The PWHL’s growth comes at a price for a Minnesota Frost team building a potential dynasty

The Minnesota Frost carefully crafted a roster that won not one, but two Walter Cups in their first two seasons of existence.

And just like that, they saw it deconstructed by the PWHL’s first round of expansion that will bring Vancouver and Seattle into an eight-team league this coming season.

Each of the original six teams protected three players. But they all will surrender four of their players for the common good. They will do so in a growing league that will continue to expand beyond 2026 — and quite possibly grow internationally after surfing the popularity of this winter’s Milan-Cortina Olympics.

The Frost protected accomplished U.S. national team players Kendall Coyne Schofield, Lee Stecklein and Taylor Heise, but they were the first team to feel the sting when the PWHL’s five-day “exclusive signing period” opened Wednesday.

Vancouver right away took two Frost defenders, Claire Thompson and Sophie Jaques. Thompson signed a one-year contract, Jaques a three-year deal. Their departures enabled the Frost to protect a fourth player, which they used to claim back rookie Britta Curl-Salemme.

By the end of Monday night’s expansion draft, the two new expansion teams will have four players from each of the original six teams.

The margins were already thin. All four PWHL Finals games featuring the Frost and Ottawa went to overtime, each won by a same score of 2-1.

“It’s going to impact everyone,” Frost coach Ken Klee said of expansion. “We play by the rules that are handed to us. When they announced every team could only protect three and everyone was going to lose four, I think all of our mouths dropped open. That’s a lot.”

Klee calls it the price paid to grow a league that last season set records in attendance, merchandise sales, social-media traffic and sponsorships.

The good news: The Frost can develop young players and expand their roles as they did in the PWHL Finals with fourth-line stars Katy Knoll, Liz Schepers and Klara Hymlarova, among others.

They will have the June 24 entry draft and free agency after that to rebuild the roster accordingly to which positional players they lost.

According to the PWHL, average attendance increased 27% from the inaugural 2024 season to last season, as the six teams drew more than 1.2 million fans over the two seasons. Visits to the PWHL website numbered 20 million from 150 different countries. League and team social-media impressions grew 68%.

The league’s “Takeover Tour” filled up NHL arenas in a regular-season barnstorming that spread the gospel from neutral sites Raleigh, N.C., Pittsburgh and Detroit to Denver. A West Coast stop convinced the league to add the two new Pacific Northwest expansion teams.

The Frost averaged 6,524 at Xcel Energy Center in their second PWHL season, down from a shorter inaugural regular season in which they averaged 7,138 fans. In the just-completed playoffs they averaged 6,537, compared to 7,067 in 2024.

“We saw a crowd of 11,000 and we certainly struggled on some dates,” Frost GM Melissa Caruso said. “Every team had that struggle throughout the winter. I was really impressed with the fan support and players were, too.”

PWHL Executive Vice President of Hockey Operations Jayna Hefford called the just-completed second season “nothing short of historic, with so many exciting first and monumental milestones.”

“We have big goals,” Hefford said. “This is just the beginning of our growth.”

Longtime sports executive and PWHL advisory board member Stan Kasten last month told the Associated Press he expects the league will broaden its reach after the Olympics and potentially turn a profit by 2031, when the league’s original collective bargaining agreement with players expires.

“Our manifest destiny is a lot more than six [teams], it’s a lot more than eight, I don’t know how many,” Kasten said. “We’re going to be a league like every other major league and that’s our goal. We’re going to be spread. Our footprint will be across this continent and hopefully others as well.”

Internet chatter objected the notion that a Minnesota pro sports team hasn’t won a championship since the Twins did in 1991. That, of course, ignores the Lynx’s four WNBA titles and the Frost’s two Walter Cups.

“It’s the best league in the world,” Klee said. “If this is not a professional league where these athletes show their skills, then I’m not sure what is. If it takes the WNBA and PWHL to get people on board ... there are a lot of cities all over the U.S. and Canada [that] are excited to get teams and I’m just excited to see where the league goes.”

That plan could mean more expansion again after this season, and beyond.

It also means the Frost’s aim at a dynasty could end at two titles.

“This group is so special and it’s sad to think that we all will never play together again,” said goaltender Maddie Rooney, a forthcoming free agent herself. “But this is the highest note we could have gone out on. To share this memory all together, we’ll remember the rest of our lives.”