PWHPA announces first games of 2022-23 Dream Gap Tour

The Professional Women’s Hockey Players Association (PWHPA) announced details for the first two stops of its 2022-23 Dream Gap Tour on Friday.

Montreal, Quebec, will host the opening weekend of competition on October 15-16, with each of the four PWHPA teams playing two games at Centre 21.02. The Dream Gap Tour will then travel to the Rath Eastlink Community Centre in Truro, Nova Scotia, from November 4-6, with each team playing three games. A full schedule is below.

The PWHPA formed in May 2019 after more than 200 players announced they would be sitting out the 2019-20 season, essentially boycotting the PHF (then NWHL). While the Dream Gap Tour has served as a stop-gap solution in recent years, most of the organization’s work has been happening behind-the-scenes and away from social media. The PWHPA’s long term goal is a women’s hockey league that pays livable wages, provides full health benefits, and treats players as professionals.

“When I’m up close to it as a player, I wanted it (a new women’s pro league) yesterday. I think we all did,” PWHPA board member Hilary Knight told On Her Turf last month. “Stepping away (and) putting on a business hat, what we’ve accomplished in the last three years is incredible, especially if you take into consideration all the other things that we’re having to juggle.”

In May, the PWHPA signed a letter of intent with Billie Jean King Enterprises and the Mark Walter Group, with the goal of creating a new women’s professional hockey league.

It was previously reported that the PWHPA-led league (seperate from the Dream Gap Tour) would launch in January 2023, but a source with knowledge of the league’s plans said last month that the timeline had shifted. As a result, this season’s Dream Gap