The Ottawa Charge are down 2–0 in the Walter Cup Finals. They have been outshot in almost every game this postseason. Their best forward, Brianne Jenner, has yet to score a single goal.

And yet, every single game has been decided by one goal. Every single game has gone to overtime.

That is what Gwyneth Philips does.

The 25-year-old American goaltender has been the story of the 2026 PWHL playoffs, and it is not particularly close. While Montreal’s Marie-Philip Poulin and Ann-Renee Desbiens get the headlines that come with playing for the best team in the league, Philips has quietly been putting together one of the most remarkable goaltending performances the league has seen to date.

It started before the playoffs even began. Ottawa needed to win its final regularseason game just to qualify, sitting a single point ahead of Toronto heading into the last day. Philips made 42 saves and shut Toronto out completely. Season saved. In their final four regularseason games combined, she stopped 130 of 132 shots and posted a goals-against average of 0.49. When the pressure was at its highest, she was at her best. That carried straight into the postseason.

Dismantling Boston when no one expected it

Ottawa faced the Boston Fleet in the semifinals, the second-best team in the league with a franchise goalie of their own in Aerin Frankel. Ottawa were outshot in every single game of the series. It did not matter.

Philips made 30 saves in a 3–1 Game Two win to even the series. She made 36 saves in a tense Game 3. Then, in the series-clinching Game 4, Ottawa needed overtime, then needed double overtime, before Michela Cava finally put it away 1:12 into the second extra period. Philips had made 43 saves. She allowed just two goals total across Games two and three combined.

Her final numbers against Boston: a 1.34 goals-against average and a .958 save percentage, were the best of any goalie in the entire playoff bracket. She was named PWHL Player of the Week. Ottawa were through to the Finals for the second year running, and their goalie had carried them every step of the way.

Two overtime losses but Gwyneth Philips did her best

The Walter Cup Finals brought the first ever all-Canadian championship matchup, with Montreal coming in as heavy favourites. Montreal finished first overall in the regular season. They had the deepest roster in the league. They had Poulin, who had already scored two game-winning goals in the semis against Minnesota.

Ottawa scored first in Game 1, as they have done in all six of their playoff games this postseason. They held on until the final three seconds of the third period when Nicole Gosling scored to tie it, the latest regulation goal in PWHL playoff history. Montreal won in overtime, 3–2. 

Even in defeat, Philips had kept Ottawa right in it throughout, turning away a shorthanded breakaway from Laura Stacey in the opening period when the game was still scoreless.

Game two was more of the same. Ottawa scored first again through rookie Sarah Wozniewicz. Montreal tied it early in the second. The two teams played a tight, gripping game through a full period of overtime before Maggie Flaherty ended it for Montreal 3:23 into the extra period, taking a pass from Poulin and one-timing it top shelf with Philips unable to get across in time. Philips had made 27 saves, including six in overtime.

Montreal leads the series 2–0. Every Walter Cup Finals game since 2025 has gone to overtime. Ottawa have now played 12 overtime games between the regular season and playoffs this year combined, and they are still standing.

Gwyneth Philips has recorded some phenomenal numbers

The numbers Philips has put up across her short PWHL career make you stop and reread them.

She carries a .951 save percentage across two full postseasons. The goaltender has made 30 or more saves five times in her 11 career playoff starts. She became the first goalie in PWHL history to surpass 700 saves in a single regular season. Last year, after Ottawa lost the Finals to Minnesota in four straight overtime games, she won the Ilana Kloss Playoff MVP Award, the first goaltender ever to win it and the first player from a losing team.

This year, she has been better. Perhaps most telling of all is a detail that was only broken this postseason: entering the 2026 playoffs, Philips had never once lost a game in regulation in her entire PWHL playoff career. Boston finally handed her that first regulation loss in Game One of the semis. She responded by winning the next three.

Ottawa needs to turn things around

Down 2–0, Ottawa now heads home to Canadian Tire Centre for Games three and 4. No team in PWHL history has ever come back from 2–0 down to win a series. But this Charge team has made a habit of doing what looks impossible.

Ottawa scrambled into the playoffs on the final day of the regular season. They beat a Boston side that outplayed them in every single game. They have stayed within one goal of the best team in the league across two straight overtime Finals games on the road.

For Ottawa to pull this off, their offence needs to convert on the chances Philips keeps earning them. The top line needs to wake up. The home crowd at Canadian Tire Centre needs to do its part. And Gwyneth Philips needs to keep doing exactly what she has been doing all postseason.