The PWHL Doesn’t Rival Like Men’s Sports. Yet?

For a few seconds, The Canadian Tire Centre went completely still.

Ottawa had scored what looked like a season-saving goal late in Game 3 against the Montréal Victoire, sending nearly 17,000 fans into chaos before the play was sent to review. White towels stopped spinning. Fans froze mid-celebration. Some stared at the jumbotron while others refused to look at all. 

And somewhere in the middle of it all – the boos, the panic, the standing ovations – something about this rivalry felt different.

There’s something uniquely Canadian about a playoff series between the Ottawa Charge and Montréal Victoire. In most sports rivalries, fans are taught to hate the other side. Leafs fans definitely aren’t cheering for the Canadiens. Yankees fans are not supposed to admire the Red Sox (and no one admires the Yankees). Rivalries in men’s sports are often built on decades of resentment, insults, and wanting the other side to fail as painfully as possible.

But Monday night felt like the first time that admiration took a backseat to desperation.

The Ottawa Charge celebrate after hometown forward Rebecca Leslie scored the game-winner (Josh Kim/PWHL).

As an Ottawa resident and fan, it is hard not to appreciate what players like Marie-Philip Poulin and Laura Stacey mean to women’s hockey in Canada, even while they are trying to end your season. These are players Canadians have spent years cheering for on the international stage. Before the PWHL existed, women’s hockey fans built relationships with players through Olympic runs, World Championships, and national team moments. For years, fans were not divided by cities or franchises. They were united by their country.

PWHL fans are deeply attached to their teams, but many still feel protective of the league’s growth as a whole. Women’s sports fans have spent years advocating for visibility, attendance, investment, and legitimacy. That creates a culture where fans often feel connected to the growth of the sport itself, not just the success of their own team.

Don’t get me wrong, not many people inside Canadian Tire Centre were hoping for a Montréal win on Monday night. But there is still a layer of admiration underneath the rivalry that feels rare in professional sports. Canadian fans grew up celebrating Poulin’s golden goals, not booing her on home ice. American fans have experienced similar tensions for years with stars like Hilary Knight and Kendall Coyne Schofield, balancing national pride with growing professional rivalries. The same dynamic exists across the league, where international hockey created emotional connections with players long before professional franchises did.

That contradiction was obvious during starting lineup announcements, when Poulin still received one of the loudest reactions in the building before spending the rest of the night being booed every time she touched the puck. Imagine Toronto fans giving Connor McDavid a standing ovation during a playoff series because of what he means to Canadian hockey overall. That tension rarely exists in men’s sports once city loyalties take over.

Marie-Philip Poulin hoisting the Canadian Flag over her shoulders after leading Team Canada to victory in the 2022 Olympics. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Ryan Remiorz.

For all the respect that still exists between fanbases and players, Ottawa’s win finally sounded like a true playoff rivalry.

The boos were louder. Every missed call felt personal. Every save changed the mood of the building. Fans stood through stoppages and defensive-zone faceoffs. And for a few seconds during that final review, admiration disappeared entirely. Nobody cared what Poulin meant to Canadian hockey history. Nobody cared about the growth of the women’s game. Nearly 17,000 people just wanted the goal to count.

When it finally did, the reaction felt less like polite applause and more like emotional survival.

“We’re fortunate that every goal we score in Ottawa feels like a big goal because our fans are so awesome, but of course that one was on the top of my list for sure,” said Rebecca Leslie, who scored the game-winner. 

Monday night felt like the moment the PWHL discovered it can have both.

That tension had been building throughout the series. Even before Monday night, the first two games going to overtime made the matchup feel far closer than the series score suggested. Montréal may still lead the series, but nothing about it has felt easy.

And maybe that is the most interesting thing about where the PWHL is right now. The league is beginning to add the emotional chaos and intensity that define great playoff rivalries, without completely losing the respect and community that helped women’s hockey grow in the first place.

Leagues like the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) are already showing what happens when women’s sports fandom becomes bigger, louder, and more polarized. Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese transformed admiration into something far messier – the kind of player-driven intensity men’s leagues have thrived on for decades.

The PWHL may be heading in that direction too. But right now, women’s hockey fandom still holds onto something slightly different. Rivalries exist, but they are layered with admiration. The hatred feels temporary. The respect does not.

Maybe that’s the future of the PWHL: not replacing the respect and community that helped build women’s hockey but layering real rivalry on top of it. Monday night proved those two things can coexist.

Edited by Mithzi Silva