The Goldeneyes have lost their second defender of the PWHL expansion process as Nina Jobst-Smith has signed a one-year SPA with PWHL Detroit.
The Vancouver Goldeneyes were lucky to escape Phase 2 of the PWHL expansion process without losing any players, but since then, it’s clear change has begun to come. Following the departure of defender Sydney Bard, the Goldeneyes have now also lost Nina Jobst-Smith to PWHL Detroit, with the rookie defender signing a one-year Standard Player Agreement.
Jobst-Smith is the second Goldeneyes player to depart during expansion and their first contract player lost in the process.
Heading into the 2025–26 season with a lower-body injury, Jobst-Smith didn’t end up making her PWHL debut until January 9 against the Ottawa Charge. She scored her first PWHL point two games later in Vancouver’s 2–1 overtime loss to the Toronto Sceptres, assisting on a goal scored by Sarah Nurse. The North Vancouver local finished the season with three points in 20 games.
Where the rookie defender really started to shine was at the 2026 Winter Olympics. As Germany’s top defender, she scored the tournament’s opening goal — her first at the Olympics — and finished with a total of two goals and one assist in five games played. Throughout the tournament, she averaged 26:32 minutes played per game, ranking second of all players throughout the tournament.
Jobst-Smith is the third defender signed by PWHL Detroit, the other two being her former Vancouver teammate Bard and former Seattle Torrent defender Cayla Barnes. Notably, Bard and Jobst-Smith played the bulk of the season as a pairing.
Detroit now has only one spot remaining before they reach the 10-player threshold needed to end Phase 4.
While Jobst-Smith was relegated to mainly third-pairing minutes as a member of the Goldeneyes, in Detroit, she should be expected to slide inte her team’s top-four, if not the top-pairing depending on how they approach the 2026 PWHL Draft. The defender has proved she can tackle lofty minutes and has shown displays of offence, particularly during her time with the University of Minnesota-Duluth, where she racked up a grand total of 13 goals and 54 assists in 172 games.