It was the week before Christmas, and Rockefeller Center was alive with visitors and shoppers and visiting shoppers.
Down on the skating rink, they shuffled along, clutching each other or clutching the boards, if not both.
Then the soundtrack paused. The amateur skaters were ushered off the ice. A Zamboni swept the surface clean. The stage was set anew, as passersby peered down, their curiosity piqued. Cue Frank Sinatra: I’m gonna make a brand-new start of it, in old New York.
That’s when the Professional Women’s Hockey League’s New York team took the stage.
New York’s newest pro sports team is one of six franchises in the PWHL’s inaugural 2024 season, which begins Jan. 1 with New York’s afternoon game in Toronto.
“It’s like the Original Six, the original six NHL teams,” New York head coach Howie Draper said. “We all think about that and we all know the heroes from that time. So to be able to maybe be part of making a similar kind of history in [women’s] hockey is very exciting.”
“I think it was kind of a pinch-me moment for all of us because we’ve been waiting for this to happen for so long for women’s hockey,” said defenseman Micah Zandee-Hart, who was introduced as the team’s first captain at the Rockefeller Center event. “And I’ve only been in the fight for a little while, but some of my teammates have been in the fight for a long time.”
The PWHL — stick with us here — is the synthesis of North America’s previous women’s pro hockey league, which began in 2015 as the National Women’s Hockey League, later swallowed the Canadian Women’s Hockey League and was known the past two years as the Premier Hockey Federation (it included the New York-based Metropolitan Riveters), and the breakaway Professional Women’s Hockey Players Association.
The PWHPA is a union of top women’s players — including the big, Olympics-famous names from the U.S. and Canadian national teams, such as Hilary Knight and Kendall Coyne Schofield — who had boycotted the NWHL/PHF over what they deemed inadequate salary and working conditions. The PWHPA formed a barnstorming tour while advocating for a new and improved league.
That shakeup eventually came with the financial backing of Dodgers owner Mark Walter, who in July 2023 bought out the PHF and dissolved it to make way for a successor. It was not until late August when the PWHL officially was unveiled.
“A lot of moving parts,” as Zandee-Hart put it. The bootstrapping was frantic.
“Preparation meant drafting and doing tons of interviews, meeting with staff, creating that team, [assembling] the players. And then we had to work on the washer and dryer,” general manager Pascal Daoust said with a laugh. “We were building from scratch in each department.”
The power-play prep left insufficient time for individual team branding. “The league is working hard on that,” Daoust said. For now, bizarrely, there are no nicknames, no distinct logos. Just a PWHL crest.
But there is a 24-game schedule that runs until early May. New York will split its 2024 home games between the Islanders’ UBS Arena (at least four dates), and Total Mortgage Arena in Bridgeport, Conn., which leadership hopes is an invitation to two constituencies, not a recipe for none. (The team practices in Stamford, Conn., at Chelsea Piers.)
“At the end of the day, we’re gonna represent New York,” said Daoust, who spent the past seven years as a GM in the Quebec junior league and has a background in women’s hockey. “So this is what we need to know to start: We know where we’re going to play, we know against who we’re gonna play and now we need to make sure that … how we’re going to play, it will be different and it will be our way so that we smile at the end of the year.”
New York’s roster may lack the star power of its rivals in Boston, Minnesota, Toronto, Montreal and Ottawa.
New York is led by Team USA centers Alex Carpenter, an electric goal-scoring threat, and Abby Roque, a skilled distributor with the reputation as something of a pest.
Zandee-Hart, a 2022 gold medalist with Team Canada and Cornell alum, was the team’s third pre-draft free agent, the only one in the league who was not an American signing with a U.S. team or a Canadian signing to play in Canada.
“I think we’re gonna be a very exciting team,” said Draper, a veteran of the women’s college game in Alberta. “My job is to try and bring out the defense in this crew. What they already have naturally is we’ve got some tremendous offensive skill and creativity. We’ve got players that have the ability to score goals when we really need them.
“We’ve got outstanding goaltenders, who are huge,” he added of New York’s tandem of 5-foot-11 Corinne Schroeder and 6-foot-1 Abbey Levy, who hails from Long Island. “They’re like the Statue of Liberty in net every night.”
The advent of PWHL New York follows an exciting 2023 in local women’s pro sports. The New York Liberty assembled a roster full of All-Stars, advanced to the WNBA Finals and lost. NJ/NY Gotham FC went on a thrilling run to become National Women’s Soccer League champs.
“I think if you look across women’s sports in general, from the university level up to the pro level, people are really starting to watch, right?” Zandee-Hart said. “We’re breaking attendance records and viewership records left, right and center. And I think for us to now be a part of that groundbreaking in women’s sports, I think it’s the perfect time.”
As sobering as it was to register their fourth straight double-digit loss, the Jets (if we can take a rose-colored glasses view for a second) wouldn’t have had to squint too hard during Thursday night’s 37-20 loss to see a template for what could be.
The Browns, with 11 players on injured reserve, playing behind their fourth different quarterback, minus three starting-caliber offensive tackles, their two leading receivers, their placekicker and punter, somehow managed to win their 11th game of the season and qualify for only their second playoff apperance since 2002.
A path to the same kind of success isn’t that far from the Jets’ reach with a little ingenuity and a little luck.
Yes, hopefully Aaron Rodgers returns to some semblance of his MVP self next season, but if not, or injury strikes again, is finding another Joe Flacco (again), or some more competent backup than what the Jets trotted out this season far-fetched?
Yes, the offensive line is a mess, but if the Browns can plug in fourth-round rookies (Dawand Jones) and get capable protection, is finding some road graders/brick walls somewhere in the draft or overlooked on some practice squad out of the question?
Yes, Garrett Wilson has been frustrated with the Jets’ offense, but he and Breece Hall are the kind of game-breakers that can get past a defense with Trevor Siemian taking snaps. Heck, that’s a far sight better than what Cleveland trotted out in the second half on Thursday.
The key, as it has been with the Browns, is having a defense that can take a team over the finish line each week. And that the Jets have. It’s not the 1985 Bears, but neither is Cleveland’s.
Still, the Jets have a unit that has allowed the fifth-fewest passing yards in the NFL this season and ranks 14th in rushing yards allowed per carry. It’s a group that has the fourth-most takeaways in the league. And it’s a group that picked itself up after a tough first half on Thursday night to hold the Browns to 61 total yards and three points in the second half.
No team can stub its toe forever; just ask the Browns.
— Paul Forrester
From the perspective of Greg Schiano, bowl games — including Rutgers’ 31-24 victory over Miami in the Pinstripe Bowl at Yankee Stadium on Thursday — still matter.
Even with the opt outs. Even with the transfers. Even with the decisions to focus on the draft, to start the search for a new program early, to get younger players more playing time. So when Rutgers forced a final turnover on downs and the ceremonies — and dancing — started on the field Thursday afternoon, the Scarlet Knights’ first bowl victory carried extra meaning.
“If you were in that locker room seeing those kids celebrate, bowl games are really important, and that will be a memory for those guys,” Schiano said. “Most guys don’t go play after college. There will be a bunch of them that will never play another snap, and that will be their last memory of football in college. It couldn’t end any better.”
Two role players — Timmy Ward and Trevor Yeboah-Kodie — combined together on a blocked punt that altered the trajectory of the game. Yeboah-Kodie played lacrosse at Brown for four years, and, as a high school football player, wanted to use his final year of eligibility on a different sport. His father and uncle played under Schiano at Penn State when he was an assistant there, Schiano said, and Yeboah-Kodie’s father reached out to gauge whether the Scarlet Knights would have any interest, Schiano said.
“I said, ‘Yeah, let me look at his tape,’” Schiano said. “All he had was his high school tape. I looked at it and said, ‘Oh, I wish I had gotten him out of high school. He is a really good player.’”
Ward was diagnosed with cancer and defeated it in high school, and he started with the Rutgers program as an equipment manager. Eventually, he went to the walk-on tryout. Schiano recalled how someone running that session approached him and recommended keeping Ward, since he flashed potential as a runner and athlete.
By this point in his second season, he’s become a central part of Rutgers’ special teams unit. The “brains of the outfit now,” Schiano said, especially with coordinating the punt-blocking team on the field.
“I’ve gone through a lot of stuff over the years, and to come in the way that I did, this moment is honestly insane,” Ward said. “I can’t even wrap my head around it right now.”
Schiano said those two players are “very symbolic” of the Rutgers program, which he has rebuilt and has now led to their first winning season since 2014. But they’re also the players, the backstories, the under-the-radar contributors who help keep the true meaning of bowl games intact.
— Andrew Crane
As we wave goodbye to 2023, we wanted to tip our cap to a baker’s dozen of some of the most compelling features that ran in Sports+ over the past 12 months. (We would love to include them all, but there are so many days in the week and we all have to get ready for 2024.)
Before Garrett Wilson became the NFL’s Offensive Rookie of the Year with the Jets and Brett Baty made himself the Mets’ potential third baseman of the future, the two grew up playing peewee football together in central Texas. And yes, they’re still friends.
When did the Islanders’ Ilya Sorokin make it clear he could be one of the best goalies in the sport? To those who played with him as a teenager in southwestern Siberia, it was clear when he gave their second-division squad a fighting chance they were not used to having. “[We] used to joke with each other that this kid’s gonna be one of the best goalies someday because of how many shots we give up,” said Cade Fairchild, one of Sorokin’s teammates. “It was amazing how many games we were in that we probably shouldn’t have been in because of him.”
The improbable, immense, Ruthian rise of Yankee Stadium, 100 years ago
Mike Vaccaro recounts how Yankee Stadium truly became “The House that Ruth Built,” from the abbreviated construction schedule to the throngs of fans lining up to attend the first game at the park in 1923 to the third-inning blast the Babe himself hit to send those fans into a frenzy: “In the moment, 74,200 people felt that contact in their hearts. And then set free a wave of thunder that only increased when the ball curved inside the right-field pole and landed 10 rows deep, and only multiplied as Ruth rounded the bases, touched home plate, shook Wally Pipp’s hand and doffed his cap with a dramatic flourish.”
What do you do when the college program you’ve committed yourself to vanishes? Dozens of men and women found out last spring when St. Francis College shuttered all 19 of its Division I teams as a result of revenue shortfalls and increasing expenses. “It didn’t click at that moment,” said track athlete Angel Okafor. “I was numb. I couldn’t hear anything. I looked around and saw coaches crying. And I just started bawling. Everything was gone in a flash.”
The sideways story of the ‘sweeper,’ the pitch that’s suddenly everywhere you look
We wouldn’t blame you for wondering where the “sweeper” pitch came from given the sudden attention paid to it across baseball last season. It turns out, Mark Sanchez found, the pitch has been winning pitchers like Corey Kluber Cy Young Awards for close to a decade. “Imagine the plunge of a curveball, but executed horizontally rather than vertically,” wrote Mark Sanchez.
Smush Parker defied the odds making the NBA. He’s trying to do it again — as a referee
Rising from New York City’s AAU circuit into a role playing alongside Kobe Bryant, Smush Parker crafted one of the more improbable careers in basketball. Now in his 40s, Parker still has his hand in the game, officiating rec league games at Baruch College in Manhattan. “It’s my full-time profession, and I’m trying to grow at it,” Parker told Howie Kussoy. “This league helped me develop to where I’m at. It’s a stepping stone to get where I want to go.”
A night with the Savannah Bananas, the wildest show in baseball
“Equal parts baseball, Broadway, Bar Mitzvah, amusement park and Harlem Globetrotters,” the Savannah Bananas are more an experience than a baseball team. Maybe that’s why they’re selling out minor league parks across the country. Howie Kussoy attended their lone visit to Trenton, NJ, last summer to find out what all the fuss is about.
How Peter Laviolette got a grip on NHL coaching on the way to this Rangers moment
Peter Laviolette didn’t make many friends in the locker room when he began his NHL coaching career. But over the years, he has evolved, learned from his mistakes and stopped trying to always prove his point and meet his players more on their terms. And that may be just what the Rangers need to break a Stanley Cup title drought nearing three decades, wrote Mollie Walker. “The hard practices, emphasis on compete level and demand for heart are still a part of Laviolette’s DNA, but the Rangers are getting the most experienced version of one of the most established coaches in the NHL.”
Fairleigh Dickinson pulled off one of the biggest upsets in NCAA Tournament history last spring in toppling No. 1 seeded-Purdue in Round 1. That led to coach Tobin Anderson getting a new job with Iona and FDU looking for a new leader. They didn’t have to look far to find Jack Castleberry, who spent years as an assistant coach before quitting and taking a job as a financial planner before getting back in the game and eventually finding his way onto Anderson’s staff. Find out about the career move that almost didn’t happen.
Inside Aaron Rodgers’ year in junior college obscurity: ‘Nobody misses kids like this’
There was a time, not so long ago, when Aaron Rodgers was a skinny kid out of Chico, Calif., without a single Division I offer to play football. So, the future four-time NFL MVP took his talents to Butte College, a local community college where he set a number of program records before his tight end at the school helped him land a scholarship at Cal-Berkeley. “I learned a lot about myself that year, being an 18-year-old playing with guys from all over the country and different countries,” Rodgers said before the 2011 Super Bowl. “We had a 25-year-old center, we had guys who had been to prison, guys who were bouncebacks from Division I.”
Pat Flaherty’s work shaping the Giants’ offensive line helped the franchise win two Super Bowls under Tom Coughlin. So why did he end up coaching in 2023 at Rutgers, where he started his legendary career? In part, it’s to help out Greg Schiano, who worked under Flaherty during his first stint at the school. It’s also to do what he does best — teach: “The biggest reason I coach is to teach players and get them out on the field to coach other players,” Flaherty told Ryan Dunleavy. “When I have to do something else, then I have to work again.”
Inside how the McCourty twins are transitioning from the NFL to a budding media empire
Turn on an NFL game, pregame, postgame, morning rundown and odds are you will see Jason or Devin McCourty. Having each spent a decade in the NFL after starring at Rutgers, the McCourty twins have dedicated their football lives to doing good in their communities thanks to the mother’s strong guidance and now are among the fastest-rising stars in the NFL broadcast universe. Andrew Marchand explains their good fortune is anything but a matter of luck.
It’s not just anyone who can turn around a Division I basketball program that averaged 8.3 wins over its previous 35 seasons, but Abbey Hsu isn’t your typical basketball player. In high school, she survived the school shooting in Parkland, Fla. And then during her first year at Columbia, her father became the first medical professional in South Florida to die from COVID. “We’ve been with her through some of the hardest moments in her life,” Columbia coach Meg Griffith said. “So much tragedy. … I always say to her, ‘I’m so proud of you. You consistently show up and you’re still the same person every day.’”
???? The Nets pulled their starters after one quarter Wednesday night against the Bucks, turning what ended up a competitive loss to the Bucks into little more than an exhibition game. Yes, plenty of teams do it, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t a disservice to every fan at Barclays, writes Mike Vaccaro.
???? If the Giants hope to have any chance of beating the Rams in Week 17, they’ll have to stop the rookie receiver they passed on in the draft, Puka Nacua, who, writes Steve Serby, looks an awful lot like his predecessor in L.A., Cooper Kupp.
???? The Pistons led the Celtics by 21. They took the Celtics to overtime. In Boston. And yet…Detroit lost its 28th consecutive game.
⚾ With Ronny Mauricio sidelined by an ACL injury, the Mets are casting about for some depth at third base, and it appears former Yankee Gio Urshela may be on their radar.
???? The Knicks went to the foul line 30 times in their loss on Wednesday against the Thunder, but a day later coach Tom Thibodeau and his team were still feeling a little underwhelmed by the amount of contact that went uncalled.