T-5 - BOSTON

Loren Gabel - Shiann Darkangelo - Taylor Girard

Sidney Morin - Kaleigh Fratkin

???

I honestly really hate having to put Boston here because their options at forward and d are absurd; you’ve got two MVPs, a two-time Defender of the Year and a Newcomer of the Year (and Darkangelo and Morin are no slouches). Gabel-Darkangelo-Girard would be absolutely disgusting as a PHF line, and Morin-Fratkin is a hell of a d pairing to back them up. Unfortunately, Boston is the only team in the PWHL who has no goalies who played in the PHF last season on their roster. So it sucks, because I think they have a group of skaters whose only competition here is the team who ends up in first. But with no one in net, it doesn't really matter, unfortunately.

T-5 - TORONTO

Brittany Howard - ??? - ???

Kali Flanagan - Allie Munroe

Carly Jackson

Toronto, on the other hand, does have a goalie! Carly Jackson may not've been a starter last season, but I would be pretty comfortable calling them the best backup in the league and I think it's fair to say they're probably better than at least one or two of last season's starters. Flanagan-Munroe is a pretty great defensive pairing, too, boasting the reigning Defender of the Year. Unfortunately, for forwards, you have Brittany Howard. No one else. You do have two more defenders eligible (Olivia Knowles and Emma Keenan), so you could technically throw them up front and ice a full line. But still, I just don't think that's enough.

4 - MINNESOTA

Denisa Křížová - Sidney Brodt - Michela Cava

Dominique Kremer - Emma Greco

Amanda Leveille

So if you’re anal about injuries and want to replace Brodt with Liz Schepers, I won’t argue with you. I’m actually surprised that there are only three Whitecaps in this lineup considering how Minnesotan their team makeup is. Leveille is probably the PHF’s goaltending GOAT and was at worst in the second-tier of PHF goaltending this past season. Maybe I’m being harsh, but even with Kremer’s Defender of the Year and Cava’s Playoff MVP, this lineup feels pretty underwhelming. Sorry.

3 - OTTAWA

Natalie Snodgrass - Mikyla Grant-Mentis - Becca Gilmore

Aneta Tejralová - Amanda Boulier

Rachel McQuigge

This is probably the most controversial choice I’ve made lineup-wise, as I’m leaving out two players who actually got drafted (Kateřina Mrázová and Daryl Watts) for three undrafted forwards. I could maybe see replacing Snodgrass or Gilmore, but MVP MGM is a lock and quite frankly it’s absurd she went undrafted (and my hot take is Snodgrass is wildly underrated too). McQuigge is…the least accomplished, we’ll say, goaltender on this list. Honestly, I think me ranking them here is mostly personal bias, because fuck I think Snod & MGM are so good. You could probably flip them and Minnesota though, if you wanted.

2 - NEW YORK

Emma Woods - Jade Downie-Landry - Élizabeth Giguère

Olivia Zafuto - Taylor Baker

Corinne Schroeder

I mentioned goaltending tiers with Minnesota, and Schroeder, in last year’s regular season at least, is pretty comfortably in a tier of her own at the top. Zafuto-Baker is a sneaky-good d pairing and there’s a decent amount of firepower amongst Woods-JDL-Giguère. Does Schroeder carry this team? Sort of, but there’s more than enough in front of her that I think without any other award winners this is still a hell of a group.

1 - MONTREAL

Ann-Sophie Bettez - Jillian Dempsey - Kennedy Marchment

Dominika Lásková - Kati Tabin

Elaine Chuli

Two MVPs (one of them being the undisputed PHF GOAT) up front alongside the Greatest Montreal Force Player Ever In The Long And Storied History of the Montreal Force (TM). You get the Toronto Six special in the back three, with Tabin and Lásková being two players I thought had really promising first full seasons in the PHF and Chuli fitting comfortably alongside Leveille in that aforementioned 2nd tier of goaltenders. Had Boston even a decent goaltender this would’ve been a bit harder, but for now I think it’s pretty cut and dry: Montreal is undisputedly the top dog in this incredibly niche and unimportant set of rankings. Long may they reign.

i'm kind of bummed we didn't get to see what havoc a loren gabel/jillian dempsey/brittany howard line could've wrought on the phf with the pride.

5 goals a game from that line alone imo. putting up wins with scores like 11-5 on the reg.

There's a new documentary out about the first season of the NWHL/PHF!

I thought it was a super fascinating and well-done look at the origin of the league. It's wild how much things have changed in the sport since that first 2015 season.

The timing of the film's release is a little crazy, especially since the doc was clearly completed well in advance of the acquisition, but, as Erin Brown on Twitter perfectly put it, "yet it stands as [a] beautiful eulogy for the NWHL/PHF."

Anyway, I highly recommend the doc. It's a little bittersweet in the context of everything going on right now, but still so wonderful and inspiring.

Former Northeastern captain Brooke Hobson, who starred for MoDo in Sweden last year has signed with the Boston Pride. Read about the signing here.

Maude Poulin-Labelle, one of the top offensive blueliners in the NCAA the past five seasons has signed with the Connecticut Whale. Read about the signing here.