Published22. April 2024, 8:10 p.m.
Ice Hockey: Comment: Well done ladies, you shut me up
We didn’t believe it. However, the Professional Women’s Hockey League has found an audience, viewers and a lot of sympathy. Respect.
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Emmanuel Favre
The attendance record for a women’s hockey match was broken on Saturday in Montreal.
X (PWHL)
In June 2023, when Mark Walter, the owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers (baseball), and Billie Jean King, one of the icons of tennis history, helped create the Professional Women’s Hockey League (LPHF) while ensuring an average annual salary of 55,000 US dollars (50,000 francs) to each of the 157 players, we were driven by a conviction.
This league made up of six teams (New York, Minnesota, Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa and Boston), like all the others before it, will face the reality of a saturated market.
In those not-so-distant days, the question wasn’t whether the explosion would happen. But when she would arrive.
Well, whether they are managers, coaches or players, these women have nailed it. And not almost.
For that, well done. Simply well done.
A record of 21,105 spectators
As the inaugural season draws to a close, the LPHF has not only tamed an audience of curious people. She won over crowds and hearts.
The firework? Saturday, 21,105 delirious people gave a standing ovation to the actresses of a duel between Montreal and Toronto at the Bell Centre, usual home of the Montreal Canadiens in the NHL.
The event was synonymous with a new attendance record for a women’s hockey match. “We’ve been working for years,” explained, moved, Marie-Philip Poulin, one of the best players on the planet. We wanted to live this moment. And here we are.”
Before that, there were 19,285 fans in Toronto for a clash between Toronto and Montreal.
13,736 fans in Detroit to see a poster between Ottawa and Boston with Zurich’s Alina Müller.
In all, seven confrontations attracted more than 10,000 people.
A strong message
One season certainly does not make a story.
But, whatever happens, it is an extraordinary victory for these women who clung to their dream and who should, according to the first plans, have played a large part of their games in local stadiums. with comfort closer to Graben than to the Bell Center.
This is a phenomenal success for a product that was little known until recently. We were even told that the viewing rate for several LPHF games was higher than for NHL matches. Not in the big markets, of course.
And this is a tremendous motivator for young players, even in Switzerland, who today have the right to consider earning a living with a stick and a puck.
2024-04-22 18:11:25
#Comment #ladies #shut
