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2026-27 Season Live

PWHL Las Vegas Starts With Its Defense

Current Matchups

PWHL Las Vegas plays its first home game on December 6 at T-Mobile Arena, against Detroit, another expansion team. Training camp opens November 18. The camp roster published in October has 29 names: 18 signed players, 8 free-agent invites and 3 unsigned draft picks.

Thirteen of the 18 signed players have played in the PWHL. Most of them came from the teams that have won the Walter Cup. Five played for Minnesota, which won in 2024 and 2025, and three for Montreal, which won in 2026. Four came from Seattle and one from Vancouver, the two teams that joined last season.

Last PWHL team Signed players
Minnesota Kendall Cooper, Mae Batherson, Madison Bizal (D); Katy Knoll (F); Nicole Hensley (G)
Montreal Erin Ambrose (D); Hayley Scamurra, Maureen Murphy (F)
Seattle Megan Carter (D); Natalie Snodgrass, Jada Habisch, Sydney Langseth (F)
Vancouver Darcie Lappan (F)
No PWHL games Tessa Janecke, Lacey Eden, Issy Wunder, Josefin Bouveng, Kendall Butze

The defense

Kendall Cooper had 19 points in her first PWHL season, tied for third among the league's 68 defenders. Mae Batherson had 15, seventh. They played on the same Minnesota team, and seven of Batherson's points came on the power play. Erin Ambrose has 37 career PWHL points, the most of anyone on the camp roster.

2025-26 PWHL points for PWHL Las Vegas's signed skaters, defenders highlighted

2025-26 regular-season points with each player's team that season. Blue bars are defenders.

Player Team Pos GP G A PTS PP points Minutes a game
Kendall Cooper MIN D 30 2 17 19 6 21.5
Hayley Scamurra MTL F 30 8 8 16 4 16.0
Mae Batherson MIN D 30 3 12 15 7 18.8
Katy Knoll MIN F 30 7 2 9 1 14.3
Maureen Murphy MTL F 21 4 3 7 2 15.1
Erin Ambrose MTL D 21 0 6 6 4 19.4
Natalie Snodgrass SEA F 29 2 3 5 1 15.2
Megan Carter SEA D 30 1 4 5 0 17.3

The scoring

Vegas's leading returning forward is Hayley Scamurra, with 16 points last season, 22nd among 123 forwards. Together, the signed players with PWHL games scored 86 points in 2025-26. Toronto, the lowest-scoring team, got 130 from its skaters.

Skater points by PWHL team in 2025-26, with the combined points of PWHL Las Vegas's signed players

Skater points by team, 2025-26 regular season. The Las Vegas bar adds up its signed players' points with their old teams.

The rest has to come from the draft. Vegas traded Hilary Knight, whom it had signed in June, to Detroit for the third overall pick and took Penn State forward Tessa Janecke. Two picks later it took Wisconsin forward Lacey Eden. Issy Wunder came with the 13th pick, which Vegas got by sending Abby Boreen back to Vancouver.

The goaltending

Nicole Hensley is the only goalie on the camp roster who has played in the PWHL. She played for Minnesota in all three PWHL seasons, and her save percentage has been below league average in each of them.

Season GP Shots against Save % League Goals vs average
2024 14 383 .919 .922 −1.3
2024-25 11 270 .900 .914 −3.9
2025-26 13 382 .908 .923 −5.7

Three hundred shots is a small sample for a goalie. Even so, three seasons below average is a pattern.

What year one looked like last time

Seattle and Vancouver joined for 2025-26. Vancouver finished sixth of eight with a .411 points percentage, and Seattle finished last at .344, allowing a league-high 92 goals. This season the league is adding four teams at once, so Vegas won't be the only first-year team near the bottom.

Sources and method

PWHL game data comes from the HockeyTech/LeagueStat feed behind thepwhl.com: every regular-season and playoff game from 2024 through the 2026 playoffs. The camp roster is from The Hockey News (October 7, updated October 12). The Knight and Boreen trades are from The Hockey News via Yahoo, and the draft picks from Fox5 Vegas. The home schedule is from News 3 Las Vegas. Points percentage uses the PWHL's 3-2-1 system. Goals vs average compares goals allowed with the league save percentage on the same shots. The roster can change before the December 5 season opener.

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