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I don’t think I’d be making a particularly controversial statement by saying the NHL has traditionally been a league largely reserved for white dudes, but the Seattle Kraken have made a notable stride forward after becoming the first team in its history to hire a female to coach behind the bench in the form of Jessica Campbell.
It’s been seven years since the NHL launched its “Hockey Is For Everyone” initiative in an attempt to position itself as a league that welcomes people of all races, genders, and sexual orientations.
That push has left a bit to be desired thanks in no small part to the self-inflicted Pride Tape Debacle it found itself dealing with last season, and while it has made strides over the decades when it comes to addressing a player demographic that can be accurately described as “Glaringly Caucasian,” it’s still not exactly a beacon of diversity on that front.
It also goes without saying that the NHL is far from the only major sports league where women aren’t heavily represented when it comes to supporting roles off of the ice. There are a handful of teams who’ve hired female employees to work in prominent roles in the front office, but unlike the NBA and MLB, no franchise has ever gone that route when it comes to a visible coaching job—until now.
According to ESPN, the Seattle Kraken have become the first team in NHL history to hire a woman as an assistant coach after securing the services of Jessica Campbell, a Saskatchewan native who played college hockey at Cornell and pivoted to coaching in Europe in the late 2010s after a stint in the CWHL.
In 2022, Campbell was hired as an assistant coach for the Coachella Valley Firebirds (Seattle’s AHL affiliate), and on Wednesday, she was called up to the big time prior to the start of a season when she’ll officially become the first woman to coach behind the bench in an NHL game (she ran the power play for the Firebirds in addition to focusing on the development of their offensive talent, so it’s safe to assume she’ll have a similar role with the Kraken).
It’s worth noting Campbell isn’t the first female with a full-time coaching role in the NHL. That honor belongs to Emily Engel-Natzke, who was hired as the video coordinator for the Washington Capitols in 2022.