Seattle Torrent re-sign Olympian and leading goal scorer Alex Carpenter

The Torrent re-signed their leading goal scorer Tuesday, announcing they had inked forward Alex Carpenter to a three-year Professional Women's Hockey League standard player agreement through the 2028-29 season.

Carpenter automatically became one of the team's three protected players as the redistribution of talent to four new expansion teams gets underway.

Carpenter, 32, initially signed a one-year deal with Seattle and appeared in all 30 regular-season games during the Torrent's inaugural season. She was one of the most consistent scorers on a team that often struggled to generate offense. She tied forward Julia Gosling for the Torrent lead in scoring with 20 points and led the team with 12 goals.

Her 440 faceoff wins were 99 more than the next highest PWHL skater, and her success rate of 59.1% was the best among regular takers on the team. She was also a Torrent alternate captain and scored the first penalty-shot goal in PWHL history March 4 against the Ottawa Charge.

Carpenter previously played for the New York Sirens. Through three PWHL seasons, she is tied for third in scoring with 63 points in 80 games. She was a finalist for the PWHL's inaugural Billie Jean King MVP award in 2024.

The Sirens have yet to make the postseason and the Torrent finished last in the eight-team league, so Carpenter hasn't appeared in a PWHL playoff game.

The Massachusetts native represented the United States at the 2026 Olympic Winter Games. Carpenter won her first gold medal after earning silver in 2022 and 2014.

Four new expansion teams - Detroit, Hamilton (Ontario), Las Vegas and San Jose - will pick their foundational players from the existing pool in the coming days. There will be no traditional expansion draft, like Seattle and Vancouver enjoyed last summer. The league shifted to a complicated series of signing windows.

The six PWHL teams that played last season, including Seattle, may protect three players under contract for the 2026-27 season. Teams have until 2 p.m. Wednesday to finalize their list of three.

Players on expiring contracts may sign with any existing team during the current phase, and any signed player automatically counts as one of the existing team's three protections.

Popular guesses for Seattle's protected players were Team USA and Torrent captain Hilary Knight, who is unsigned; forward Hannah Bilka, who is signed through next season; and defender Cayla Barnes, who is the only Torrent player signed through 2027-28. Thanks to Carpenter's signing, at least one of those three will be left unprotected.

Seattle can lose a maximum of four players under contract for 2026-27, but there's no limit on how many players under expiring contracts the teams can lose from their 2025-26 rosters. Knight, Gosling, Emily Brown, Brooke Bryant, Megan Carter, Gabrielle David, Carly CJ Jackson, Mariah Keopple, Sydney Langseth, Theresa Schafzahl, Natalie Snodgrass, Aneta Tejralová, Woodinville's Marah Wagner and Emily Zumwinkle are all on expiring contracts with no rights held.

Names will really start coming off the board when Phase 2 starts Friday. All four expansion teams will acquire five players.

The dust settles with June 17's PWHL entry draft - Seattle's pick is still unknown, but it won't be the first overall selection - and an open signing period that begins June 19, essentially the start of free agency.

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This story was originally published June 2, 2026 at 4:55 PM.