As the end of the 2025–2026 PWHL season looms large, some teams are gearing up for an increasingly tight and exciting playoff race. Meanwhile, others are already looking towards the 2026 draft. The upcoming draft is near-unanimously considered the strongest in league history, with Caroline Harvey projected to go first overall.

Winning the first overall pick can be franchise-altering, and the difference between winning the PWHL Draft and finishing second or third is massive. Unlike the NHL Draft Lottery, the PWHL has the Gold Plan, which rewards teams for winning points after being eliminated. Here’s how it works

What is the PWHL’s Gold Plan?

To understand the Gold Plan, imagine that after a team gets mathematically eliminated from the playoffs, its point total resets. From then on, teams still get points under the same 3–2–1 point system. However, instead of earning points to determine playoff seeding, they are earning points to determine which team gets which pick. This is why the term “draft order points” is occasionally used in this context.

In other words, the team that earns the most points after being eliminated also earns the first overall pick.

The ultimate aim of the system, according to the PWHL, is “to encourage competitive play by all teams throughout the full regular season.” It’s also good for fans, who no longer need to root for their favourite team to lose to have a more ideal draft placement.

Pros and cons of the PWHL’s Gold Plan

The Gold Plan was created with the intent to eliminate any benefit a team may earn from intentionally losing under a lottery system. However, there is an argument that this does not prevent teams from intentionally losing to be eliminated faster.

With only eight teams in the PWHL and three points up for grabs with every regulation win, the standings can change so quickly that the value of losing when there is a chance at the playoffs comes across as overstated. As the league expands, this strategy could come into play, but it’s not a real factor yet.

Some critics of the plan suggest that it rewards teams that barely miss the playoffs because they have more capacity to earn points than lower-ranked teams. However, this balances out when considering that teams eliminated earlier have a greater window of opportunity to earn points.

When could the Gold Plan start?

As of this morning, all teams have eight games remaining on the schedule, leaving an opportunity for all to earn 24 points. Nothing is set in stone. It’s not yet mathematically possible for any particular team to win all of its games.

However, if the Toronto Sceptres had a stretch in which they won all of their games in regulation. At the same time, the Seattle Torrent lost all of their games in regulation; the Torrent would be eliminated after three Sceptres wins, coinciding with the Sceptres’ game on April 1.

This is the earliest possible point of elimination for Seattle. It also means that the earliest possible point at which a team could begin acquiring draft order points would fall on the Torrent’s April 4th game against the New York Sirens at Madison Square Garden.

Expansion makes things interesting

In the previous two seasons of the PWHL, only two teams failed to make the playoffs both years. In both of those, the New York Sirens, the last-place team in the league, won the Gold Plan by virtue of the fact that in either campaign, no other team was eliminated until the last game of its season, giving them no time to accumulate points.

Now, with eight teams in the league, elimination starts sooner. There will be more competition for the first overall pick than ever before. Even if playoffs aren’t in sight, fans of eliminated teams should still expect fun, high-stakes hockey.