The PWHL announces dates for its "Takeover Tour" to return to Little Caesars Arena and Detroit. Here's what you need to know
The PWHL announces dates for its "Takeover Tour" to return to Little Caesars Arena and Detroit. Here's what you need to know
This morning, the Professional Women's Hockey League announced plans for its second "Takeover Tour," which will bring games to eight cities across North America beyond its "Original Six" markets of Montreal, Minnesota, New York, Boston, Ottawa, and Toronto. Included in that tour is a return to Detroit and Little Caesars Arena for a Mar. 16 game between the New York Sirens and Minnesota Frost.
Last March, the PWHL paid a visit to Detroit, with Boston and Ottawa playing before a record crowd for a professional women's hockey game in the United States. The visit offered proof of the city's eagerness for its own team.
"Detroit is a market we looked really closely at as we were doing our market research," commissioner Jayna Hefford said at an intermission of that game, explaining why her league chose to visit. "It's Hockeytown. The grassroots hockey in this market we know is huge. The proximity to Canada, so you get the cross-border fans, and obviously the legacy of the Red Wings. It just seems like an obvious hockey market that we'd love to be a part of. Although not in our original six, it's somewhere that we still have our eyes on, and tonight has just been another proof point that this is a market that loves hockey and loves women's hockey."
Now, Hefford and company have officially locked in a return date, with the Sirens and Frost set to provide the entertainment. That match-up means once again Red Wings center J.T. Compher's sister Jesse (a Toronto Sceptre) won't be coming to town, but Sirens' forward Abby Roque—a Sault Ste. Marie native—will be making a homecoming to her home state.
With the PWHL reportedly eyeing expansion, the game will offer Hockeytown another chance to prove its fitness when the league does eventually decide to add new markets.
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