Minnesota's scoring dominance isn't luck. Four top-tier talents lead the charge, fueled by balanced effort and confident goaltending, setting a new league standard.
Minnesota has been scoring at a rate that stands out in a league built on parity. Through the opening stretch of the season, the Frost have accounted for 38 of the league’s 244 total goals (tops in the PWHL), roughly 15.6 percent of all scoring.
In an eight-team league, an expected share would sit at 12.5 percent, which already puts Minnesota comfortably above the line before you even get into who’s doing the damage or how those goals are being created.
And this isn’t one player dragging the offense along behind them.
Minnesota currently has four of the league’s top six point producers in Kendall Coyne Schofield, Britta Curl-Salemme, Kelly Pannek, and Taylor Heise. That kind of concentration at the top of the leaderboard is rare in a league designed to spread offense around. It’s one thing to have a star. It’s another to have multiple players producing at elite levels at the same time, night after night, without the offense feeling brittle or overextended.
Head coach Ken Klee has been open about what underpins that balance. “When you’re part of the Frost, we expect a lot from you and we need you to contribute,” he said after a recent win.
That expectation isn’t just rhetoric. Minnesota has shuffled lines, adjusted combinations, and navigated absences without their offense grinding to a halt. The common thread has been pace and attitude rather than reliance on matchups.
What helps keep that production steady is that Minnesota’s top players aren’t chasing offense. Klee has pointed to Taylor Heise’s growth in that area, saying she’s learned “not to get too frustrated if you’re not getting good looks — to know that, ‘hey, I just have to play solid, I’ll get my looks, it’ll come.’”
That patience shows up in how Minnesota scores. Goals arrive from sustained pressure, from secondary touches, and from players staying with the process even when the puck isn’t following them around.
There’s also an element of security behind it. Minnesota’s offense doesn’t operate in fear of the next mistake, and that’s in part because of what’s happening at the other end of the ice. With Nicole Hensley providing steady goaltending, the Frost can afford to stay assertive rather than conservative.
As Heise put it recently, knowing there’s a reliable backstop “gives us the confidence to make plays that some teams might not.” That confidence doesn’t just show up on highlight reels; it shows up in how often Minnesota keeps the puck, pushes play forward, and stays on the attack.
The pattern isn’t new. Last season, in a six-team league, Minnesota scored 18.8 percent of all goals, comfortably above a neutral share of 16.7 percent. Expansion has changed the math this year, but it hasn’t changed the identity. If anything, Minnesota’s influence on the league’s scoring environment has become more noticeable, not less. They’re not simply keeping pace in a deeper league — they’re shaping how high the bar is set.
All of that adds up to an offense that feels stable rather than streaky. Minnesota isn’t riding a short-term heater or living off a handful of power-play bursts. Their goals are coming from structure, patience, and process — the kind that allows multiple players to live near the top of the scoring race without forcing the game. In a league where margins are thin and goals are hard to come by, that kind of offensive weight is noticeable – and hard to play against.