ST. PAUL, Minn. -- The 3-year-old National Women's Hockey League added its first expansion franchise on Tuesday, reaching into the Midwest to acquire the Minneapolis-based Minnesota Whitecaps in a non-cash deal ahead of the coming season. The Whitecaps will be the league's fifth club and first NWHL team outside the Northeast.
"Having Minnesota in the NWHL expands our national footprint and grows the game in so many ways," said NWHL commissioner Dani Rylan. "This is a monumental step for the NWHL."
The Whitecaps, founded in 2004, belonged to the Western Women's Hockey League until the league folded in 2011, and they won the last three championships. Since then, they played an independent schedule, facing mainly Division I colleges.
Over the years its roster featured numerous U.S. Olympic medalists -- Angela Ruggiero, Natalie Darwitz, Julie Chu, Hannah Brandt, Kendall Coyne, Jocelyne and Monique Lamoureux, to name several -- along with many top postgraduate players from Minnesota.
The club is expected to play at TRIA Rink, the Minnesota Wild's practice facility and site of the 2018 NWHL All-Star Game, though Rylan would not confirm that at a Tuesday news conference. The league will own the Whitecaps and be responsible for salaries and travel costs, Rylan said. Jack Brodt, the club's co-founder and father of Whitecaps captain Winny Brodt Brown, said he plans to remain as coach.