The Toronto Sceptres scored a league low 51 goals in 2025-26, and after losing most of their top forwards this offseason in expansion, the team is facing an even more challenging offensive campaign ahead. Could they score even less?
Last season, the Toronto Sceptres scored a league low 51 goals in 30 games. It was a far cry from the Minnesota Frost who led the league with 91 goals.
Through expansion and free agency however, things may have gone from bad to worse with the Sceptres, who saw 30 of those 51 goals depart this offseason.
Toronto is returning on 21 goals from last season, a number that includes the acquisition of Jamie Lee Rattray from Boston, who had the most goals of any PWHL veteran who will suit up for the Sceptres this season. That number, however, was a meagre four goals.
Even their shots on goal returning dropped from 847 to 467. The quality of whee those shots came from looks even worse.
It's a drop in offensive potential that will be hard to recapture.
Where Were The Losses?
Leading scorer Daryl Watts signed with Detroit. She was the only player on Toronto's roster to hit double digit goals last year. Captain Blayre Turnbull will miss, at least, a good chunk of next season as she's due to give birth in December. She finished second on the Sceptres in scoring last season. Third leading scorer Jesse Compher signed in Detroit, while the team's fourth leading scorer Emma Maltais signed in Montreal.
Scorers five to five from the Sceptres' 2025-26 roster are back in Renata Fast, Claire Dalton, Natalie Spooner, Ella Shelton, and Kali Flanagan, but three of those five are defenders, and Fast and Dalton, the only two to reach 10 points, both finished outside the top 50 in PWHL scoring.
Following that group, Savannah Harmon who finished 10th on the Sceptres in scoring retired, Maggie Connors (11th) signed in San Jose, and Anna Kjellbin (12th) joined PWHL Hamilton.
Offensively, the Sceptres were decimated this offseason.
Who Will Do The Scoring?
Jamie Lee Rattray finished 11th on the Boston Fleet last season in time-on-ice spending most of the season on their third and fourth lines. This year, she'll likely be tasked with centering Toronto's top line. It's highly likely a boost in production will come where Rattray can grow the 12 points she scored last season, which were already a career high, and represent the most points at the PWHL level of any returning player.
She was the only player Toronto managed to lure from another PWHL team. The Sceptres were gifted Kirsten Simms at 8th overall in the 2026 PWHL Draft, a drop in her status almost no one saw coming. Simms will now be tasked with not just being part of Toronto's offense, but driving it. She's creative, and can run a power play, but as a rookie, without PWHL calibre veterans filling Toronto's top six, it's a tall order.
Toronto's best hope for success this year is a second-season jump from Kiara Zanon, Emma Gentry, Sara Hjalmarsson, or Clara Van Wieren. A few of those players will need to hit double digits in scoring for the Sceptres to have any hope of a playoff spot this season. All are capable of far more, especially if Pascal Rhéaume constructs a more offensive system than the tight checking model Troy Ryan tried to employ.
Toronto will hope for another offensive step forward from Claire Dalton, and also that Natalie Spooner can find even a modicum of the success she had in the league's inaugural season before she suffered an ACL tear which required reconstructive surgery.
Defence Wins, And Toronto Will Need Them To
The old adage goes that defence wins championships. Toronto isn't going to win a Walter Cup next season unless something remarkable happens, but they do have one of the best top four groups in the PWHL, and are backed by Raygan Kirk in net who emerged as an elite pro goaltender last season.
In their top four, Toronto welcomes back Renata Fast, Ella Shelton, Kali Flanagan, and Allie Munroe. It was an off season last year for Shelton and Fast following Shelton's acquisition from New York. Neither looked themselves, although Fast got stronger as the season progressed. Toronto will need this foursome, including the newly engaged pairing of Flanagan and Munroe, to help drive offense from the back end, and to join the rush whenever possible.
Toronto's third pair will likely be made up of two of Brooke Disher, Alyssa Regalado, and Hanna Baskin. All are highly capable third pairing defenders, and Regalado, who could be a late round PWHL Draft steal, has some intriguing puck moving skills. Disher, the best of their defensive prospects, will make Toronto more difficult to play against, but isn't likely to light up the scoresheet enough to move the needle.
Overall, the PWHL's lowest scoring team lost almost all of their remaining offseason. With a new coach, and the bulk of their returning talent patrolling the blueline, the Toronto Sceptres will have a tall task not only to make the playoffs, but to avoid an early date with the PWHL's Gold Plan.
