Tuesday January 31, 2023
By Abbi Holt
The Boston Pride were well represented in this year’s Premier Hockey Federation All-Star round robin, sending a league-leading total of 9 players to Toronto’s Matamy Arena. Starting with Pride President Colleen Coyne serving as Coach for Team USA, Boston had four players on each of Team USA and Team Canada, with Defender Aneta Tejralová on Team World from Czechia. Team Canada beat out Team World in a 3-2 championship final.
The All-Star event was played in a new format this year. There were three teams based on the athletes’ home countries: Team USA, Team Canada, and Team World. The new format was designed to highlight the growth of the women’s game outside of the USA and the PHF’s ability to hire talent from all over the world thanks to its salary cap increase. The PHF’s salary cap is now the highest of any women’s professional sports league.
The three teams played a round-robin format and only moved to a shootout if necessary, unlike last year where the shoot out was a built-in feature of the tournament. Team USA was led by Madison Packer after the player vote for team captain tied multiple times between Jillian Dempsey and Packer and was only decided when Dempsey pulled herself from the running so Packer’s children could watch her captain the team live. Indeed Packer’s children were present and contributed to some excellent Twitter content!
During the first game between Team USA and Team Canada, the teams were all tied (1-1) at the end of regular time, with goals from Boston’s own Loren Gabel for Team Canada and Shiann Darkangelo of the Toronto Six for Team USA.
In the game deciding shootout, Team Canada’s Brittney Howard then scored and the game was over after Boston’s Goalkeeper playing for Team Canada Corrine Schroeder held strong against Team USA.
The next game was Team USA vs Team World and Fanni Gasparics began an incredible run, scoring 4 goals in a row over the next two games. Team World genuinely looked like they were having all the fun with jubilant “unicorn” stick-to-forehead celebrations that Team Canada stole only to have them stolen back in World’s win in the second game.
Playing for Team World, Metropolitan Riveters Fanni Gasparics’s heroics were enough to take down Team Canada once, followed by Team USA. When Team World faced the Canadians again in the final, however, Boston’s league-best goalie, Corinne Schroeder seemed to have learned from the last game and made three amazing saves in a row to clinch a win for her team. Boston Pride’s Loren Gabel was also instrumental in Team Canada’s run, with 3 goals and 1 assist in the tournament. In the end, Loren Gabel took MVP and Corinne Schroeder took best Goalkeeper and, as Captain Kaleigh Fratkin in a post game interview put it, Canada defended “our house.”
This weekend was not so much about the competition however, but a way to showcase the athletes and the causes they care about. As someone who works with LBGTQ+ youth, it was also incredible to see Madison Packer using the event to raise money for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention and the Trevor Project, both of who do really important work for that community. Packer also had this amazing basketball-style gloved dunk shot that didn’t count, but made everyone laugh.
Overall the event seemed to run more smoothly than last year, at least from what I could see on ESPN. The format and the fun the players were clearly having made for excellent entertainment. So happy to see these players in a professional women’s league getting the attention they deserve!
Boston Women's Sports 
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