PWHL Ottawa was the lone team to lose significant talent this offseason with the departure of Daryl Watts. How will it impact their future?
PWHL Ottawa was the lone team to lose significant talent this offseason with the departure of Daryl Watts. How will it impact their future?
Daryl Watts is now a member of PWHL Toronto, and her departure stings with a taste of bitterness for PWHL Ottawa fans. Watts was the best player to hit free agency.
Watts was a breakout player for Ottawa, starting on the 3rd line to start the season and then moving up to form what for a time was the best line in the PWHL alongside Katerina Mrazova and Brianne Jenner. Watts finished 3rd on the team in points with 17 only behind her linemates Jenner and Mrazova. Watts’ absence will be sorely missed for PWHL Ottawa as for many fans it feels like a stab in the back for an Ottawa player to leave and go to the arch rivals in Toronto.
Her departure was in many ways inevitable, money was a “huge factor” for Watts and Watts specified she’d test the market to talk to other teams in Free Agency. There was a real sense of optimism that Watts would return because of comments earlier in June to The Hockey News from by PWHL Ottawa General Manager Mike Hirshfeld.
“We feel like we're in a good spot,” said Hirshfeld. “And again, I want to talk with specific needs, but I think we'll get the ones that we want to get done. We'll get them done.”
However, according to a report from The Hockey News’ Ian Kennedy, Watts turned down more money to play in Toronto which makes the whole decision more bizarre, until you find out the elephant in the room.
The potential determining factor for Watts was that Gina Kingsbury, Troy Ryan and the rest of PWHL Toronto’s staff have deep roots with Hockey Canada.
Watts had never been selected to play for Canada. Two days before she signed for Toronto, Watts received her invite to Hockey Canada’s summer camp. The wound of Watts' departure is enormous for Mike Hirshfeld and PWHL Ottawa.
There is a case to be made that Hirshfeld needed to be more proactive in anticipation of losing Watts, and there will be some hard discussions in Ottawa as to what went wrong. There are now questions to be asked about Hirshfeld’s process, from trading impact players in Lexie Adzija and Amanda Boulier at the deadline when Ottawa was in a playoff position, for players in Shiann Darkengelo and Tereza Vanisova who combined for 2 points in Ottawa down the stretch as Ottawa failed to make the playoffs.
Hirshfeld is beginning to take a lot of fan scrutiny for his decisions, and losing Watts only adds fuel to the fire. The sprinkle of good news for Hirshfeld and Ottawa fans is that they did re-sign free agent Katerina Mrazova to a two-year contract according to The Hockey News’ Ian Kennedy which ends a potential completely disastrous off-season for Ottawa.
Ottawa on paper now might have one of the least talented squads in the PWHL without Watts as every other team has increased their talent pool dramatically with the Draft without a major loss, unlike Ottawa with Watts’ departure. There is nobody that Ottawa can find in free agency that will fill the Watts hole in the lineup. There are some options that could help with Rebecca Leslie and Claire Dalton still available in free agency, but none are of the talent or skill of Watts.
In the end, the first PWHL Free Agency hit Ottawa the hardest. However, the game of hockey can be fickle and is certainly not won on paper. Last season, PWHL Toronto was the most talented team and didn’t make it out of the first round. Nevertheless, talent is talent and Ottawa’s road to the playoffs next year becomes significantly harder.