Logistical challenges might make the Professional Women’s Hockey League (PWHL) arrival to Vancouver quite a long shot.
More than 19,000 hockey fans attended Rogers Arena Jan. 8 for the game between the Montréal Victoire and the Toronto Sceptres.
This was the second game of the PWHL’s Takeover Tour, consisting of taking the league across various cities in North America to draw interest and test out potential markets, UBC Sauder School of Business professor James Brander told BIV.
The league’s six teams are all located in the east – three in Canada and three in the U.S. Out of the nine cities visited by the tour this year, four of them are in the west, including Vancouver, Edmonton, Seattle and Denver.
Viable but challenging
So could Vancouver ever get a PWHL team in the future? Brander says it could be viable, and in fact, Vancouver could be one of the most likely places to get a team.
However, this does depend on numerous factors – one of them being having at least two teams in the west to make it viable.
“The league is hoping to add two teams next season,” said Brander, who specializes in international business and public policy. “Would it make sense to add Vancouver and Quebec City? Well, no, it wouldn’t make sense. Maybe Seattle, maybe Calgary, maybe Edmonton.”
One of the reasons for this would be for teams to save on long and expensive travel times from the east and to facilitate scheduling.
Overextending finances and high costs of living
Then there’s the issue of finances, which Brander says the league must be careful not to overextend.
The PWHL launched in 2023 and is a privately held company owned by Mark Walter, who also owns the Los Angeles Dodgers from Major League Baseball and co-owns Chelsea F.C. from the English Premier League.
Now in its second season, the league’s budgetary situation remains undisclosed.
“They put out a lot of positive spin – saying that revenues are exceeding expectations,” he said. “But as far as I can tell, they are losing money.”
The question is how much money the PWHL will be willing to put into franchises that will probably lose money initially, he added.
Perhaps the most significant challenges in getting a PWHL team in Vancouver are salaries combined with the city’s high cost of living.
According to the collective bargaining agreement between the PWHL and the player’s association, the highest salaries are upwards of US$80,000 – each team must have at least six players earning no less than this figure.
Minimum salaries in the league are US$35,000 and each team must have an average salary of US$55,000.
“The salaries the women are earning are much lower than NHL players,” said Brander. “In fact, they’re similar to what minor league hockey players are earning in the American Hockey League [AHL].”
The AHL is a professional hockey league mostly serving as a development league for the NHL – for instance, the AHL’s Abbotsford Canucks is the Vancouver Canucks’ NHL farm team.
There are still plenty of women who would love to play, he added, but Vancouver’s cost of living for players, coaching and staff is a major hurdle to overcome if the city’s getting a team in the future.
A place to play
Although the PWHL drew 19,000 attendees to Rogers Arena earlier this month, it is unlikely numbers would remain as high for regular season games – these numbers would be more like 5,000 to 7,000, the current average out east, said Brander.
The challenge of filling Rogers Arena, mixed with the arena’s heavy demand for concerts and Canucks games, would probably make having a PWHL team more plausible in another Lower Mainland venue that can accommodate those numbers.
This raises yet another challenge regarding the team’s internal travel within the city, which isn’t the easiest to navigate, said Brander.
The Canucks are currently the only major hockey team in town and the sport does draw a lot of attention.
“I think Vancouver would probably be a pretty good place in terms of drawing fans,” he said. “But that still doesn't mean that economics will work out.”
Expansion of women’s sports
There’s no denying interest in women’s sports has increased, and there’s no reason why it wouldn’t continue to increase.
However, Brander foresees a steady increase in interest rather than a sudden explosion.
“Women’s sports have been around for a long time, and we have seen this [gradually] increase over time,” he said. “Nothing indicates it’s going to suddenly double or triple next year.”
Nevertheless, he remains optimistic the league will be able to survive and do well in the long run, adding the league will expand west sooner or later.
“If I were doing it, I would make the first expansion relatively close to the existing teams, just because it's easier to expand outward from where they start,” Brander said. “I think Vancouver is a long shot, but it’s certainly a possibility.”
