With several cities in Alberta including Calgary, Edmonton, Red Deer, Lethbridge, and Medicine Hat all boasting PWHL worthy venues, should the PWHL consider calling a new team "Alberta" and allowing them to truly represent the province, rather than isolating them to a single market?
Plenty of teams have gone by state or province names in professional sport. In the NHL there are the Minnesota Wild, New Jersey Devils, Florida Panthers, Colorado Avalanche, and Utah Mammoth. The PWHL has the two-time champion Minnesota Frost.
In other Canadian professional sports, there's the Saskatchewan Roughriders and BC Lions. The WNBA has the Indiana Fever, Golden State Valkryies, Minnesota Lynx, and Connecticut Sun, while the NWSL has the Utah Royals, and North Carolina Courage.
But what if the PWHL went further. What if instead of simply making it a team named the Alberta, what if it were truly an Alberta wide team? Certainly, the franchise would need a home for players and practices, likely Edmonton, but Alberta is a province filled with spectacular venues and rabid hockey fans.
Those venues include Edmonton's Rogers Place (18,347), Lethbidge's VisitLethbridge.com Arena (5,479), Calgary's Scotiabank Saddledome (19,289) which will be demolished and replaced by the 18,400 seat Scotia Place in 2027, Red Deer's Marchant Crane Centrium (7,111), and Medicine Hat's Co-Op Place (7,100).
The PWHL has shown interest in taking the league on tour through the PWHL Takeover Tour. From two, to nine, to 16 this season, the league has grown their tour schedule every year. It's served an incredible purpose in allowing the league to test potential markets for expansion, as well as to showcase professional women's hockey outside their existing markets, growing the league's fan base.
In Canada, venues across the country have consistently drawn large crowds. Last season that includes 19,038 in Vancouver, 18,259 in Quebec, 17,518 in Edmonton, and this year has already seen a sold out crowd of 10,438 in Halifax.
This season the PWHL will visit Edmonton twice, and also make a stop in Calgary.
If the PWHL knows Alberta is a market they want a team, but also that they can't put two teams in the province at the moment, why not, instead of choosing Edmonton or Calgary to represent the province, put the name "Alberta" on a team and bring out the support of the more than five million people who live in the province.
Playing the bulk of games annually in Edmonton would likely be required due to the overuse of Calgary's NHL arena by not only the Flames, but also the AHL's Calgary Wranglers, WHL's Calgary Hitmen, NLL's Calgary Roughnecks, CEBL's Calgary Surge, and a plethora of non-sport related events from the Stampede to concerts.
But with the league likely needing to expand their schedule beyond 15 home games per season as expansion brings the league to 12 teams as soon as next season, allowing more regional games for a team that will seek regional support seems logical.
If the league climbed to even 18 home games next year, it could be enough for 12 games in Edmonton, two in Calgary, one in each of Red Deer, Lethbridge, and Medicine Hat, and still allow the league to send an Edmonton to host a Takeover game elsewhere.
While Calgary and Edmonton are certain to draw, Red Deer is a location that could be a sweet spot for the league not only because of their 7,111 fan facility, but because it's a nearly identical split halfway between Edmonton and Calgary allowing fans from either market to attend.
Over time, if one of the smaller markets doesn't work out, the league will have at least built demand across the province making the sport accessible to all of Alberta, where a vibrant women's and girls hockey culture exists.
The league itself boasts several prominent players from Alberta including Emerance Maschmeyer, Danielle Serdachny, Stephanie Markowski, Jessica Kondas, Dara Greig, and Sarah Wozniewicz, many of whom would happily come home to play, and Alberta has more talent on the way.
The PWHL has always thought outside the box, and creating a regional team that is not only regional in name like professional teams across North America are today, but one that truly embraces their regional name by visiting other locations in the province or state whose name they share, could be a major victory for the league and women's hockey.