Sitting comfortably at my desk at 8:07pm EDT, the incomparable Kyle Cushman forcibly woke me from a daze to announce that the Boston Fleet had traded Teresa Schafzahl to the Seattle Torrent for Jessie Eldridge. There’s a lot to unpack here, and since I’m not as smart as Danielle Marmer or Meghan Turner, I’m not going to try to figure out why this trade happened, but instead look at the impact.

PWHL trade: The Boston Fleet have acquired Jessie Eldridge from the Seattle Torrent for Theresa Schafzahl

— Kyle Cushman (@Kyle_Cush) March 17, 2026

At the midseason mark, this feels lopsided in the sense that Jessie Eldrige became a Superstar level scorer last season with New York, and a 0.68 PPG pace, despite losing key supporting scorers in Hilary Knight and Hannah Bilka to injury. For the Fleet, Eldrige will fill the void left by Knight’s departure in the expansion signing window last summer. This should improve the Fleet’s scoring efficiency down the stretch, while making their power play even more threatening by creating a right-handed one-timer option aside from Haley Winn.

For Seattle, Schafzahl arrived at a point where the team needed a shakeup. Their transition game has been lacking, their scoring hasn’t been there, and they haven’t been able to win the tight checking games either. Schafzahl has been an Average producer her entire career with the Fleet after a very efficient career with the University of Vermont. 2025-2026 has already seen her tie her career high in points with 6, and with increased deployments in the attacking zone in Seattle, she should elevate that further. Additionally, she should slot in as an efficient penalty killer to take some pressure off Lexie Adzija, who has been deployed in every situation possible since the Olympic break.

Of note is that both players will be unrestricted free agents at the end of the season.

• Christian