Utah NHL Team

The Utah NHL team is a professional ice hockey expansion team that will be based in Salt Lake City. The still-unnamed team will compete in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Central Division in the Western Conference, and will begin play during the league's 2024–25 season. The team will play its home games at the Delta Center, the home of the Utah Jazz of the National Basketball Association (NBA), with plans being made to remodel the arena to make it more suitable for both franchises.

On April 18, 2024, the NHL Board of Governors approved the establishment of a franchise in Salt Lake City, to be owned by businessman and Jazz owner Ryan Smith. In lieu of an expansion draft, to stock the new team, Utah acquired the hockey assets of the Arizona Coyotes franchise, which suspended hockey operations at the same time. The team name, logo, and colors have yet to be announced, though it has been confirmed that the franchise will use the "Utah" state moniker, rather than Salt Lake City.

History

Background and establishment

History of ice hockey in Salt Lake City

Prior to the arrival of the NHL, Salt Lake City had limited ice hockey history. The first team to call the area home, the minor-league Salt Lake Golden Eagles, played 25 seasons across the Western Hockey League (WHL), Central Hockey League (CHL), and International Hockey League (IHL) from 1969 to 1994. Playing out of the Salt Palace for their first 22 seasons and the then-new Delta Center for their final three, the Golden Eagles won two Adams Cup championships in the CHL and two Turner Cup championships in the IHL, before ultimately being sold and relocating to Auburn Hills, Michigan, as the Detroit Vipers after the 1993–94 IHL season.

After just one season out of ice hockey, Salt Lake received another IHL franchise in 1995, as the reigning Turner Cup champion Denver Grizzlies, having been replaced by the newly relocated Colorado Avalanche of the NHL, relocated to the Delta Center for the 1995–96 season as the Utah Grizzlies. The Grizzlies spent two seasons in Salt Lake City proper, including a second consecutive Turner Cup championship in 1996; notably, the Cup-clinching game 4 of the Turner Cup Finals saw an attendance of 17,381, at the time the largest attendance in minor-league ice hockey history. The Grizzlies later moved to the newly constructed E Center (since renamed the Maverik Center) in the suburb of West Valley City for the 1997–98 IHL season, and joined the American Hockey League (AHL) in 2001 alongside five other surviving IHL franchises upon the latter's collapse. However, the Grizzlies voluntarily suspended operations for the 2005–06 season, before being sold to Dan Gilbert, the owner of the NBA's Cleveland Cavaliers, and relocating to Cleveland, Ohio, as the Lake Erie Monsters (later Cleveland Monsters) for the 2007–08 season.

The AHL iteration of the Grizzlies were subsequently replaced by a relocated ECHL franchise of the same name; the franchise had most recently played in Lexington, Kentucky, as the Lexington Men O' War, but had become dormant after the 2002–03 ECHL season. The new Grizzlies began play out of the E Center in 2005, immediately after their AHL predecessor had gone dormant, and have played 19 seasons in the ECHL since. However, the franchise has been comparatively unsuccessful; although they have missed the playoffs only three times, they have won just one division championship and no conference championships, only having reached the conference finals twice.

In addition to these teams, the Delta Center has previously hosted multiple Los Angeles Kings preseason games as part of the NHL's Frozen Fury series. However, the arena was not considered well-suited to host ice hockey on a permanent basis, owing to poor sightlines and broadcasting capabilities. Furthermore, the aforementioned Maverik Center, as well as the Peaks Ice Arena in the suburb of Provo, hosted Winter Olympics ice hockey in 2002, which featured NHL players.

Establishment of the team

Salt Lake City initially emerged as a potential NHL destination in June of 2023, with rumors regarding the Arizona Coyotes' potential relocation spreading after the failure of the New Tempe Arena referendum. Six months later, in January 2024, Ryan Smith, owner of the NBA's Utah Jazz and co-owner of Major League Soccer's Real Salt Lake, petitioned the NHL to begin the process of expansion to Salt Lake City. Discussions to bring an expansion team to the city were revealed to have been underway since early 2022, with the Utah State Senate passing tax legislation in February 2024 to support a new ice hockey-capable downtown arena proposed by Smith.

On April 13, 2024, it was reported that, with the NHL's permission, the Coyotes were making efforts to relocate to Salt Lake City following concerns about an indefinite timeframe on a new arena and the effects of continued play at the 4,600-seat Mullett Arena. The deal became official on April 18 after the NHL Board of Governors voted to establish a team in Utah using the Coyotes' hockey assets; under the terms of the agreement, rather than a formal relocation the Coyotes franchise taking place the Coyotes will be considered "inactive", with Utah regarded as an expansion team in a similar situation to the Cleveland Browns and Baltimore Ravens of the National Football League. While the deal was reported in the media as a $1.2 billion "sale" of the Coyotes, it is in reality two separate transactions in which $1 billion is being paid by the NHL to Meruelo for the Coyotes franchise while Smith is paying a $1.2 billion expansion fee to the NHL's other owners. The $200 million difference is thus in effect a '' de facto'' relocation fee to be shared equally by the other 31 NHL clubs. According to Smith, the team sold more than 11,000 season-ticket deposits in the four hours after going on sale, with 6,000 sold in the first two hours. The team was formally introduced at the Delta Center on April 26, with over 12,000 fans attending a welcome celebration featuring players and coaches.

Team identity

Name

The team was initially introduced without a name, though Smith confirmed on April 18, 2024, that the franchise would use the "Utah" state moniker, rather than Salt Lake City. After emphasizing not wanting to "rush" the naming process, Smith announced on April 22 that the team identity would be chosen via an eight-name bracket, voted on by fans using the Smith-founded Qualtrics platform. In the days surrounding the team's founding, a law firm filed trademarks for a multitude of names on behalf of an anonymously-owned LLC; these included Utah Hockey Club (Utah HC), Blizzard, Fury, Venom, Yetis, Outlaws, Ice, and Mammoth.

Team information

Broadcasting

Television

On April 18, 2024, shortly after the establishment of the team, it was announced that the team had reached an agreement with the E.W. Scripps Company to broadcast Utah NHL games on their Provo-based station KUPX-TV. KUPX, branded as Utah 16, had previously served as a regional affiliate of the Vegas Golden Knights' television network, and also broadcast select Arizona Coyotes games.

Players and personnel

Current roster

Owners

The team is owned by Smith Entertainment Group, which is controlled by businessman Ryan Smith and his wife Ashley.

General managers

* Bill Armstrong, 2024–present

Head coaches

* Andre Tourigny, 2024–present

References

External links

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2024 establishments in Utah
Central Division (NHL)
Ice hockey clubs established in 2024
Ice hockey teams in Utah
National Hockey League teams
Sports in Salt Lake City