NWHL

A Moment of “Zam”

/ Jake Solomons / Leave a comment

After an opening weekend of back-to-back tripleheaders, and an uncontested Boston Pride victory Sunday night (thank God), Monday brought a much-needed moment of zen to the Lake Placid sports complex. And also brought a bit of “Zam.” A bit of what?? If you were glued to the Twitch.tv stream and Twitter feed like I was, then you’d know I’m talking about the “Zamboni cam” in between periods. Yes. The NWHL Twitch feed actually aired the Zamboni cleaning the ice between gameplay. It’s genius. Believe me.

The Zamboni cam, I think, was not even remotely in the headspace of the marketing team. Or the videographer’s mind for that matter. Either way, for those stressed out during the games (me), it provided a sense of “Placid-ity.” Bad pun, sorry not sorry. Maybe it’s just me I don’t know, but there’s something oddly satisfying when it comes to watching a Zamboni drive back and forth to resurface the ice. A day off for the players certainly didn’t stop the NWHL marketing team from getting right to work.

For the People, By the People

Twitter is the hotspot for connectivity between fans/followers and athletes/celebrities/public figures. This weekend was no different. Many fans, including myself, found it amusing to see how much attention the Zamboni cam was actually getting. Almost too much. Honestly it’s never too much, I love it. But anyway, the NWHL Twitter timeline was spammed with a demand for Zamboni merchandise and I’ll tell you this. I’m fully on board. There’s no secret to making money. Especially when you have a brand that is gaining momentum beyond belief, you can do only one thing. Give the people what they want…

You put that s*** on a t-shirt. It’s not really an extended clothing line, but this shirt is most definitely the hottest item in the online store. That is almost a guarantee. Below are 2/4 teams with personalized “Zambonanza” t-shirts. I haven’t looked at the net profits so IDK for sure. But regardless of the sales, this is how easy marketing your brand can be. Now, it hasn’t been a cakewalk for the women’s league in a male-dominated media landscape. But when you take social media by storm with the only vehicle ever associated with hockey…you go with it! It’s like the Bernie Sanders mittens meme, fans can’t get enough of it.

  • Metropolitan Riveters
  • Connecticut Whale

I’d be lying if I said I didn’t already acquire one of these bad Larry’s. It’s weird how when you go on the league store website, every team is included except Toronto and Boston. Well Boston is a privately-owned team but still. Which lowkey shows how lazy I am in going to an entirely different site for my merch. But the Pride are built different. They’re my team, I’ll rep them all day. Again with my Boston bias. Get over it. Honestly, I wish I could watch the Zoom call footage for that marketing meeting. Someone logged on and most definitely just said: “T-shirt” and left the call. The rest is her-story. Bad pun again, still not apologizing.

Social Media Stays Undefeated

Look. I can’t really say that the NHL or any other men’s league has a devoted “fancam” or even a sense of some “cult” following for a Zamboni. Or plural Zamboni’s. Basically, in order to get recognized you have to be different. Aside from specific players making headlines, the NWHL turned an inhuman object into the hottest topic – and commodity – in town. If a trend picks up traction like that, put some wheels on it and let it resurface the ice. These jokes are terrible but it’s early and I haven’t had my coffee yet and I’m just writing this for fun.

If you think about it, this post could exclusively be just a thread of Twitter posts. I will @ the NWHL so I can give them their credit, don’t you worry. But there’s too many to choose from. And I wanted to at least provide some context for them. Anyways, I know social media can be a toxic environment for numerous reasons…*cough* Barstool *cough*. But if you can sift through the negatives and see that the fans are looking towards something that can grow a brand in a positive way, then you gotta capitalize on that.

Some players who were in the locker room between games actually had a bit of FOMO when it comes to enjoying the performance of the NWHL’s newest icon. Players like Kiira Dosdall Arena, defenseman for the Metropolitan Riveters, even joined in on the conversation:

I mean it’s an honest question, if you weren’t aware of the trend in real-time. Some people don’t realize that the silliest things can generate the most popularity. At any rate, it’s very amusing and inspiring to watch the women’s game grow outside of the boundaries in which the media traditionally limits them to. For the sport of women’s hockey, the sky is the limit in terms of opportunity. If you keep the league fun and interesting, fans will resonate and demand more. Enough said.

One more for the road, I couldn’t help myself…LOL

You Can’t Burst Their Bubble

/ Jake Solomons / Leave a comment

What a year this month has been, huh? In such a short time, there’s been a lot going on in the world of sports. Specifically the National Women’s Hockey League. They have been building their brand to new heights with TV deals and sponsorships in tow, all of which to promote the 2021 season. Not to mention the fact that they have expanded to Canada with the Toronto 6 organization. As excited as I am about this growth, I’ll break it down and discuss it further as the season unfolds.

With 2020 in the rear view mirror, the future of the NWHL has never looked brighter. The Boston Pride, Buffalo Beauts, Connecticut Whale, Metropolitan Riveters, Minnesota Whitecaps, and Toronto 6 – all have one common goal in mind. Victory.

A Done Deal

Just a quick show of hands, how many people have watched a women’s hockey game that was televised aside from the Olympics? Hmm…not too many hands raised, that’s what I expected. The NWHL‘s 2021 season has commenced inside the “Bubble” in Lake Placid, NY. And there’s “some good news” (sorry John Krasinski, don’t sue me) in getting the opportunity to watch these athletes showcase their talent and inspire others. If you are a gamer, you may be familiar with the streaming platform Twitch. If not, it’s basically a streaming service where gamers/influencers interact with their friends and fans.

NWHL Twitch Live Stream Screenshot

The streaming site has agreed to team up with the NWHL to broadcast/stream/air, whatever term you want to use, all of the regular season and playoff matchups. Of course, as a relatively new concept to women’s hockey, national broadcasting is something that needs to be earned I guess? IDK why they aren’t deserving of more primetime airwaves (they most certainly are) but I digress. If Twitch.tv is stepping up and giving these athletes a platform, then I know they will make the very best of it.

Even though the streaming service is unfamiliar to many viewers, the Semifinals and Finals round of the NWHL playoffs will be broadcasted nationally on NBCSports Network. I cannot stress this enough, even though there are only three games on NBCSN, those media time slots are critical to the growth of this league and sport as a whole. The glass ceiling has already been shattered.

In just the first day, Twitch recorded about 87,500 viewers between all three games. So like there were 29.2k viewers per game. I’m looking at my notes here and the math checks out…that’s a damn good starting point for viewership, and there’s no where else to go but up. You know what? I’ll make it even EASIER for you to find where to watch:

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It’s a Pride Thing…

I’ll just say it. I’m a Boston sports fan. Is that biased, no. Alright maybe it is but I’m not just going to turn my back on my hometown team and cheer for someone else. Anyway, the Boston Pride are on a “Revenge Tour,” as it was declared on their Twitter account Friday morning ahead of their travel day. The 2016 Isobel Cup champions looked to carry some leftover momentum into Lake Placid that was lost when Ms. Rona came to visit, and overstay her welcome.

The 2020 NWHL season had been an early victim of the coronavirus. In March of last year, the Pride had entered the playoffs with a 23-1-0 record. Very impressive, I agree. The championship game was set to take place in mid-March against the Minnesota Whitecaps. I like to think that they should have given it to the team with the best regular season record instead of suspending it altogether. Which would have awarded the Pride with their second Isobel Cup. But no. I guess it was never meant to be…

Boston Pride Championship Banners Hung At Logan International Airport – Ham Sports
Boston Pride Championship Banners, Logan Int’l Airport

Fortunately, we got to witness the 2020 championship take place as an exhibition in the 2021 season opener vs. the Whitecaps. Unfortunately, the final score reflected a 2-1 Minnesota victory on January 23 at Herb Brooks Arena. Oddly enough, Boston’s penalty kill looked like the powerplay and the PP line looked like the PK unit. No team is perfect, and there’s gonna be some hiccups. So it’s quite appropriate to have some pent-up aggression heading into Sunday vs the Buffalo Beauts. I love this game and this team but they can practice all they want. True game-readiness comes from playing games. They had 1. Everyone relax. I won’t lie I overreacted at first after the game, somewhere along the lines of:

Everybody Stay Calm GIFs | Tenor

But I will say, adding fresh blood into the mix is certainly something to look forward to in the next few days. Especially when you have an eye towards the future and the tools for building a championship-caliber franchise. The Pride front office has assembled what seems to be Boston’s real powerplay unit: the 2020 Draft class.

It’s a Bit Draft-y In Here

Being the new player in the locker room is never easy. Either the new system is tough to follow or the adjustment to the professional level is a bit more difficult than the NCAA. The Pride don’t seem to have that problem, breaking in their first-year talent to create a more cohesive unit. They adopted Sammy Davis (Boston University) and Tereza Vanisova (UMaine/Czech Republic) into the Lion’s Den as the first two picks in the 2020 NWHL Draft.

  • 2020 First Overall Draft Pick Sammy Davis Signs with the Boston Pride - NWHL
    Sammy Davis
  • Tereza Vanisova

Davis dominated with the Terriers recording 142-career points, supported by 66 goals. Even redshirted as a senior, she still put up some impressive numbers which clearly checked off all the boxes in the Pride’s criteria. Vanisova really excelled in the UMaine program, netting 63-career goals and tallying 129 points. The Hockey East conference is simply a factory for highlighting player’s raw talent and thankfully, Boston knows how to pinpoint key attributes to achieve the goal (no pun intended) of a title within a system built around untapped potential.

As always, there are additions to the team that fly under the radar. Some may call them sleeper picks. A trifecta of Wildcats out of UNH Taylor Wenczkowski, Meghara McManus and Carlee Turner bring an abundance of grit from the Granite state as well. The McManus/Wenczkowski power duo had collected 56 goals in the past two seasons in Durham. I know what you’re thinking, that’s incredible. So there’s not a singular doubt in my mind that these young stars will bring the same energy this season. Only this time, they’ll be sporting the black and gold sweaters.

  • Taylor Wenczkowski
  • Meghara McManus

Time will tell if they will be playing on the same line – if Head coach Paul Mara realizes their inherent team chemistry. I personally think it’s smart to keep them in pairs but separate the trio in order to gel with the rest of the team but if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Who’s to say whether a couple of UNH liney’s can’t work together on the Pride? Call me crazy but it may just be helpful.

Carlee Turner

In Saturday’s game vs. the Whitecaps, McManus and Turner shared the fourth offensive line while Wenczkowski harnessed a spot on the third line. It’s interesting to see a team filled with so many players from the same NCAA team. But on the downside, when there’s a few Hockey East rivals blended together between UNH/BU/Northeastern, a few feathers may be ruffled and take the chirping too far. Hopefully not…

Pack Mentality

Like I said before, you can’t be fully ready for a game until you’re tested mentally and physically in the game itself. Having lost to the Whitecaps was a much needed wake-up call for the Pride. There is some serious competition in the NWHL and being down 0-1 is another challenge in itself. Playing catch up in a condensed season is no easy feat. Women’s hockey has had its back up against a wall, fighting for media exposure and they finally got it. The Pride face a similar situation in their battle for league supremacy yet again.

Sunday’s tilt against the 2017 Isobel Cup champion Buffalo Beauts will really set the tone for the remainder of the season. The Beauts battled it out Saturday against the Connecticut Whale, culminating in a shootout which resulted in a 2-1 win for Connecticut. As much as I want every team to play well, I cannot stomach another loss for the Pride. It’s gonna be an interesting matchup of two 0-1 teams as they basically have everything to lose and essentially everything to gain, too.

Boston is synonymous with champions. I don’t necessarily think the hardware needs to solidify that fact. Whether the Pride bring home the Isobel Cup or not, the sport of women’s ice hockey and NWHL have ultimately prevailed as the overall winner. People notice them now. This league has advanced leaps and bounds into the spotlight of the media, inspiring young athletes and fans alike…and they’ve only scratched the surface.

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Ok so let me know what you think! I know it’s my first post in a while so bear with me. Like, comment, subscribe, whatever you’d like – but please SHARE! With the season upon us, this is gonna be a lot of fun and I’m excited. As they say in hockey: “let’s do that hockey.” Go Pride!

Starting From the Bottom

/ Jake Solomons / Leave a comment

As some may have heard, aside from my last post, the Canadian Women’s Hockey League is coming to an end. There was no money left in the piggy bank so the 150+ players are out of a job. But of course – with death comes rebirth.

The NWHL is trying their best to adopt this large number of players into their league. However, they don’t realize that expanding teams can help facilitate their need for putting these players somewhere.

The grassroots campaign “NWHL to Seattle” actually launched this morning. In hopes to begin extensive talks with the league to outsource a team to Seattle, Washington. The first west coast team in the league.

The startup organization’s site is obviously very new, not even a day old. They are already selling merchandise to promote this expansion to the Great Northwest. From their mission statement and general purpose, this organization has pretty big plans for the soon-to-be team in Seattle.

Stevens Tysland, who is a former US Olympian, is the spokesperson for “NWHL to Seattle,” plans to have the NWHL all star game in their inaugural season. Very ambitious for a team that doesn’t exist. But I like it.


“We believe Seattle can become a hub for training hockey players — both women and men. The professional players will serve as role models for up-and-coming players and the new world-class facilities will provide more access and opportunity to develop future college, professional, and Olympic athletes. Fostering a hockey hub in Seattle will keep talent in the Pacific Northwest and enable players to stay in the area to continue their professional careers, both on and off the ice.”

-Kelly Tysland

As this campaign moves forward, I hope that more cities will realize that ice hockey is a community sport and should be shared by many. Seattle is a great sports town, but it shouldn’t stop there. Getting involved with progressing this expansion is important because the players that lost their job playing in Canada need a place to play. Your help actually matters!

So tell me, what can you do to get involved? Where would you like to see the most elite women hockey players in the world play? Everyone can do their part, don’t let this women’s revolution die.

Are you Hitting Me?!

/ Jake Solomons / 1 Comment

When you turn on a hockey game, what’s the first thing you notice? You might say that the puck is too small to see or that everyone’s skating very fast. But the one thing that goes on without even realizing it, is how often the players hit each other. Men’s ice hockey is very physical as it is mainly a test of strength as well as skill. Many players have a role of the “enforcer” which basically means they are paid to hit people and fight. If you watch a women’s ice hockey game, there’s no such thing as an enforcer. Believe it or not, there’s an actual rule against hitting all together. You may find it odd to think that in a game that requires such strength and agility, that women are discouraged to hit one another for their own safety. So why then, are men and women allowed to play the same sport but men are allowed to make contact?

Putting on pads serves only as a formality as injuries can occur for both men and women. You could tell me that women are too weak to protect themselves over a hip check into the boards, and I can give you at least five examples of guys who got laid out in plain sight, no thanks to their helmets or pads. The physicality makes watching the men’s games exciting and the women’s brand suffers due to a lack of contact. Professional women’s leagues are suffering from low ratings because people want to see violence and contact, not this game of respecting personal space.

Denna Laing, a former NWHL forward for the Boston Pride, suffered a career ending injury in 2016 where she crashed hard into the boards chasing the puck. Many people look at this incident and say “this is why women shouldn’t be able to play contact sports!” First of all, she fell into the boards after being tripped up and quite frankly she couldn’t really protect herself that close to the wall. Laing was paralyzed from the neck down following this incident which is cause for concern in the women’s ice hockey community.

Do women lack some gene that makes them incapable to play at a level where physicality isn’t a problem? I would really like to know because from what I can see, aside from incidents on both sides, there seems to be no difference in the pace of play and the level of talent that’s on the ice. Nathan Horton, Denna Laing, Marc Savard are just a few names of players whose careers have ended due to injuries from being hit. It just confuses me because with the lack of contact in women’s hockey there has been one real injury. With men’s hockey, there have been countless open-ice hits, pucks to the face, and other injuries that outweigh the women’s.

Women want to hit and because of the feminine nature surrounding them, they’re told no. In a “male-dominated sport” such as ice hockey, if you aren’t gonna let women compete at the same level and with the same rules, why waste everyone’s time? Elite female hockey players like Hilary Knight and Meghan Duggan compete in the Olympics and train their bodies to absorb hits and use their strength to out muscle their opponents just the same as men. So it makes you wonder, why are these women being held back?

Opening Face-off

/ Jake Solomons / 1 Comment

Women’s ice hockey is sport that has gained momentum in terms of popularity among young girls and adults alike. The problem however, lies within the fact that the media doesn’t do enough to promote the sport and creates a stereotype that women don’t deserve enough air time because women are not as masculine or athletic as men. Within the landscape of ice hockey as a whole, women are primarily recognized during the Olympics. Within the 4-year gap between events, how are they represented in the media? I plan to explore this dilemma further in understanding why women aren’t given their fair share of publicity.

I think it’s important for my readers to get a sense of how the world of sports is evolving and how women are using their voice to stand up and say: “we deserve a chance.” Throughout my publication(s), I want the audience to see through different perspectives, how the media is portraying women’s ice hockey both positively and negatively. I would like to discuss how different men’s ice hockey is from women’s and how the limitations for the women suggest physical inferiority. By using these negative or oppressive stereotypical examples, I believe they will help readers understand how we can turn these issues into solutions.

Throughout this publication, I’m not trying to argue who is better at playing hockey. I think it’s hard to differentiate and compare talent when some people don’t even know that professional women’s hockey exists. Within the realm of gender inequality in ice hockey, I want to limit the focus of weaknesses that women have because my main goal is to build on the fact that these athletes play an elite level and deserve to be seen as equal.

Exploring different aspects and headlines that display gender inequality in women’s ice hockey. For example, I would like to discuss the comparison of salaries between professional female players and NHL players. A lot of the imbalance in who gets paid more is due to airtime and actual visual presence on TV. NHL games are televised on a daily basis which cultivates sponsors and generates revenue, whereas the NWHL gets little to no recognition resulting in far less capital. I want to talk about how the lack of media recognition, outside of the Olympics, hurts women and their sport because they’re seen as less interesting than men.

Outside of the sport of ice hockey, I’ve become a firm believer in the idea that women deserve the same rights and opportunities that men have. I’ve been inspired to explore this issue within the world of ice hockey because my sister is a female hockey player. She feeds off of people’s criticism that girls are too frail or unathletic to play hockey. When my sister was little, she wanted to learn how to skate and be like the boys. She had to join the boys youth teams because there were no girls teams around. This is inspiring to me because I want to help uncover this “hidden” sport and use my source of inspiration as a role model for other little girls to defy gender norms.

As I continue with this publication, I would ideally want my audience to target young women who feel like there isn’t a chance for them to play a sport that they are interested in. I think this topic can bring to light the issues that derogate this the athletes who play this sport and the women who are ambassadors for this sport whom I will talk about as well, can act as a beacon of hope for aspiring female hockey players. I think my audience could also extend to parents and adults who believe women hockey players deserve the same opportunities as men or “athletic feminists”.

Women’s ice hockey is a growing sport in the world but just how much of it do we know? A lot of the unfamiliarity comes from the idea that media does not cover enough of women’s sports in general and specifically ice hockey, due to it’s masculine and physical nature. I believe it’s crucial for sports fans to understand this injustice that women are being overlooked because they aren’t as talented and can’t generate revenue or ratings outside of the Olympics. By addressing the problem that women are not treated or seen as equal to the men in this sport both physically and journalistically, we can inspire change and spread awareness to the fact that women are just as talented as male hockey players and deserve the same amount of attention and respect.