PWHL head coaching role new challenge for former Huskies, Blades coach Bumstead

There hasn’t been much in the way of a summer break for Christine Bumstead this year, given a plate of new responsibilities she’s earned with the Seattle Torrent of the Professional Women’s Hockey League.

When Saskatoon Blades head coach Dan DaSilva gave her a call last month ahead of training camp, however, it was a reunion at SaskTel Centre which she couldn’t pass up.

“Dan called me and asked if I was available to come out and hop on the ice,” Bumstead said. “It was as an immediate yes as I could make it with my schedule.”

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Bumstead has returned to Saskatoon, the same city which has prepared her for the biggest coaching opportunity of her career.

After spending the 2025-26 PWHL season as an assistant coach on the Torrent bench, Bumstead will head back to Washington state this fall as the organization’s new head coach after being promoted in June.

While it’s a role she’s spent years chasing after, she said it will be about seizing each opportunity which comes her way.

“It’s an honour and it’s humbling,” Bumstead said. “At the same time, you’re not there. You got to still earn it, show up and earn it every day.

Seattle Torrent head coach Christine Bumstead (pictured) assisted the Western Hockey League’s Saskatoon Blades on the opening day of training camp on Aug. 28, 2026. (Rick Elvin/Saskatoon Blades)

“For me, the trust from (general manager) Meghan Turner and the rest of the organization is huge. Now, it’s just about living up to it and taking the season by the horns.”

Bumstead spent four years coaching in Saskatoon, hired by the University of Saskatchewan Huskies women’s hockey team in 2021 as an assistant coach.

The 30 year old helped the Huskies to three playoff appearances and two trips to U Sports national championships, while running the team’s defence and penalty kill.

In 2023, Bumstead became the first woman to coach with the Western Hockey League’s Blades as a development coach, a role which she held for two seasons.

DaSilva said it was great not only to have Bumstead out to training camp, but to watch her rapid ascent in the coaching world to the PWHL.

“Obviously it’s a credit to her,” DaSilva said. “Being a head coach in the PWHL is no easy feat and she’s climbed the ladder fairly quickly. She obviously did a great job with us for a couple of years in a development coach role.”

Along with her time spent with the Huskies and Blades, Bumstead coached at the WHL Cup with Team Manitoba, served as head coach and general manager for Canada’s women’s team at the 2024 World Deaf Ice Hockey Championship and has spent time at the NHL level as a guest coach at development camp for the Florida Panthers and Seattle Kraken.

All those experiences have now led Bumstead to a professional head coaching role.

“You’re just there to learn, observe and always taking things away,” Bumstead said. “That’s the mindset I’ve always had. It’s those learning experiences and opportunities that just prepare me for the next opportunities when they come.”

Bumstead will take over a Seattle team which finished last place in the PWHL with an 8-1-5-16 record to finish their inaugural season with 31 points. While there is a push for the team to try to compete for a playoff spot in 2026-27, Bumstead said there are positives to take over from their first season in the league.

“I think we laid a good foundation,” Bumstead said. “Foundation isn’t always measured by the wins and losses, I think it’s about knowing who you are. I think as a group, we know who we are now. It’s about showing up who we are every night.”

Seattle will have to compete this winter without American hockey legend Hilary Knight, who was traded to the PWHL’s expansion franchise in Detroit over the off-season.

The Torrent also lost several veterans in free agency and 2026 expansion process including Cayla Barnes, Hannah Bilka, Corrine Schroeder and Megan Carter.

Led by Abbey Murphy, who was selected second overall in the 2026 PWHL Draft, Bumstead expects Seattle to be a hard-nosed team and will demand as much out of new and returning faces.

“The decisions I have to make are different this year,” Bumstead said. “It’s always showing up authentically to me. I am pretty competitive – I think it’s the red hair in me sometimes when it comes out – but they know that and see that in me.”

Even with the increased decision-making on her end in terms of ice-time and lineups, the fact Bumstead has already earned a professional head coaching opportunity is something that is still a bit surreal – especially considering years of fighting and advocacy for a unified women’s professional league.

Christine Bumstead (pictured) will take on head coaching duties for the Seattle Torrent after serving as an assistant coach during the team’s inaugural season in 2025-26. (Seattle Torrent/Facebook)

“This was never something I could have imagined when I was growing up playing,” Bumstead said. “It’s really cool that a lot of those players in the league now are builders of it.”

Surrounded by the most talented women in the sport on a daily basis, that level of excellence is still special for Bumstead as she begins her new chapter.

“Sometimes you catch yourself watching in practice how easy some of them make it look,” Bumstead said. “It’s really inspiring to think of how quickly this league has developed in its first three years, heading into year four.”

As for lessons she’s taking back to the PWHL and the Torrent, it’s a blue-collared approach she said has been part of her hockey DNA growing up on the prairies.

“If I didn’t get better today, somebody else did and now they’re ahead of me,” Bumstead said. “Just always with that mindset of getting better every day, being competitive, being consistent and just playing to our identity.”

While she calls Winnipeg home, Saskatoon has taken up a big place in Bumstead’s heart with the hockey community helping to propel her to the PWHL level.

With an exciting new chapter ahead, it’s those faces in rinks across the city which she thinks about before stepping behind the Torrent bench.

“It’s been a nice response to obviously know that there’s people excited and cheering you on,” Bumstead said. “It’s just another group of people that you got to do it for and make proud.”

Bumstead will head back to Seattle next month with training camps slated to open across the PWHL in mid-November.