PWHL Walter Cup Finals to Debut on US National TV

The Professional Women's Hockey League announced on Wednesday a landmark broadcasting agreement that will bring its Walter Cup Finals to national linear television in the United States for the first time. The best-of-five championship series, scheduled for mid-May, will air on ION, a network from Scripps Sports reachable by 126 million American households through over-the-air, pay television, connected TV and ad-supported streaming platforms.

The deal arrives amid heightened interest in women's hockey following Team USA's gold medal win over Canada in an overtime thriller at the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics last month. The PWHL featured 61 Olympians across its rosters, with 41 earning medals, including many from the U.S. and Canadian national teams. This partnership builds on recent efforts to expand visibility, including last week's announcement of a neutral-site game on March 28 in Detroit between the Montreal team and New York, which marked the league's first national U.S. broadcast and was also carried by Scripps Sports.

Scripps Sports, which holds rights to WNBA and NWSL games and has previously aired PWHL contests in its NHL television markets, described the agreement as...