How did the PWHL pull off a playoff travel nightmare? Behind the scenes on ‘an all-hands-on-deck effort’

Flights had to be booked. Buses had to be arranged. Hotels had to be contacted. And all this had to happen in a matter of hours — after all, one team was going to be flying in to Toronto on Tuesday morning before their game on Wednesday.

It’s a credit to Alexis Miller, the PWHL’s senior director of player experience, who co-ordinates team travel throughout the season, that all of it went off without a hitch, even with the final playoff picture not decided until Sunday, the very last day of the season.

Miller received an early heads-up Monday afternoon directly from Toronto general manager Gina Kingsbury that the team had selected Minnesota as its opponent — news that wouldn’t be shared publicly or with any league or team officials until 7:30 p.m. that night.

Luckily, she had worked out some of the travel details in advance with a travel agency.

Miller already knew the location of some games, with Toronto and Montreal established as the first- and second-place teams back on May 1. That meant Toronto would be hosting games one, two and five of the semifinal.

From there, booking hotels was relatively easy — because no matter what, a road team would be in Toronto on those dates. Miller said the league notified hotels to hold rooms, then once the team was determined, they told the hotel how many single- and double-bed reservations they needed.

Flights were more complicated.

“We were able to look at all of the various scenarios — whether it was Minnesota needing to fly to Toronto or fly to Montreal, whether Boston needed to fly to any location,” Miller explained. “We were able to plan for every scenario going into it, knowing that we would then need to identify the exact scenario at a very last minute.”

The league put holds on plane tickets on various airlines that had the amount of seats the teams needed. It also co-ordinated with bus and trucking companies — companies the league already has relationships with in all four playoff markets — to have those services ready as well.

Then, when the first-round matchups were finalized Monday, they pulled the trigger.

“The travel agency and everybody there was on standby to make all of the calls to say, ‘OK, we’re booking these tickets at this time,’ ” Miller said. “It’s really just an all-hands-on-deck effort.”

So far, things have gone smoothly. Minnesota coach Ken Klee said Monday night he didn’t know what time the team would be flying — but the team still arrived in Toronto on Tuesday morning. Boston will make its way to Montreal by bus on Wednesday.

“It has certainly been a whirlwind, but honestly it’s so exciting,” Miller said. “Coming down to the last regular-season game, having Toronto need to select an opponent and then travel needing to happen about 12 hours later, you truly can’t write a better story.”

Not everyone wants the travel to be smooth. Toronto head coach Troy Ryan is hoping it gives his team a competitive advantage.

“Hopefully it’s difficult for them,” he said.