with creative agency Flower Shop. It was clear to Scheer and Bhatt-Shah that fans wanted conventional team names in line with those used in most North American sports leagues. Throughout the season, fans were enthusiastic about throwing names into the hat and the league, Bhatt-Shah said, “considered all of them.”
“We feel very fortunate that we were able to have an inaugural season where it was ‘PWHL team name’ because we were able to get input from fans at games and see everything that was happening on social media and be able to really listen and get a sense of what would resonate in local communities. That was definitely a big piece of this,” she said.
The project began with a research phase where they dove into each market — talking to staff, players and members of the community — to try to ensure each fan base would connect with the new names. “We really wanted to be deliberate and thoughtful and strategic about the process from beginning to end,” Bhatt-Shah said.
There was a lot the league considered when brainstorming and ultimately choosing each name.
Does the nickname make sense for the city? Is it something fans will connect to and rally around? What could the logo and graphics look like? How would it come to life in-arena? And, of course, is the name legally available?
Scheer said one of the big challenges in the process is finding names that could be successfully trademarked and owned by the league in both Canada and the United States in 2024, with so many professional hockey and sport franchises already in existence.
If a name checked all their creative boxes, but was already in use, the group would move in another direction. For example, some fans — and players — liked “Minnesota Reign.” But the Ontario Reign — the NHL’s Los Angeles Kings’ minor league affiliate — already exists.
“You can’t just pick a name out and then say, ‘I’m going to do that,’” Brian Jennings, the NHL’s executive vice president of marketing, explained to The Athletic back in November 2023. “In hockey, is there somebody else called that? They could claim that there’s consumer confusion. If it’s another sport, you could probably get a coexistence agreement with the Trademark and Patent Office. But it takes time to navigate that.”
Once each name was selected, the group moved on to the design. The process moved quickly, given the lengthy manufacturing timeline required for jerseys to be produced. Bhatt-Shah said she first met with the jersey designer in March 2024 — about four months after she started working with the league. The final design deadline was in May.
“Fans wanted traditional team nicknames and logos, and jerseys that obviously bring these to life,” she said. “And so for us, it was really about making sure that we would have jerseys that would go alongside these identities for our second season.”
