What Went Wrong for the 2025-2026 New York Sirens?

Ahead of the 2025–2026 PWHL season, the New York Sirens were the only original six franchise not to get to the Walter Cup Playoffs. Going into the third year of the league, the leadership group was determined to change that. However, they failed at this objective. They ended the season in 7th place, with 36 points.

Before the reasons behind this can be analyzed, it’s important to contextualize the Sirens’ offseason.

A Complete Shakeup

Sirens leadership never called what they did last season a rebuild. However, it’s hard to say that’s not what it was.

Over the summer, the Sirens lost four of their top five scorers from 2024–2025: Jessie Eldridge (9G, 15A in 30 games), Alex Carpenter (11G, 9A in 26 games), Abby Roque (6G, 11A in 30 games), and Ella Shelton (8G, 8A in 24 games).

This was on top of losing key depth pieces, including Jade Downie-Landry, Chloé Aurard-Bushee, and Élizabeth Giguère. Another key departure was that of goalie Corinne Schroeder, who played in 35 games for New York. In that time, she posted a .924 save percentage and 2.41 goals against average with five shutouts.

Most of these players would be replaced with rookies at the 2025 draft. The Sirens made nine picks in six rounds.

“It was not a decision to be popular,” Sirens general manager Pascal Daoust told the New York Post back in March. “It was a decision to make the organization better in the window that we were in.”

How exactly that shook out varied. In January, the Sirens boasted a seven game point streak, a franchise record. Immediately after this, they lost nine of their next ten games.

Here are some key struggles this team endured.

Road Woes

If you look at the Sirens’ home record, they’re a competitive team. They had a 7–2–2–4 record at home games with 27 points, good for a .600 point percentage. This placed them 4th in the league in terms of winning at home.

Away from home, they managed only a 2–1–1–11 record with nine points and a .200 points percentage. These numbers made them 7th in the league as the away team, leading only the Seattle Torrent.

Only 22 of their 63 goals came on the road. They were the worst in the league in scoring away from home. Across 15 away games, they averaged just 1.46 goals per game, compared to 2.73 goals per game at home.

Goals against numbers tell a similar story. They allowed 34 goals at home (tied with Vancouver for 4th in this stat) and 49 on the road (second-worst, only better than Seattle’s 52). This averages out to 2.26 goals against at home and 3.26 goals against on the road.

This gets worse when you bring in the stats behind another sore spot for the squad.

Special Team Struggles

It became clear very early in the season that the Sirens would be a team that took a lot of penalties, but their penalty kill couldn’t keep up. Its 78.9% efficiency was second-worst in the league, besting only Minnesota. (Minnesota’s kill, however, had around 20 fewer opportunities.) It gave up a league-worst 19 power play goals.

The Sirens’ kill had a league worst 75.5% efficiency on the road. At home, it ranked 5th, with 82.9% efficiency.

The power play didn’t fare much better. With a league-leading 102 opportunities, the Sirens scored just 13 goals on the player advantage for a 12.7% efficency, 6th in the league.

Away from home, this dropped to a league-worst 8.7% efficiency. The home power play came in at 16.1% efficiency, ranked 5th.

The Sirens also gave up a league worst five shorthanded goals.

Key Injuries

You can’t discuss this season of Sirens hockey without mentioning the injuries sustained by Kristýna Kaltounková and Taylor Girard.

Kaltounková, the Sirens’ 1st overall pick in 2025, led all rookies in goals scored with 11. This was despite missing nine games at the end of the season with a lower-body injury and having a five game goalless streak prior to her injury. The total is four more than the next closest rookies and places her within the top 10 goal scorers overall. Her 12 total points were 8th among rookies.

Girard had her breakout season in the PWHL in 2025–2026 after previously putting up high-caliber seasons in the PHF. In just 17 games played in 2025–2026, she had seven goals and one assist.

If these two had been available to the Sirens down the stretch, it’s impossible to say just how different the team’s season could have looked.

Other Missed Time

Zooming out, though, missed time is a theme among the Sirens. Only six Sirens skaters played all 30 games of the season. (This is not counting Denisa Křížová, who was traded to New York at the deadline.)

Other key players who missed games throughout the year included Casey O’Brien (2 games, upper-body injury), Sarah Fillier (1 game, upper-body injury), second-round pick Anne Cherkowski (2 games, non-hockey related procedure) and Captain Micah Zandee-Hart (1 game suspension).

The Sirens also didn’t even start the season with a full roster. Rookie defender Dayle Ross began the year on LTIR.

Taken individually, these smaller absences don’t amount to much. For a young team with a lot of new players, however, it meant more situations where coaching was forced to change lines and less opportunity to develop chemistry that might have already existed in an experienced squad.

Goalie Depth

Kayle Osborne had a back-and-forth season in net as a second year pro and first year starter. In 27 starts, she posted a 2.47 goals against average, a .906 save percentage, and four shutouts.

Her play in the front half of the PWHL season was impressive enough to earn her a spot on Team Canada’s Olympic roster. Prior to the Olympics, she recorded three shutouts, a .917 save percentage, and a goals against average of 2.21.

Osborne struggled in net following the Olympics, where she saw no ice time. In 12 starts following the Games, her save percentage fell to .861, and her GAA fell to 3.08.

New York seemed to have no backup plan in place for if their new starter struggled with a larger workload. Both of their backup goalies were rookies, and Callie Shanahan never exactly came across as reliable. In four appearances, she put up a GAA of 3.02 and a save percentage of .871. Counting only her starts, she had a 3.24 GAA and a save percentage of .853.

Where to Next?

Growing Pains

The gamble Daoust took on rookie talent just might have been worth it, with first-year contributions all over the lineup. The team will be in a strong position if it can keep its young core talent together and allow them to continue to grow as a team. Granted, with expansion looming, this may be an impossible task.

Regardless, retaining O’Brien and Kaltounková, in particular, is a must.

Much of the Sirens issues with offensive chemistry, both 5-on-5 and on the power play, can be boiled down to the fact that most of the team simply lacked experience with one another relative to other teams in the league.

In the future, emphasis should be put on coaching a cleaner game, though the Sirens’ penalties could be viewed as a problem of rookies adjusting to the pros that will fade with time. The same could be, and already has been, said about the squad’s struggles in away venues and with maintaining the quality of play throughout the season.

Blending More Experience

Attracting more veteran forwards would be a way around some prior issues, but it’s difficult to say who would actually end up in New York with much of the league entering free agency.

It should also be a top priority in the offseason to find a goalie who is better able to split ice time with Osborne than Shanahan. While Osborne has flashes of brilliance, she’s not currently at the caliber of Desbiens or Frankel. Playing her as though she is does a disservice to both her talent and the Sirens’ competitive edge. A European goaltender with more experience in the pro leagues over there would be a worthwhile pickup.

Glass Half Full

Despite falling short of the playoffs, the 2025–2026 Sirens squad changed the narrative surrounding their team in many ways. The third season of the team’s existence marked the first time they finished with a winning record on home ice. Their remaining in the playoff race until the end of their 29th game was unprecedented.

They also set new team records for longest win streak (4) and longest point streak (7 games).

It would be a lie to say that expectations were high outside of the locker room. However, the group in that locker room surprised many. It’s clear that while not successful quite yet, the Sirens have a solid foundation of young talent on which to improve. If they are able to build on this in the proper ways and have better luck with injuries, New York Sirens fans have a lot to look forward to.