The PWHL’s “Takeover Tour” of neutral-site games officially kicked off with big crowds, major stars, highlight-reel goals and broken records.

Boston beat Montreal 3-2 in the first stop on the tour in Seattle last week. Hannah Bilka put on a show with two unbelievable goals — one in regulation, the other in a shootout. The crowd of 12,608 — including local women’s sports legends Sue Bird and Megan Rapinoe — at Climate Pledge Arena was the largest of the 2024-25 season.

Three days later, 19,038 fans attended the Montreal-Toronto matchup in Vancouver, where Marie-Philip Poulin scored her first game-winning goal in the city since her golden goal at the 2010 Olympics. The announced attendance was more than the Vancouver Canucks’ season high (18,940) in the same arena, and the third-highest in the history of the PWHL.

“Last time I was here (in 2010) it was a sea of red and white,” Poulin said after the game. “And now it’s seas of different jerseys across the PWHL. To see these crowds, it was once every four years during the Olympic year. Now it’s every week. Every day of the week, there’s potential to have a sold-out crowd, to have a full house behind us and it’s been unbelievable.”

Then, on Sunday night in Denver, the PWHL set a new record for attendance at a women’s professional hockey game in the United States with 14,018 fans at Ball Arena. Minnesota beat Montreal — which plays in four of the nine neutral-site games — 4-2 to regain the No. 1 spot in the league standings, ahead of the Victoire.

Through three games, the Takeover Tour has drawn 45,664 fans — with a projected capacity crowd at the 18,000-seat Videotron Centre in Quebec City set for Sunday afternoon. Rounding out the list of neutral sites are Detroit, Buffalo, St. Louis, Raleigh and Edmonton.

Naturally, given the league’s admission that it’s looking to add up to two teams as early as the 2025-26 season, there have been questions about expansion with each stop on the tour. In this case: How realistic is it that the PWHL could expand to the West Coast?

If we consider the neutral-site games to be tests for expansion, then Seattle, Vancouver and Denver have all passed — at least where fan support is concerned.

“There’s a lot to consider, but certainly, this first experience here on the West Coast has been incredible, and it gives us a lot to think about,” Jayna Hefford, the PWHL’s senior vice president of hockey operations, said in Vancouver. “There’s great potential here.”

But fan support has never really been the concern with Western expansion, certainly when we consider the Feb. 16 game in Edmonton is also sold out. It’s more about the travel and cost in a league that is largely (save for Minnesota) based in Northeastern U.S. cities and eastern Canada.

Minnesota would be the closest team to, say, Vancouver and is still over 1,600 miles away — or a 3.5-hour flight. Unlike the NHL, which charters flights, teams in the PWHL fly commercial.

The travel would be more manageable with two Western franchises and would allow for longer road trips instead of one-off games hundreds of miles away. But it would still come at a significant cost at a really early — and still growing — stage of the business.

“The bigger challenges are making sure that the travel is right,” said PWHL senior vice president of hockey operations Amy Scheer. “Making sure from a travel perspective, it’s right for the players and the players’ health.”

Still, league officials haven’t shut down the idea of expanding outside its current geographical footprint. And there’s no denying Seattle, Vancouver and Denver have showcased themselves well.

Scheer confirmed last week that the league will gather proposals from potential expansion partners over the next few weeks and that there are more than 20 interested parties and markets.

Here’s what else we learned around the PWHL this week.

That overtime winner

Before the excitement over the attendance record in Denver, there was an overtime controversy in New York.

Sirens forward Jessie Eldridge scored the lone goal of Sunday’s game against Toronto in overtime but was very clearly offside as she chased down a long pass out of the zone from Sarah Fillier. The officials didn’t catch that Eldridge was at least a foot offside, and there was no review on the play. That’s because there is no video review for offside in the PWHL, per the league’s rule book.

Naturally, the response from a lot of fans — and critics — online was, “Why doesn’t the PWHL review this?”

Let’s just take a step back and remember the NHL has video reviews for offside, but it’s an awful mess of a system that writers at The Athletic have been trying to abolish for years.

The Eldridge goal is an egregiously bad non-call that ended a game with meaningful points on the board. But I also don’t think the PWHL should have any kind of knee-jerk reaction to it because offside reviews can become incredibly disruptive. In the NHL, some plays are challenged when the missed offside call had no material effect on the goal that was scored; think Player A was offside by an inch minutes before a goal was scored.

We all want goals to be scored legally, but there are plenty of ways for that goal to not count before adding more lengthy reviews to the league. And it starts with the referees being better.

If it continues to happen, maybe I’ll adjust my stance. But I’d rather not!

Heise’s quietly productive start 

There have been a ton of storylines out of Minnesota this season — rookie Dominique Petrie’s hot start, Claire Thompson’s dominance and injuries plaguing an incredibly talented roster. All that has meant Taylor Heise, the 2023 No. 1 pick and last year’s playoff MVP, has kind of flown under the radar.

Heise had the overtime winner against Boston on Wednesday night and her nine points is fifth in the PWHL. She is already halfway to her goal total from her rookie season (4) and only needs four points to surpass the 14 she scored in 19 games in 2024.

It’s been a strong start to Heise’s sophomore season, especially when we consider she played multiple games in December with a full knee brace under her gear and was one of the many players hit with a flu bug after the holiday break.

To be a point-per-game player while not being 100 percent for most of the start of the season is incredibly impressive. And it’s scary — for opponents — to think Heise will only continue to get better as the season goes on and she stays healthy.

Emptying the notebook on Poulin 

The PWHL game in Vancouver was a perfect excuse to write about Poulin’s return to the city where she played her first Olympic hockey and really made herself a household name in Canada. The story, of course, couldn’t include everything about her illustrious career and focused largely on her path to the 2010 golden goal and her clutchness.

There was so much I gathered that didn’t make it into the story and what really stood out is that in the seven interviews I did, everyone made it a point to say how much they adore Poulin. She will go down as the greatest player to ever play the game, in my opinion, but it’s clear Poulin is also a beloved teammate.

“The success that she’s had, the joy that she’s brought to other people, the type of team player that she is, I think you’re just so happy for her,” said former Team Canada forward Jennifer Botterill. “She’s just so deserving of all the success and recognition of who she is as a person and as a player.”

Botterill played on the fourth line with Poulin at the 2010 Olympics and admitted that tournament was an up-and-down time for her. Poulin, however, was a joy to be around.

“She’s just so authentic and so sincere,” Botterill said. “She’s brought the biggest moments that the country shares in and celebrates with her. And she’s still just humble and grateful for where she is and the people she’s surrounded by.

“She’s the most amazing teammate you could ever imagine.”

Ottawa’s road swing 

On Saturday, the Ottawa Charge played their first game at home at TD Place Arena since Dec. 3. The team played in Ottawa at the Canadian Tire Centre on Dec. 6, but otherwise had 39 days between true home games, largely due to the World Juniors being hosted in Canada’s capital.

They’ll play at home again on Tuesday before going back on the road. This means the Charge will play 11 of their first 15 games of the season on the road — if we consider the game at CTC a “road game.” Quirks of the schedule are not unique to Ottawa in the PWHL; the Boston Fleet just finished a six-game road swing and now have 11 days between games. Meanwhile, Minnesota has played six times at home through its first 10 games.

Home ice advantage — and simply not needing to travel — means a lot in the PWHL with bus trips and commercial flights.

But if we look at Ottawa specifically, the goal through this stretch has to be to just stay in the mix and go downhill for the remainder of the season, where it plays nine of its last 15 games at TD Place.

With a 4-0-2-3 record (14 points) while sitting third in the standings, the Charge have done just that — thanks, mostly, to Emerance Maschmeyer’s MVP-caliber play, including a league-leading .935 save percentage to start the season.

Boston, meanwhile, will play 13 of its first 20 on the road before playing eight of its last 10 at home at the Tsongas Center.

Canada is golden

It’s not the PWHL, but several prospects — and future league stars — competed in the U18 Women’s World Championship over the last two weeks.

Team Canada shut out Team USA 3-0 to win the gold medal on Sunday afternoon — Canada’s eighth gold at U18 worlds.

Marilou Grenier — committed to play at Minnesota-Duluth next season —  stopped all 14 shots she faced as Canada locked down defensively against the Americans, who won last year’s tournament. Caileigh Tiller — committed to University of Connecticut — scored the first goal of the game for Canada, which would stand as the winner. Northeastern commit Stryker Zablocki led the tournament in goals (8) and points (12) in six games for Canada.

Slovakian phenom Nela Lopušanová, who first made headlines when she scored the first Michigan goal at the 2023 U18 worlds, was named tournament MVP for the second time. She finished second in tournament scoring with five goals and 11 points in five games.

Canadian captain Chloe Primerano — who made her senior team debut back in November — was named Best Defender for the second year in a row. She finished with 26 points across two appearances at U18 worlds, tying Poulin for the most points by a Canadian at the tournament.

PWHL standings

PWHL games this week

Tuesday, Jan. 14 at 7 p.m.: Toronto vs. Ottawa at TD Place Arena

Wednesday, Jan. 15 at 7 p.m.: Minnesota vs. New York at Prudential Center

Friday, Jan. 17 at 7 p.m.: Minnesota vs. Montreal at Place Bell

Sunday, Jan. 19 at 1 p.m.: Ottawa vs. Montreal at the Videotron Centre (Quebec City Takeover Tour)

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This article originally appeared in The Athletic.

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