Photo Courtesy of Professional Women’s Hockey League- Wikimedia Commons
Ahead of their 2026–27 debut, the PWHL's four new expansion franchises unveil their inaugural diagonal-letter jerseys, bringing fresh color schemes and city identities to the ice before full team names and logos drop on Dec. 5.
This past May, the Professional Women’s Hockey League (PWHL) announced four new expansion teams will be added to the league for the 2026-27 season. This marks the second consecutive expansion for the league since its inception.
The PWHL unveiled the inaugural jerseys for its four new expansion teams: Hamilton, Detroit, San Jose, and Las Vegas, ahead of the 2026-27 season. These first‑year jerseys follow the league’s expansion tradition: no official logos yet, just a diagonal city name across the chest. Full team names and logos will still be announced on Dec. 5 before the season begins.
When the league first revealed the branding, colors, and logos for its original six franchises, I shared my thoughts on the identity and overall design for this lovely newspaper. So to stick with tradition, here are my thoughts on the four teams’ jerseys and colors.
Let’s start off with my favorite: Hamilton. This team sports a home jersey with deep red, burnt orange, and cream accents. This palette is supposed to reflect Hamilton’s steel industry and deep sports history, with nods to the Canadian Football League (CFL) Tiger-Cats and Ontario Hockey League (OHL) Hamilton Bulldogs. Many might not be a fan of the warm colors combination, but it reminds me of the University of Minnesota uniforms and my high school’s colors; call me cheesy if you must, but I enjoy it.
Now, the fan favorite in my opinion is Detroit, a black jersey with silver accents referencing the city’s automotive history. On the bottom, there are three stripes in white, silver, and red meant to mimic Detroit’s 313 area code. This jersey and color scheme is definitely the sleekest, so I can see the appeal, but it is just a little too simple for my taste.
Next up is San Jose, with the brightest and loudest colors of the four. The home jersey is mandarin orange with sky-blue features. The colors were chosen to represent the Bay Area’s creativity and California’s natural beauty, as well as the city’s flag and the orange groves. This color scheme is not the best, but not the worst. I would personally never buy it, but that does not mean that no PWHL fan will.
Last but not least-ish, is Las Vegas, which has by far the worst color scheme in the entire league. Las Vegas is sporting green, gold, and navy inspired by Southern Nevada’s natural landscape, with the gold accents representing the desert sun’s sparkle. I cannot even begin to describe how bad these colors are, but I will try. The green is vomit-esque, the gold is dingy, the only good color is the navy blue which does not even go with the other colors. When I think of Las Vegas, I am thinking of red, black, and city night-life, not natural landscapes. Is it just me?
As you are reading this, you might be thinking: who is this girl to be sharing her opinion on these jerseys and colors? Much like the Lorax spoke for the trees, I speak for PWHL fans (or at least I think I do). The real question now is: what will be the team names and logos?
The names and logos will matter much more than the color schemes do in the long run. When someone thinks of a team, the colors are an afterthought. First comes the name, then the logo, and finally the colors fill in the blank space in our brain’s picture of the team.
The league announced alongside the colors that the official team names and logos will be revealed before the start of the season on Dec. 5, so fans like myself have just a couple more weeks of waiting before we can do this all again.