With somewhat greater than two minutes left on the clock in a Rivalry Collection sport between Canada and america, Nova Scotian Blayre Turnbull scored the game-tying aim for the Canadians.
The house crowd inside Halifax’s Scotiabank Centre exploded with a refrain of cheers from 9,265 folks.
Even the American head coach could not assist however assume it was cool to see the gang’s response to Turnbull scoring in entrance of her hometown crowd, even when it pressured his crew right into a shootout.
“That was in all probability the loudest crowd and most right into a sport that we have seen in [the Rivalry Series] or perhaps a world championship,” U.S. head coach John Wroblewski mentioned after the sport, a 2-1 shootout win for the U.S., in early February.
“And that is saying loads as a result of final yr [at the world championship] in Utica, I believed our residence crowd was simply wonderful. However that was electrical.”
There’s a lengthy checklist of cities that want to add a PWHL enlargement franchise, because the league seems to be at whether or not so as to add as many as two groups as early as subsequent season. An announcement on the league’s plans are anticipated to come back inside the subsequent month.
Halifax is not prone to be on the brief checklist this time round. However it’s a market that might verify off plenty of objects on the league’s want checklist, together with area availability, a rising variety of women and girls taking part in hockey, and a fan base hungry for professional sports activities.
“Girls’s hockey is prospering in Nova Scotia,” Toronto Sceptres and Canadian crew head coach Troy Ryan, who’s from Spryfield, N.S., mentioned in regards to the prospect of a Halifax PWHL crew. “I believe the help can be unimaginable.”
Rising ladies’s hockey group
Halifax is residence to skilled lacrosse and soccer, together with ladies’s skilled soccer. The Northern Tremendous League crew, Halifax Tides FC, will start play on April 26.
However the metropolis hasn’t been residence to skilled hockey for the reason that AHL’s Halifax Citadels left in 1993.
Quickly after, the town obtained a QMJHL crew: the Halifax Mooseheads.
The crew performs out of Scotiabank Centre, which seats greater than 10,500 in downtown Halifax. The Mooseheads repeatedly rank among the many high groups within the QMJHL on the subject of attendance. Final season, the crew drew greater than 8,300 followers on common.
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There’s additionally proof that Nova Scotia loves ladies’s hockey. The variety of ladies and women taking part in hockey within the province has elevated by greater than 83 per cent between 2007 and 2024, based on Hockey Canada registration knowledge.
When the ladies’s nationwide crew lastly performed in Halifax this previous February, it was in entrance of a close to sell-out crowd. The Skilled Girls’s Hockey Gamers’ Affiliation additionally organized video games in Truro in 2021 and 2022.
“Some of these communities actually rally round their groups and and not using a skilled crew on this market and with the Mooseheads being as profitable because the Mooseheads are, I might see it being an awesome match, particularly when you think about Canadian cities,” mentioned Gina Kingsbury, who’s GM of each the Canadian nationwide ladies’s crew and the Toronto Sceptres.
A downtown area
The PWHL is utilizing a weighted mannequin to rank the cities concerned with a PWHL enlargement franchise. A number of the elements embrace financial alternative, media, infrastructure and journey prices.
Infrastructure is an important of all of them, govt vice chairman of enterprise operations, Amy Scheer, instructed reporters final week.
Adria Younger, a spokesperson with Occasions East, the corporate that operates Scotiabank Centre, mentioned there can be curiosity in exploring the world being residence to a PWHL crew within the coming years, because the league explores enlargement. She mentioned the corporate would “welcome these conversations with pleasure and enthusiasm when the chance arises.”
“It has been wonderful to see what the PWHL has achieved when it comes to success in such a short while for the reason that league was established,” Younger added.
The crew might additionally draw followers from elsewhere within the Maritimes, which saw a population boom during the pandemic.
Like Nova Scotia, ladies’s and women’ hockey is rising in New Brunswick: registration has elevated by greater than 120 per cent from 2007 to 2024. Moncton, which is a couple of two-and-a-half hour drive from Halifax, has been one of the fastest-growing regions in the country.
When Montreal took on Toronto on the Bell Centre final season, Victoire head coach Kori Cheverie noticed a number of Maritime followers within the crowd.
Requested throughout coaching camp in November to select any metropolis anyplace to host an enlargement crew, the New Glasgow, N.S. native selected Halifax.
“I actually assume it will be supported nicely,” Cheverie mentioned. “I actually hope for Halifax.”
Elsewhere in Canada, PWHL Takeover Tour video games offered out arenas in Vancouver, Edmonton and Quebec Metropolis this yr, in what may very well be checked out as auditions for an enlargement franchise.
Scheer has careworn that one sport will not be a serious deciding issue for a possible enlargement market. However competitors will probably be stiff ought to the league need to add one other Canadian crew.
Main U.S. cities like Detroit, Seattle and Denver have additionally hosted Takeover Tour video games with success. With the league nonetheless in search of a nationwide U.S. broadcast accomplice, the concept of increasing to massive American cities may very well be attractive.
Journey a draw back
Like Quebec Metropolis, Halifax would not have an NHL crew to accomplice with for help. It will even be the smallest market within the PWHL.
Journey may be tough. Gamers would not be shut sufficient to bus to any video games, below the principles within the collective bargaining settlement. Groups fly industrial within the PWHL and would not be capable to fly direct between Halifax and Minnesota.
Turnbull sees journey as a draw back of a Halifax crew. However for a participant who by no means thought she’d get the chance to play an enormous sport in entrance of a house crowd, the concept is tantalizing.
“I believe it will be tough for lots of groups to get right here,” the Sceptres ahead mentioned. “However other than that, I believe the ambiance, the fan help, the quantity of younger women taking part in hockey within the province now could be simply rising and rising. So I believe it will be an awesome residence to a future PWHL crew.”
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