For the first 10 games of the PWHL season, teams shook hands following the heated contests. On game 11, that stopped. It's one of hockey's few traditions showing true camaraderie and respect, and it's one the PWHL is wise to keep.

Tracing the origin of the hockey handshake line is no easy task. Many have tried. Hockey historian Liam Maguire spent years sifting through microfiche and newspaper clippings to confirm a story he heard in the 1980s about the first handshake line.

He was told it occurred on January 2, 1908 at a benefit game, which some have coined as hockey's first major league all-star game. By the 1920s, it's believed the handshake line had become regularly entrenched in hockey tradition, with teams meeting at center ice to congratulate one another, wish their opponent well, and show a level of sportsmanship and humanity that extends beyond the on-ice competition, no matter how fierce a game or series was.

For the first 10 games of the inaugural PWHL season, players from each team lined up following the games and shook hands. It was new in that these were regular season games. In minor hockey and other sports, handshakes are commonplace following all games, but not in the pros. In pro hockey it's a ritual typically reserved for playoff elimination games. In the PWHL, it was a welcomed change showing the solidarity and camaraderie among the athletes who had waited years, and generations for this league to come. It was also a departure from the toxicity of men's hockey.

But in game 11, when the final buzzer went, PWHL New York left the ice. When Montreal turned from their celebration surrounding netminder Ann-Renee Desbiens, there was obvious confusion, shrugging shoulders, and questions about where their opponent had gone. Montreal was ready to shake hands, but the opportunity had passed. Instead, Montreal went back to a dance-filled post game celebration on the ice at Place Bell in Laval, Quebec.

According to New York, as reported by Jared Book, the team was directed by the PWHL not to shake hands. According to Montreal, their staff was not aware of the directive. Since that decision, the PWHL backtracked and will reportedly allow players to continue with post game handshakes.

The handshake has been vanishing from minor hockey in recent years as well as sometimes tempers flair over into post game moments, and also due to concerns over diseases spread whether it was SARS, or more recently COVID-19. Hockey Newfoundland and Labrador decided to end post game handshakes all together in December 2023.

"The custom of a handshake in sport is meant to provide an opportunity for players to wish their opponents good luck and, as such, there is an argument that it should occur before a game starts," the organization said in a press release. "In addition, including the handshake gesture at the beginning of a game reduces the potential risk from any heightened animosity that can occur between opposing players throughout the course of a game."

“Disappointing,” said former NHL player Alan Letang of the decision to ban post game handshakes. “There’s a respect and camaraderie in sports. You can go out and compete hard against someone, but at the end of the game it’s, ‘Great game, great job.’ Respect goes both ways."

Over the first 10 games of the PWHL season, that respect, even in the regular season, was on full display. It was a step forward, person by person, shake by shake for the sport. It's something the PWHL is wise to keep in the game.

In women's hockey, handshakes have been more prevalent. After each Rivalry Series game, Canada and USA shake hands, no matter how heated the contest got. It's an exhibition series, with nothing aside from potential roster spots on the line, unlike elimination games where the handshake it typically found.

In a sport where culture is constantly under the microscope, the handshake was a moment of peaceful connection.

The handshake itself originated, as many believe, as a way of "conveying peaceful intentions."

"By extending their empty right hands, strangers could show that they were not holding weapons and bore no ill will toward one another," historian Evan Andrews wrote. Some even suggest that the up-and-down motion of the handshake was supposed to dislodge any knives or daggers that might be hidden up a sleeve. Yet another explanation is that the handshake was a symbol of good faith when making an oath or promise. When they clasped hands, people showed that their word was a sacred bond."

From "pledges and displays of trust" to "the eternal bond between the living and the dead" or as "a symbol of friendship and loyalty," the handshake has served many meetings in the world, including more recently as a greeting.

Or as Boston Globe columnist Yvonne Abraham wrote, the sports handshake is a "demonstration of sportsmanship and civility" even following the most gruelling competition.

Whether it's at the net following a tennis match, after the final putt is sunk in a game of golf, in a post game scrum on the football field, at home plate in baseball, or between hockey players in a handshake line, the gesture has long been tied to sport.

While many traditions in hockey need to go, the display through the opening two weeks of handshakes after every game showed the PWHL could be different, and move the dial in hockey culture. There's no need for women's hockey to mimic men's hockey for success. If the league chooses to remove post game handshakes permanently, so be it, as long as the intent isn't to conform to what hockey has always been. 

When Montreal faced Ottawa early this season, People.com wrote that the handshake between captains Brianne Jenner and Marie-Philip Poulin was a sign of what the PWHL had come to represent.

"Poulin and Jenner's handshake at the end of the game personified the unity that's become the driving force of the PWHL in its first few weeks as a league," People's Sean Neumann penned. And it's true.

The way hockey players look at themselves and treat others has been flawed, and the PWHL is a fresh opportunity to change that, perhaps one handshake at a time.