What goes into making the PWHL schedule?
Since the Professional Women’s Hockey League launched in 2023, fans worldwide have wanted to know how the league works behind the scenes. Those who followed the women’s game before understood that many of the former pro and semi-pro leagues would be put on the back burner in terms of importance, but wondered if things would be different with a fully functioning pro league funded by the Mark Walter Group and backed by Billie Jean King Enterprises.
Over the first few years of the league’s existence, one thing has become very prominent across women’s hockey: fans hate waiting…especially when it comes to releasing the season schedule. Sure, the inaugural schedule was released one month before the first puck was dropped. While the annual release comes out a couple of months in advance, many followers prefer an even earlier reveal.
But what if the league can’t?
As anyone who has ever followed any other major professional league – NBA, NHL, MLB, etc. – knows, putting together a calendar that works for every venue is a challenge. With the PWHL being such a young league and not owning any of the 12 buildings its franchises call home, creating a regular-season layout is even more strenuous.
The PWHL released the 2026-27 schedule on Friday, 64 days before the first game of the new campaign. To some, that might seem like short notice. However, the world’s top women’s hockey league is right on track with some other premier sports leagues. The NHL released its 2026-27 regular-season slate on July 16, 75 days before the first game this past Tuesday. The NBA put out its schedule on Aug. 13, only 68 days before tip-off later this month. In fact, the PWHL’s schedule came out with more days’ notice than the English Premier League, League One Volleyball, the National Women’s Soccer League, and the Women’s Super League.
So, with that in mind, are you curious as to what hoops the PWHL has to jump through to have each team play 30 games in a regular season?
Daily Faceoff has received exclusive insight into the PWHL’s inner workings and how it builds its annual schedule. If you think the league procrastinates when creating a new schedule, think again…
The first thing the organization has to figure out is arena availability. While the Vancouver Goldeneyes are the primary tenant of the revamped Pacific Coliseum, the rest of the PWHL has to deal with other pro teams, concerts and various events before locking down home dates. On top of that, the league seeks out potential dates at other venues for Takeover Tour games and special one-off contests – such as the Battle on Bay Street at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto, or the Duel at the Top in Montreal’s Bell Centre.
Cap Summary
Draft Picks
Each team receives a list of dates that they can play on throughout the season, which comes after NHL and NBA teams pick their dates, along with arenas accommodating other previous commitments for concerts, shows, and other major events, such as the NCAA Basketball Tournament. For example, the expansion team in Detroit has to wait for the Detroit Red Wings and Detroit Pistons to solidify their dates, on top of the laundry list of events held at Little Caesars Arena, before the new team in the PWHL can claim when they want to play on home ice for its inaugural season.
By July, the PWHL has its dates on hold. After that, the league works through a process to ensure proper travel logistics. The league’s hockey and business divisions, along with general player feedback from previous years, determine that. For example, following the 2024-25 season, many across the league asked for less cross-border travel during a single road trip, as it can be tough to get an entire roster and team staff, along with the massive amount of gear, through customs. There was also a strong desire for more direct flights to destinations, with the PWHL working to adjust travel schedules to reduce layovers, especially with cross-continent travel heading into Year 3.
So, when you think to yourself, “Why doesn’t (insert PWHL team here) play tonight, since no one’s at the arena?”, just know that there might be some behind-the-scenes workings that wouldn’t allow a game to be held in the first place.
With four teams now in the Pacific Time Zone, ensuring teams have enough time to travel from one end of North America to the other is vital to players’ health and safety. Former Goldeneyes head coach Brian Idalski admitted that the travel his team endured during its first season was harder than they expected.
The collective bargaining agreement requires the PWHL to follow certain guidelines when creating a schedule. For example, players must receive one day off per week. That means no games, practices, training sessions, meetings, appearances or travel. Also, no team can play more than four games in a seven-day span. In the league’s first three years, it has been rare to see a team play more than three contests in a week. Like the NHL, each team in the PWHL has a “bye week” with a minimum seven-day break, typically in the middle of the season.
One thing fans have griped about is the timing of certain games, especially for TV audiences. Many prefer primetime or evening games rather than afternoon contests. However, PWHL business leaders recognize that some game times boost ticket sales, as they can draw larger audiences when coordinated with other local events. That’s also the case when teams want to avoid “competing” with another event in the area (i.e., the New York Sirens playing a home game on a Sunday when the New York Giants or Jets are also home).
This year’s schedule was even harder to put together. With four more teams entering the league, there is going to be a record number of games during the regular season, 180 in total, with Eastern and Western Conference alignmen.. Yet the PWHL has done its due diligence to ensure each franchise has the best accommodations for the new campaign.
The 2026-27 PWHL season begins on Dec. 5.
