PWHL Adds First Investors to Keep Women's Hockey Growing Fast

The Professional Women's Hockey League, known as the PWHL, announced on Monday that it has taken on its first two outside investors. The new partners are the Ilitch Companies from Detroit and Kilmer Sports Ventures from Toronto. Both groups own several well-known sports teams. This is a major milestone for a league that only launched in January 2024 and has already doubled in size.

The PWHL started with six teams and now has twelve, adding four new teams last month in Detroit, Las Vegas, San Jose, and Hamilton, Ontario. League advisory board member Stan Kasten said finding investors this soon was ahead of schedule. He called it the clearest sign yet that the PWHL is one of the fastest-growing sports leagues in the world. Kasten said fans, sponsors, and other partners have all shown strong support, allowing the league to grow faster than expected.

The league was founded and is mainly funded by Mark and Kimbra Walter, who also own baseball's Los Angeles Dodgers and the NBA's Lakers. Even with new investors joining, the Walters will stay in charge of running the league. The new partners will offer advice, business connections, and fresh ideas. The league's central leadership structure stays the same.

The Ilitch family owns the NHL's Detroit Red Wings and baseball's Detroit Tigers. Their involvement showed last week when their employees helped host the PWHL's awards ceremony and player draft in Detroit. CEO Chris Ilitch said the PWHL's rise has been one of the most compelling stories in professional sports. He added that investing in the league could help create pathways for female athletes for generations to come.

Larry Tanenbaum is part-owner of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment, which includes the NHL's Toronto Maple Leafs and the NBA's Toronto Raptors. His company, Kilmer Sports Ventures, also owns the WNBA's Toronto Tempo and a soccer team in France. Tanenbaum praised what the PWHL has built so quickly and said he is honored to be part of it. He called the league's growth incredible.

The league's growth got a boost after the 2026 Winter Olympics, where Team USA, led by star Hilary Knight, won the gold medal in women's hockey. More fans tuned into PWHL games after the Olympic win. Last season's average attendance was 9,304 fans per game, a 28 percent jump from the year before. The league also grew its list of corporate sponsors from about 50 to 81 in one year.

Even with new investors, players will not get pay raises right away because the league has not yet made a profit. Mark Walter has already invested hundreds of millions of dollars. Right now, the minimum player salary is just over $37,000, and only 10 of 194 players earned more than $100,000 last season. Kasten said he hopes the new investment gets the league closer to the day when players can earn more.

The PWHL was the first professional women's league to launch with a collective bargaining agreement already in place, running through 2031. The league is also looking for a bigger U.S. television partner, since it currently reaches about 126 million American homes through the ION network. With 12 teams, league officials believe a larger broadcaster will now be more interested. In Canada, broadcast deals could also improve once current contracts end after next season.

Kasten reflected on how far the league has come since it started with no venues, no city deals, and no logos. He said the league believed that if it gave the world's best women's hockey players a stage, fans would show up — and they did. The first PWHL game was played in a 2,500-seat arena in Toronto. Now, the team plays in an 8,500-seat venue and has even sold out a game in a 19,200-seat arena.