Young girls in Pacific Northwest excited about PWHL's arrival in Seattle

Elly Garcia-Dudek can't help but gaze out toward the ice during hockey practices at the Kraken Community Iceplex.

The 12-year-old Garcia-Dudek is a big fan of women's national team stars like Hilary Knight, who starred for the Boston Fleet of the Professional Women's Hockey League last season. Pretty soon, Garcia-Dudek, who started playing through the Seattle Kraken's Learn to Play program, won't have to look across the country for role models like Knight.

The PWHL is expanding to Vancouver and to Seattle next season, which was music to Garcia-Dudek's ears. She and her family are Kraken fans and have already put down deposits for PWHL Seattle season tickets. Luckily for Garcia-Dudek, Knight has agreed to play in Seattle.

"It's really inspiring and cool to watch them play because it's different from the men's game because women aren't used to playing with contact, but they get to with the PWHL, which is really cool to watch," Garcia-Dudek said. "It inspires me personally like, 'Oh, I can be one of them when I grow up."'

Seattle's lineup should feature plenty of offence from the outset, especially with Knight, a four-time Olympian and PWHL MVP finalist last season, on the scene.

"Hillary is a superstar in every way, right?" Seattle general manager Meghan Turner said of Knight after the PWHL expansion draft. "Like she plays the way she plays, the way she carries herself in the locker room, the way that she carries herself outside the rink. She's just really got at all."

The Pacific Northwest expansion will give the PWHL eight teams and its first two west of Minnesota. The moves are expected to spur even more interest across the region in hockey, which has steadily grown especially in Seattle since the arrival of the NHL