The wait is finally over after the Professional Women’s Hockey League unveiled the names for its six teams Monday.
In Canada, there will be Montreal Victoire, Ottawa Charge and Toronto Sceptres. Across the border, it’s the Boston Fleet, Minnesota Frost and New York Sirens.
Kanan Bhatt Shah, PWHL vice president of brand and marketing who led the naming process, said the league heard “loud and clear from the get go that fans wanted traditional kind of nicknames and logos.”
“We wanted to move mountains and do whatever it took to give them that and names and logos that felt like they were evocative of their communities,” Bhatt Shah said in a statement.
The PWHL, a first-of-its-kind women’s league with deep-pocketed investors, shattered women’s hockey attendance records in a short-notice first year after the league was founded in June 2023 and formed into the PWHL in August 2023.
All teams played without nicknames or logos during the PWHL’s inaugural season from last January to late May, with city names stitched across each club’s jerseys. Full team jerseys will be released in late October or early November, according to the league.
The PWHL says all teams will keep their primary colours from their inaugural season to “maintain a sense of continuity and additional colors have been added to each team’s palette.”
The Montreal Victoire’s crest features “Victoire” in capital letters above a winged figure the league says alludes to the Goddess of Victory. The logo also has a hidden “M” and the fleur-de-lis at the centre.
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Montreal team captain Marie-Philip Poulin said it’s an identity that the team and its fans can rally around.
“It’s going to be a mindset,” Poulin said during the PWHL’s press conference Monday.
PWHL senior vice president of business operations Amy Scheer said it was an “intentional decision” to pick a name in French and not use an anglicized version of “Victoire.” The league wanted to be represent Montreal and Quebec, she explained.
“There is not meant to be a translation,” Scheer told reporters.
The Toronto Sceptres’ name is meant to showcase the city’s “regal history and commanding presence,” according to the PWHL. It’s also a nod to the Queen City nickname and Queen Street. The jersey’s sceptre motif is meant to “evoke power.”
“I think the league did a great job picking our name,” Toronto captain Blayre Turnbull said, describing it as a tie-in to the city.
The Ottawa Charge name is in honour of the city’s motto “Advance – Ottawa – En Avant.” The emblem is a red “O” with spikes trailing along its side to suggest momentum. A slight gap in the “O” also allows it to be interpreted as a “C.”
In the process of choosing club monikers, Scheer said hundreds of different ideas were considered. The challenge was finding names that aligned with intellectual property laws in both Canada and the United States.
The PWHL didn’t hold public voting polls with fans to select the winning names, but Bhatt Shah says the league had “extremely valuable” in-depth conversations with fans in each market.
“All six team names, we love,” Scheer said.
The announcement comes ahead of the league’s second season. A schedule has not yet been released, though play will begin earlier than last season’s Jan. 1 start date.
The regular season will increase from 24 games to 30 and it will bring “a lot of excitement,” said Scheer. The whole league, from staff to players, “can’t wait” for the puck drop.”
“We’re ready to roll,” she said.
— with files from The Canadian Press
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