PWHL San Jose is Building The Future of Women's Hockey

Um, my condolences to all of the existing teams who have had to see their, their players-

Which two, eight

... mo- moving on.

[laughs]

Yeah, w- I, I can't say we know exactly how that feels.

The, we, the only expansion we've really been a part of is at the NHL level.

There are, like, plenty more teams.

I think it's far less brutal, but I think if anything, a- as much as it hurts now, I think you just gotta rip the Band-Aid off, you know? The, this is un- you know, charted territory right now.

Previous reiterations of, um, women's professional hockey leagues have really never made it out of the East Coast, have never really gone past six teams.

You know, this, this league is really trying to get to that next level where women can see themselves having a career at this level beyond NCAA.

Young girls, you know, young kids looking at these players and seeing that there is a future for them elsewhere.

And I'm not saying everything is 100% exactly how it should be run, but there's definitely room probably for improvement.

But I appreciate that they do seem to have put in some thought.

Obviously, some things have changed from last year when they expanded for Seattle and Vancouver, which we briefly went over in our last episode.

Phase one as, is the time for the existing teams to decide who they're gonna protect.

They are able to protect up to three, three players, and so that list was, became available.

I was not surprised who the Victoire protected, and it was just really interesting to see across the league, it looked like majority of teams prioritize protecting a goaltender, which I think it was, was a good move.

And then maybe you have, you're looking towards the future, I, I feel like Seattle prioritize their, their younger goaltender.

Um, and then we acquired Corinne Schroeder with, um, one of our picks to come over to San Jose.

And, um, yeah, so you have any thoughts about how phase one went?

Honestly, I didn't pay too much attention to phase one, because it had nothing [laughs] to do with San Jose.

[laughs] I'd, I like quickly probably looked through the list and stuff.

Again, uh, the only one that I realized or noticed was the Victoire, which everyone knew exactly what three players they were gonna protect, like you said.

Um, I think I was a little surprised to see that Minnesota didn't protect, uh, Kendall Coyne Schofield, but I think she also may be looking to want to play in Detroit possibly, 'cause it's closer to home.

Um, actually, I, I think she's from Detroit or something.