The Beginning of a Takeover

For any athlete, the dream is to play the sport they love for a living as a professional. As the Professional Women’s Hockey League’s (PWHL) visit to Seattle for the kick-off of the Takeover Tour at Climate Pledge Arena, for many girls and young women, that dream might feel just a little bit more real.

Kraken assistant coach Jessica Campbell played three seasons with the Calgary Inferno in the now-defunct Canadian Women’s Hockey League.

“I dreamt of playing in NHL arenas,” Campbell said. “That was always our goal; that was what we were striving for, even when I was playing seven years ago. Now, for me, sharing Climate Pledge with the players coming in and knowing that that's the stage that they've always been deserving to play on – that’s the biggest thing. It's so special to finally see it and not just see it happening, but to see the crowd show up, and to see it full, and see the energy. The product's always been there. It's just been about visibility and, honestly, support. So now it's all come together, and I'm just grateful that I get to be part of it here in Seattle. It's like all my worlds combined.”

Putting professional women’s hockey players on the biggest stage possible with exposure to as many people as possible is what the Takeover Tour is all about. Announced in November of last year, the league is going to nine neutral site cities across North America. In each market, two of the PWHL’s six teams will face off in regular season contests.

In Seattle, the lineup was set for the Boston Fleet to host the Montreal Victoire on Jan. 5.

But when it comes to the PWHL, women’s hockey and the Seattle Kraken, there’s always going to be a lot more than just a game.

“When you look at an event like this, I think you have two options,” Katelyn Parker, a member of the Kraken’s development staff, said. “You can just stay in the background and allow the event to happen, or you can rise up with it and be part of it. And for us in our community that's still growing, I think it's so important to be able to take these activations and be able to really shine some light on what's happening at Climate Pledge Arena (with the game) and engage different members of the community and the girls that it's going to impact.”

To that end, PWHL players were out and about all over Seattle, and the Kraken got to work planning a girl’s clinic that would involve the pro players as well.

The clinic was a true team effort. With backing from Kraken COO Rob Lampman and Krista Leesment, VP of business operations for Kraken Community Iceplex (KCI), Parker was part of a team of people passionate about women’s hockey that ran the hour-long session. Kraken youth hockey goalie coach Julia Takatsuka was there. Kraken employees (and former players) Fiona McKenna and Amy Peterson were also on the ice along with Mel Harrow, head coach of the University of Washington women’s team, and her sister Laura White. Everything was set up and ready to go so that when 36 10–12-year-old girls got on the rink, all you had to do was add some PWHL players and you get magic.

“That was the cool part,” Parker said. “Every moment that those young girls were on the ice, they had a PWHL player with them or around.”

After each team practiced at KCI, Montreal’s Mikyla Grant-Mentis and Claire Degeorge (who hails from Anchorage, AK) came out for the first thirty minutes, and Boston’s Sidney Morin, Amanda Pelkey, and Emily Brown filled the second half of the hour.

“Obviously, the players want to grow the game and grow their brand,” Parker said. “But then to be able to just come out and engage with the kids right away is what makes it so special for the kids, right?”

Special indeed.

Maren Lester is from Edmonds and has custom skins for her goalie pads that are just like Victoire’s Ann-Renee Desbiens’ pads (Takatsuka helped make that happen). On this day, Lester got to show her gear to her idol.

“My favorite part was when people shot the puck at me,” Lester said afterward.

Spoken like a true goalie.

She was at the game on Sunday. So too was Tim Wiley, whose 12-year-old (turning 13 in February!) daughter Anja also participated in Saturday’s clinic. Anja loved playing with players at the highest level of the game because it was “more chill…. It felt like I was playing with actual people. It was absolutely fun.”

“Six years ago when (Anja) was trying to get (into hockey) and she could not even skate,” Tim said. “Now she just feels more and more drawn into it, and we’re just hoping to grow the women’s program everywhere.”

And that was the point.

“You never know,” Parker said. “It seems like just a 60-minute clinic on a Saturday afternoon, but maybe that's that moment, or that spark for those little girls that are like, wait. I really want to be Claire Degeorge. I really want to be Amanda Pelkey when I grow up. I’m very grateful that we are able to help aid in that potential.”

That’s what the weekend was about: building potential players to come and building potential for the pro game to grow.

Kraken head coach Dan Bylsma had the same role in Buffalo when the Buffalo Beuts debuted in 2015 as part of the National Women’s Hockey League. He watched that team take hold in the community. He’s also attended numerous World Cup and Olympics women’s games, calling the 2014 gold medal game between the United States and Canada one of the top hockey games he’s ever seen live.

“In Buffalo, it was a chance to be exposed to the game and the more you're exposed to it, the more you're going to see that it's a great game,” Bylsma said. “I don't know if it's the fewer number of games that they play or not, but every game has playoff intensity, a playoff matchup type atmosphere to it. And you know that exposure is just going to create more fans for the game, and I hope it continues. I hope (this tour) is an indication that the PWHL might be coming to more cities in the future.”

Bylsma, who was in attendance at the Fleet-Victoire matchup Sunday, had Campbell ask women’s hockey legend Marie-Philip Poulin to read the lineup before Saturday’s Kraken game.

“Captain Clutch” obliged.

And when it came time for the Fleet and the Victoire to show their stuff, the two teams on the ice certainly made a good case for wanting more of PWHL hockey.

The Victoire jumped out to a 2-0 lead thanks to Laura Stacey and Abby Boreen in the first period before Hannah Bilka put the Fleet on the board in period two. Both Desbiens and Aerin Frankel (BOS) made impressive saves before, with 9:02 remaining in the third, Susanna Tapani put the second puck in the net for the Fleet to make it 2-2.

The 12,608 fans in attendance were thrilled to watch five more minutes of 3-on-3 (and sometimes 3-on-4 and 4-on-4 with penalties resolving) before the game went to a shootout. Poulin scored another highlight reel goal, but that would be the only one for Montreal as Hannah Brandt, Bilka, and Tapani would all finish their chances to beat the number one team in the league 3-2 and end a three-game losing streak.

“(Women’s hockey) has never been any different than what you see on the international stage or tonight,” Campbell said. “It's just great to know that now the pieces are all in place, and the drivers and the leaders in the community, in the corporate world, are making this possible and believing in what women's sports is, because it's obviously popular, and it's obviously just as deserving. It's special to have it all be wrapped around in Seattle here, and to get to see our fans now take a piece of that as well.”