Women’s Hockey Round Up – MN Girl’s State Results, PWHL Updates & Preview

With the Olympics now behind us, it’s time to turn our attention back to girl’s and women’s hockey! I had intended to write full, separate posts about the MN girl’s state high school hockey tournament and another about PWHL updates and previewing storylines as the season restarts, but everything that happened immediately after the Olympics took a lot of my focus and attention away. If you haven’t seen my thoughts on all of that, please feel free to read more here.

The best news coming out of the Olympics is that there is a ton of fantastic women’s hockey on deck for us to enjoy and support! Let’s get into what’s been happening and what to look forward to.

Minnesota Girl’s High School Hockey State Tournament

Congratulations to state champions Breck (A) and Hill-Murray (AA) on their 2026 state titles!

Breck had a great season, with only 1 loss and 1 tie before the tournament, and showed the dominant team they had been all season. I was truly expecting Warroad to sail through the A tournament, but that wasn’t what happened, and Breck played great games throughout the tournament and were a deserving winner.

Hill-Murray is now back to back state champs! They were dominant early in the title game, and then were forced to withstand a late and furious charge from Centennial/Spring Lake Park to come away with their 2nd straight title. They have been a great team and it was fun to see them play again in this tournament. They are also an incredibly young team, so expect them to be a top team again next season.

Also congratulations to the award winners from the season, which saw Holy Family’s players dominate in the awards! Fantastic seasons by all of these players as well as a number of other great players who fell just short of winning these awards.

• Maddy Kimbrel of Holy Family was named the 2026 Ms. Hockey after a wonderful season, scoring 37 goals and 20 assists. She leaves high school with 108 goals in 113 games and was a fantastic player throughout her high school career.
• Kayla Swartout of Holy Family was named the 2026 Jori Jones Award winner as the state’s top senior goaltender. She ended her season with impressive stats of 1.97 GAA, 0.938 SV%, 24 wins, and 7 shutouts.
• Mia Miller of Northfield and Katya Sander of Holy Family were named the co-senior defenders of the year. Mia Miller finished with 18 goals and 31 assists, and Katya Sander contributed 10 goals and 12 assists.

PWHL is Back Today!!!

After an electric, exciting, fantastic Olympics, the PWHL is back! It feels like the athletes that played in the Olympics had basically no break, but as a hockey fan, I love that we’re getting right back into more hockey so quickly!

Since it’s been awhile since we last saw PWHL play, let’s look into some headlines and preview what we’ll be watching for in the 2nd half of the PWHL season.

Headlines/Roster Updates

• World Para Ice Hockey announced a development camp aimed at boosting global participation in women’s para ice hockey. 
• The Charge signed forward Maggy Burbridge to a reserve player contract. 
• The Charge announced that their home game against the Victoire, originally scheduled for March 11^th at TD place, has been moved to Friday, April 3^rd, at the Canadian Tire Centre. 
• The Fleet activated defender Riley Brengman from long-term injured reserve and placed Zoe Boyd on LTIR. Boyd suffered a lower body injury in practice before the Olympics and is eligible to return on March 6^th. 

PWHL Storylines & What to Watch

The Boston Fleet have been the first place team for most of the season, and after the incredible success of their players at the Olympics, I expect them to keep rolling in the 2nd half of the season. Between Aerin Frankel’s continued dominance in net, Megan Keller’s golden goal, and Alina Müller scoring the bronze-medal winning goal, they have big players coming back to the team that should be full of confidence after playing such big parts in their team’s successes in Milan.

The flip side of the Olympics for all of the athletes that competed will be how their energy and health are after getting essentially no time off to rest or recover. This season is a grind, and as much as it’s a blessing for us as fans to immediately have more women’s hockey to watch after the Olympics end, it’s a physical challenge these players haven’t faced before, wanting to be at their peak at the Olympics but then still expected to continue to perform and compete at a very high level for 14-16 more regular season games in the PWHL immediately after, not to mention hoping to go on a run in the playoffs after that.

Marie-Philip Poulin is obviously one of the biggest question marks. How serious her injury is, and how that will impact the rest of her season, as well as how it will impact the Victoire overall. She’s such an important player in the league and for the Victoire that her health could have a huge impact on how their season turns out. Poulin’s wife, team Canada teammate, and Victoire teammate, Laura Stacy, was one of the best players at the Olympics, so if she can remain healthy and can continue playing like that for the Victoire, that will be a huge benefit for them, but it still won’t fully replace having her playing her best alongside a healthy Poulin.

Before the Olympic break, the Goldeneyes were starting to find some consistency and play better hockey, and the Charge looked to be on the upswing as well. It will be interesting to see how quickly teams get back into the groove after such a long break, and if momentum continues carrying in the directions it was pre-Olympics for teams, or if things change dramatically out of the break.

We still have right around half of the season remaining to play, so a lot could still change in that time. How teams play these first few games out of the break could really set the tone for the 2nd half of the season.

Final Thoughts

It was a fantastic Minnesota girl’s high school season, and while I’m sad it’s over, it was a fun one to experience, and it will be a ton of fun to see the top senior players move onto the NCAA and add some impressive talent to the pool next season.

In addition, it’s so exciting to have PWHL games starting back up today! Who do you think will play the best coming out of the break? Do you think the trends from the first half of the season will continue, or are do you see shake ups coming? Please let me know your thoughts in the comments.