i walked by emily brown and anna wilgren at pride. i didnt know it was them. i complemented their shirts because they were funny. emily said thank you. and then i recognized them. best and worst day of my life.
I've been thinking about Seattle's choice to protect Wilgren a lot because that was probably the one that took me by surprise the most.
So I sat down to compare stats between Barnes and Wilgren (below the cut)
Wilgren made 60k
Barnes made 70k
not a huge difference, but might be enough to matter in terms of salary cap etc.
Wilgren - 30 games played - 3 goals, 7 assists - 10 points
Barnes - 30 games played - 3 goals, 5 assists - 8 points
pretty similar - let's break that down
Barnes scored a power play goal this year, but no shootouts or game winners. One of the goals she scored was an empty-netter. And she scored one all by herself (no assists).
Barnes had two assists on game tying* goals (Jan 18 2026 and Apr 25 2026).
Wilgren scored no power play goals, but did have 1 shootout goal in 3 shootout attempts and 1 game winning goal (Apr 22 2026).
In the same game that she scores the game winner (Apr 22 2026) she also assisted on two of the other goals scored; so 3 of 5 goals in that win can be traced back to her.
Wilgren had an assist on a game winning goal (Dec 23, 2025), had an assist on a game tying* goal (Jan 3 2026) and also scored a shoot out goal in that same game. Additionally, a couple of times this season she has assisted on the only Seattle goal scored in the game (Jan 25 2026 and Mar 13 2026).
tbh both Wilgren and Barnes kept us in that heartbreaking Vancouver game we lost on April 18 2026 - Wilgren had two goals, Barnes had a goal and two assists and we needed all of that...to lose (thanks ex-coach).
*note: I'm using the phrase "game tying goal" to mean a goal that tied the game and forced the game to OT - not just anytime a team ties it up with a goal.
Wilgren - 36 hits
Barnes - 16 hits
I feel like I've heard Meghan Turner say they want a Fleet-like defense. So protecting Wilgren makes sense to me looking at total hits this season.
worth noting that penalty minutes are up significantly for both of them this year (Barnes had 12 minutes last year, Wilgren 8 minutes last year)
though both of them did see an increase in their overall and average time on ice (see below) - so maybe it's a case of just having more minutes on the ice to commit those penalties?
Wilgren (this year) - 602:30 Total TOI - 20:05 TOI/GP
Wilgren (last year) - 497:41 Total TOI - 16:35 TOI/GP
Barnes (this year) - 698:44 Total TOI - 23:17 TOI/GP
Barnes (last year) - 654:21 Total TOI - 21:48 TOI/GP
So, all in, for 10k less in salary - we get a defender who helps generate the only offense the team sees in some games, who can score shootout goals, who assists or scores in clutch moments (game winning and game tying goals), and who plays physically (36 hits!).
Hopefully her penalty minutes come down with a new coach and system. But other than that, I don't really see a downside to protecting Wilgren at all.
(I did not include Tejralová in this because imo it's harder to do a straight comparison when she played 7 games less than the other two because of injury and suspension. She's also 3 years older than the other two and while that's not a huge amount, I wonder how much that plays into the decision when Carpenter was already locked down so they knew they'd have a veteran leader on the team already.)
