Celebrating champions: Star goalie reflects on inaugural PWHL season
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Minnesota is busy celebrating its first national title brought home by a professional sports team since 2017.
In the inaugural season, Minnesota’s yet-to-be-named Professional Women’s Hockey League team clinched the Walter Cup, shutting out Boston 3-0 in the final game in a best-of-five series on Wednesday.
Friday night at the Xcel Energy Center, fans gathered to cheer on the victorious athletes and celebrate a new chapter in women’s sports. The last national title for Minnesota was secured by the Lynx.
Fans celebrated with Minnesota players, who wore championship hats and chains and lifted the Walter Cup above their heads. Among the fans was Ngoc Doan, who said she was never into hockey before.
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"PWHL was a really, really great way to actually get me to learn how sports work and what that whole industry is like," Doan said.
Doan and her partner Samantha Howchlei went to two regular season games. “And we went to the Friday night playoff game and we were like, well we gotta come back for us to win the cup on Sunday,” Doan siad.
Minnesota didn't win the cup at that home game last weekend. They played Game 5 on the road in Boston Wednesday and won 3-0 to clinch the title.
‘We did it first’
Two-time Olympian Nicole Hensley and her swift goaltending skills — she had an excellent 0.945 save percentage in the postseason — helped lift Minnesota to victory.
“We had some hardships going into the playoff, but I think we stuck together and we knew that our group could do it,” Hensley told MPR News on Friday’s Morning Edition. “So just to be the first ones to get to hoist the trophy… it’s something pretty, pretty special. Nobody can take away the fact that we did it first.”
Following the league’s international break in April, Minnesota slipped into a slump. Head Ken Coach Ken Klee said last Friday the team “just tried to take it one game at a time.” That strategy and tight teamwork paid off.
A loyal and growing fanbase has supported the league from day one. Minnesota’s first-ever home game set an attendance record of 13,316 in a matchup with Montréal. That record was later shattered by a Montréal-Toronto game with 21,105 fans in the stands. The Minnesota Wild, founded in 1997, averages 18,000 fans a game in St. Paul.
Whether it’s a T-shirt, a sticker, a hand-drawn sign or a social media post, every bit of fan support counts.
“It’s been so cool to see all the little girls with the signs at the games; we read all of them. So don’t make any mistakes — we see you guys up there,” Hensley said. “It’s just been so cool. And again, super excited to celebrate with everyone tonight.”
A new league has its growing pains. Body checking is allowed, making the game more physical. There are just six teams. Playoffs are a five-game series, not seven. It’s year one for gaining sponsorships. Finding an arena that fits fan demand isn’t always easy — for instance, Tsongas Center in Lowell, Mass., sold out for the final but has only 6,500 seats for hockey games.
“It was a learning process for the league, us the players, the referees, coaches, being the first year, but I think everyone did a great job of adjusting and adapting,” Hensley said, desiring more clarity on what’s allowable under the league rules. “But overall, I think it was a really strong start. And it can only go up from here.”