By Adam Floujeh
It would have been the start of fall semester in 2023 when I was asked to come onboard with Intermission Sports by our Editor-in-Chief, Mitchell Fox.
The timing could not have been any more perfect. That semester, Mitchell and I were taking a reporting sports class together at Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU) that was being taught by CBC columnist Shireen Ahmed.
Shireen treated everyone in that group like colleagues, not students—there was an immense level of respect for us and it went both ways.
Anyone who was in that class would tell you how special it was. There was an unspoken standard for us all and between us all. No one wanted to give Shireen any piece of work that was below par and she expected great work from us. When we didn’t deliver she would let us know, but in a constructive and respectful way because she knew what we were capable of producing.
If you ask me, Shireen never set out to teach us how to write about sports, she instead taught us how to be professionals. I’d like to think we all took those lessons to heart. I know I did.
I met a lot of good friends in that class. People who have helped me in too many ways to count and many who would end up taking the same journey as me over the next few months, both in and out of that classroom.
Over the rest of fall semester and the start of winter, I put more focus on Intermission, trying to prove to Mitchell I was a reliable and talented writer. I credit many of those early articles with helping me really define my writing style and how I wanted to tell stories. The stars all aligned, however, when the PWHL started up in the new year.
Enter the PWHL
The now-named Toronto Sceptres (then PWHL Toronto) played their inaugural season at the Mattamy Athletic Centre (MAC), formerly Maple Leafs Garden. For those who aren’t familiar, the MAC is where a lot of TMU’s athletics host their games and by mid-January, Intermission was given media credentials.
Now feels like the right time to express some gratitude to the Toronto Sceptres and their PR department. They’ve given myself and countless others the opportunity to live out a dream by giving us the chance to cover them.
It still boggles my mind that more students haven’t taken the opportunity to write for outlets like Intermission, OTL Sports or Girls Sports Club that provide a space for student writers to cover games like these, especially last season. Toronto were playing in our backyard and the league were—and still are—willing to have student media there.
When a new professional sports league starts up, you should be itching to report on it. I jumped at the first opportunity and its been more fulfilling than I could ever have imagined.
First Game
Our coverage began right as the Sceptres started a massive winning streak. Mitchell covered our first game, which was Toronto’s first home win of the season. My work with Intermission paid off as he gave me the opportunity to cover our second match.
It was around the NHL’s All Star break and Toronto were playing against the Minnesota Frost (then PWHL Minnesota). As you may imagine, I was terrified. It was the first pro hockey game I had ever covered.
Whenever I cover a game, I not only try to represent Intermission in the best light possible, but whether she knows or not, I try to represent Shireen as one of her former students as well.
The first question I ever asked was to Sceptres captain Blayre Turnbull. I remember I was building up the courage to ask and the hand that was holding my phone up to capture audio was getting increasingly shaky (not to mention my heartbeat was blasting). I think it was a question about the original Battle on Bay Street being sold out in 30 minutes or something along those lines. I don’t remember for sure, the nerves were too much.
Allez Montréal
There’s a special place in my heart for Montreal. I spent some years living there and I was born and raised a Canadiens fan. So you know I tried my best to get the first Toronto/Montreal matchup possible and I was successful—I got to go alongside two of my friends from Shireen’s class.
I was writing a story about the PWHL’s willingness to try new rules and wanted some quotes from Montreal forward Laura Stacey and another notable member of the Victoire…
In easily the largest scrum I’ve ever been part of, I somehow got in a question to—you guessed it—Marie-Philip Poulin. Julia Tocheri, who was still at TSN at the time, actually let me get the question in before her own, a sign of the community I’ve been glad to be part of around the PWHL. I made sure to thank her afterwards because after her, the scrum was ended by Montreal’s PR team.
I still get emotional thinking about it. A friend of mine who was also covering that game happened to have taken a video of the scrum and panned over to me when I asked that question.
I remember being on the subway back to Union Station with her and another friend and I just started crying because…well, come on. I just got to ask Marie Philip-Poulin a question. At some point, getting the chance to speak with professional athletes starts feeling somewhat normal but I never EVER want to forget that feeling.
If I’ve learned anything in my 25-years on this planet it's that nothing comes easy. This isn’t the time or place to delve into my life story, but the past nine-years haven’t exactly been a walk in the park for me. I don’t actually know if I’ve ever told anyone this, but that scrum and the feeling I had afterwards, as silly as this may sound, was probably one of the happiest moments of my entire life. Maybe the happiest. It was a moment where I thought to myself, ‘It has all been worth it.'”
Again, I practically grew up idolizing every aspect of Montreal hockey, and I got to speak with one of the greatest French-Canadian hockey players of all time, maybe the greatest of my lifetime.
It's something that everyone in this industry dreams of doing.
It’s Special
A much more lighthearted moment came during a Boston/Toronto matchup. As I was getting food in the media room with a fellow student-media member, we jokingly asked, “Have we made it?”
There have been so many times I’ve been speaking to fellow students who are also covering the PWHL and thinking to myself ‘there's no way this is real?”
One such occasion came before game two of Toronto and Minnesota’s opening round matchup of the inaugural Walter Cup Playoffs.
About five of us were sitting in the overflow media section before a single fan had entered the building.
I’m someone who needs to be early to everything. Sometimes it leaves me pacing outside an arena for 30-minutes during the ever-harsh Toronto winter, waiting for doors to open, but the magical part of doing that when you cover a sporting event is seeing the arena slowly fill up with fans. The atmosphere was unreal that entire night at Coca-Cola Coliseum—their playoff home last year and now their full-time home arena—and that sellout crowd was ready to pop the entire night for a goal. It all built up to Jesse Compher’s last-minute goal to win game two.
I can still remember hearing fans cheering and chanting as they were leaving the arena, a raucous we could hear from the interview area Toronto used at that time.
Battle on Bay Street 2.0
Fast forward to Jan. 26, 2025, a day after I got the chance to cover the PWHL’s second Battle on Bay Street.
Nothing gets me more amped for a hockey game than a packed house singing ‘Oh Canada’ and hearing that as a member of the media was surreal. A sold-out Scotiabank Arena belting out the national anthem was, quite simply, magical.
It wasn’t just the crowd that made it special, it was the circumstance too.
Sitting in the media seating with me were my friends, all chasing that same dream together. All covering the game together.
Two of them were from Shireen’s class, one was a fellow Intermission writer who took her class last semester and the last had the privilege of having that game as his first-ever pro game as a media member.
You couldn’t make it up.
The Dream
When I write a PWHL article I think of a few things:
Is this good enough for Intermission Sports?
Is this good enough for Shireen?
Is this good enough for the PWHL?
Is it as good as anything one of my friends or colleagues would produce?
If I ever feel like the answer is ‘no’ to any of those questions, there’s probably no point writing it.
There’s a sense of pride that I refuse to damage because I don't want to let anyone down who's helped me get to where I am today. I won’t allow it.
But there’s a balance.
As hard as I can be on myself, I never want to lose the feeling of being a fan and loving covering the game of hockey. I never want to lose that feeling because being a fan is what led me here in the first place.
I was once told by an old boss to never lose my smile because it would take me far in life. Although that’s easier said than done some days, moments like game two against Minnesota and Battle on Bay Street Two will always bring a smile to my face. It’s made whatever hurdles I’ve had to face in life feel worth it.
How don’t you get emotional when you’re living the dream?