Top 4 PWHL Goaltenders: 2025–26 Fantasy Hockey Review & 2026–27 Outlook.
The goaltending in the PWHL has never been better. In its third season, the league continues to attract elite netminders at every level — veterans who have been to the Olympic podium, crafty young starters who have stolen the show in the playoffs, and everywhere in between. For fantasy managers, PWHL goaltending is the foundation of any winning roster, and these four names need to be on your radar. Here is a deep dive into the top four goaltenders from the 2025–26 season, how they performed, and what to expect from each heading into next year.
1. Aerin Frankel — Boston Fleet
Position: Goaltender | Catches: Left | Contract: Signed through 2027–28
Season Review
If there was any doubt heading into the 2025–26 season about where Aerin Frankel stood in the pecking order of PWHL goaltenders, she erased it before the calendar even flipped to December. Frankel opened the season in a manner that bordered on supernatural, helping the Boston Fleet run the table in their first seven games with a 0.45 goals-against average and a .985 save percentage — numbers that had the entire hockey world rubbing its eyes in disbelief. She recorded three shutouts in those first seven outings alone, including two in the first three games to help Boston become only the second team in PWHL history to open a season with three straight regulation wins.
The Green Monster, the nickname bestowed on her by Boston fans and media, a nod to the iconic left field wall at Fenway Park, is the most decorated goaltender in the brief but star-studded history of the PWHL. She was a finalist for the PWHL Goaltender of the Year award for the second consecutive season and is the only goalie in league history to surpass 1,000 career saves, a milestone she reached back in January 2025. Her 2025–26 campaign saw her set a PWHL record with seven shutouts in 22 starts, including three consecutive blanks, another league record, and a scoreless streak of 236 minutes and 45 seconds that made opposing forwards look lost at sea.
Off the ice, Frankel brought added momentum into the season fresh off one of the most decorated stretches of her career on the international stage. At the 2026 Milan Olympics, she went 5–0 with a .980 save percentage and became the first goaltender in the history of Olympic women’s hockey to record three shutouts in a single tournament. She shut out Canada in Olympic play, a feat that had never been accomplished by an American netminder before. She returned to Boston a gold medalist and a genuine global star, and the city was waiting with open arms.
Fantasy Outlook for 2026–27
In fantasy hockey, Frankel is as close to a sure thing as the PWHL offers. She is locked into Boston through the 2027–28 season, so there are no contract concerns, and the Fleet continue to build a strong team around her. She leads the league in shutouts, consistently ranks at the top in save percentage and goals-against average, and has the workload of a true number one starter. If she is available in your draft, she should be your first goaltender off the board without hesitation. Frankel is not just a fantasy asset, she is the fantasy asset in the PWHL.
Fantasy Grade: S-Tier | Must-Start Every Week
2. Raygan Kirk — Toronto Sceptres
Position: Goaltender | Catches: Left | Contract Status: Unrestricted Free Agent
Season Review
Of all the stories in the PWHL this season, Raygan Kirk’s emergence as one of the league’s top goaltenders may have been the most compelling. Entering 2025–26 as the only returning goaltender on a heavily reshuffled Toronto roster, Kirk was asked to step into a starting role she had never fully held at the pro level, and she delivered in a way that no one outside of the Sceptres locker room saw coming.
Kirk finished the season with a 1.90 goals-against average that ranked third-best in the entire PWHL, and her eight wins included three shutouts, all of which came in a remarkable late-season run beginning March 15th that had Toronto pushing hard for a playoff spot. Her back-to-back shutout performances in mid-March were the talk of the league, stopping Seattle dead in its tracks and turning heads across the hockey world. She became the first Toronto goaltender to face, and stop a penalty shot, and she did it in the very first game of the season, a 30-save performance in a 2–1 win over the defending champion Minnesota Frost on opening night.
Kirk’s backstory adds even more to the narrative. Drafted in the seventh round — 42nd overall — in the 2024 PWHL Draft, she was one of the most undervalued selections in league history. She spent five years in the NCAA, first at Robert Morris where she was named to the CHA All-Rookie Team and won a conference championship, then at Ohio State where she went 22–2–0 with ten shutouts and backstopped the Buckeyes to the 2024 NCAA National Championship with a 27-save shutout in the title game. She came into the PWHL quietly, and in Year 2 she made enough noise for everyone to hear.
Fantasy Outlook for 2026–27
Here is where fantasy managers need to pay attention, and pay attention fast. Kirk is an unrestricted free agent heading into the offseason, and her contract situation is one of the most important storylines in the PWHL this summer. She has confirmed that her current deal expires at the end of this season and that extension discussions have been left for the offseason. If Kirk re-signs with Toronto, she is an immediate top-three fantasy goaltender next season. She has the numbers, the workload, and the competitive mentality of a starter who is only going to get better. If she walks in free agency and lands somewhere with a strong team in front of her, her value could jump even higher depending on the destination. Keep your eye on Kirk’s contract situation this summer. She may be the most important free agent in women’s hockey.
Fantasy Grade: A-Tier | Top-Five Goaltender if Re-Signed | Watch the UFA Market Closely
3. Gwyneth Philips — Ottawa Charge
Position: Goaltender | Catches: Left | Contract: Signed through 2026–27
Season Review
There is a version of this story where Gwyneth Philips spends the entire 2024–25 season as Ottawa’s backup, never gets her shot, and quietly works her way into a starting role the following year. That is not what happened. Instead, Philips stepped in after veteran starter Emerance Maschmeyer suffered an injury in March 2025, went 8–5–1 with a 2.11 goals-against average and a .919 save percentage to close out the regular season, then proceeded to carry the Ottawa Charge to the PWHL Finals in one of the most jaw-dropping postseason goaltending performances the league has ever seen.
In the 2025 playoffs, Philips went 4–0–4, never losing a game in regulation, with a 1.23 goals-against average and a .952 save percentage. She led all playoff goaltenders with 257 saves, a number so staggering it was more than 100 saves ahead of the second-place finisher. She became the first rookie goaltender in PWHL history to record a postseason shutout, and she was awarded the inaugural Ilana Kloss Playoff MVP award. For her efforts, she was named a finalist for both the PWHL Rookie of the Year and Goaltender of the Year awards in the same season.
And then she did it again. In the 2025–26 season, now the unquestioned starter in Ottawa having signed a two-year extension on July 27, 2025, Philips picked up right where she left off. In the season opener, she set a career high with 38 saves. She carried the Charge through another playoff run, making 30 saves in a 3–1 win over the Boston Fleet in Game 2 of the 2026 semifinals, part of a postseason performance that once again put her in elite company among the league’s best netminders. Entering this year’s playoffs, her track record in high-leverage situations was already among the most impressive in PWHL history for a goaltender in just her second professional season.
What makes Philips so special, beyond the raw numbers, is her pedigree and her composure. She left Northeastern as the NCAA’s all-time career save percentage leader at .958 — a record that stands to this day — and she won gold for Team USA at the 2025 World Championship as the overtime-winning goaltender after entering in relief of an injured Aerin Frankel. Big moments do not rattle Gwyneth Philips. They seem to fuel her.
Fantasy Outlook for 2026–27
Philips is locked in as Ottawa’s starter through next season, which gives fantasy managers the certainty they crave. The Charge play a grinding, defensive-minded structure in front of her that keeps shots manageable and tends to favor a goaltender’s numbers, as her postseason GAA numbers prove. The one wild card is the PWHL expansion draft, which could strip Ottawa of some roster pieces and affect the team’s defensive depth in front of her. Ottawa protected her ahead of the expansion process, so Philips herself is safe, but the team around her bears watching. Regardless, she is a top-three goaltender in the PWHL and one of the safest fantasy investments at the position going into 2026–27.
Fantasy Grade: A-Tier | Top-Three Goaltender | Locked In as Ottawa’s Starter
4. Maddie Rooney — Minnesota Frost
Position: Goaltender | Catches: Right | Contract: Signed through 2027–28
Season Review
In a league where the goaltending conversation often begins and ends with Aerin Frankel, Maddie Rooney has spent three seasons quietly building one of the most consistent résumés of any netminder in the PWHL. The 2018 Olympic gold medalist, famous for stopping Meghan Agosta in the decisive round of the shootout to hand the United States its first gold medal in 20 years, has been the heartbeat of a Minnesota franchise that has appeared in the postseason in each of the league’s three seasons.
The 2025–26 campaign was Rooney’s most complete regular season yet. Sharing duties in a well-managed tandem with Nicole Hensley, Rooney made 16 starts and posted a .921 save percentage, fourth best among all PWHL goaltenders entering the playoffs. The Frost finished third in the league with a franchise-record 50 points, and while their offence was the flashiest part of the story, Minnesota scored a record-breaking 91 goals led by Kelly Pannek, Taylor Heise, and Britta Curl-Salemme, it was Rooney and Hensley who kept the ship steady on the nights when the goals were harder to come by.
Rooney’s value has always been in her composure and her big-game performances. In the 2025 PWHL Finals, she took over in net for Game 2 against Ottawa and responded with a career-high 37 saves in a 2–1 win, then backed it up with 35 saves in a triple-overtime victory in Game 3. She holds the all-time PWHL record for career shutouts across both the regular season and playoffs, and her playoff résumé — eight wins, two shutouts, a 1.46 goals-against average and a .939 save percentage — is the stuff of franchise legend. The Frost have been to three consecutive postseasons, and Rooney has been the backbone of that consistency.
Fantasy Outlook for 2026–27
Rooney is under contract through the 2027–28 season, which is a significant advantage for fantasy planning. Minnesota is built to win now — their offence is the best in the PWHL, their organizational depth is strong, and they head into the offseason as a genuine Walter Cup favourite for a fourth straight year. The question around Rooney in fantasy circles is not her ability — it is her workload. Minnesota operates a genuine two-goalie system, and Hensley’s presence means Rooney will not carry a full starter’s load in terms of game volume. That said, her start quality is consistently elite, and she tends to be handed the ball in the biggest games. For fantasy managers who can account for split starts, Rooney is still a top-four goaltender in the PWHL. For formats that reward wins and shutouts over pure volume, she may rank even higher than that.
Fantasy Grade: A-Tier | Elite Numbers, Watch Workload Split | Three-Year Contract Provides Stability
– By Nathan Add – The Add List +