The Ideal NHL – Expansion AND Relocation of Franchises

Matt Kartozian-USA TODAY Sports

Relocation: Arizona Coyotes to Salt Lake City, Utah

There is no indication that Utah would support an NHL hockey club, but anything would likely be better than the fiscal failure the Coyotes organization has been as of late. After filing for bankruptcy in 2009 and being forced to sell the franchise to the NHL, former owner Jerry Moyes learned the hard way that NHL hockey just doesn’t work in the desert. The Coyotes were under NHL ownership until 2013 when IceArizona purchased the franchise. But that doesn’t mean attendance is any better. The Coyotes ranked dead last in average attendance last season with 13,776 attendees a game. They ranked 29th in attendance percentage but only because their arena is smaller than the Panthers’. Despite their recent playoff success outpacing that of the Panthers, it is a no-brainer that keeping the team in Arizona is only going to do more harm than help to the NHL, and it is unlikely that they will ever land a big-name free agent seeing as how not many players would want to play there.

Salt Lake City could be to the NHL what the Oklahoma City Thunder is to the NBA. When the Thunder moved from Seattle to Oklahoma City, it was unknown whether the small market would be able to support an NBA franchise. Luckily for the NBA, their experiment worked out, and last season fans filled the 18,203 seats to 100% capacity – one of eight in the league to reach full capacity. Salt Lake City could prove to be a victory for the NHL in that sense, as well as creating a regional rivalry with the Colorado Avalanche whose closest geographical rival – the Minnesota Wild – is almost 700 miles away by plane, and even more when traveling on land. The Avs, whose biggest rivals used to be the now-Eastern Conference Detroit Red Wings, could spark a rivalry with a new NHL team in Salt Lake City.