Isn't Kansas City supposed to have a newly-built, empty arena? Is it not NHL-approved, or is the NHL not interested in that city? (Not saying they should get a team over Quebec, this just has be curious.)
Sprint Center seats like 17k people for a hockey game. Whether or not it's a decent hockey market remains to be seen, but there was a game played there this preaseason between the Pens and Kings with a sellout crowd.
If Houston gets a team, I have no idea who I'd be cheering for. I'd stick with the Stars, but Houston would be pretty high up for me.
I'm thinking Minnesota moves into the Central, Nashville/Columbus to the Southeast, and Winnipeg to the Northwest. I'd prefer the Stars move, but it just seems unnecessary at this point. Central seems more in the northern part (St. Louis, Chicago, Detroit), and St. Paul is considerably closer to several of those cities. Nashville would be the farthest away, but they could easily shift to the Southeast.
But maybe Vancouver moves to the Pacific, Winnipeg to the Northwest, and then the Stars to the Central. Confusing, I know, but in the end (without any relocations) it looks like this:
Eastern Conference
Atlantic
Pittsburgh
New Jersey
New York R.
New York I.
Philadelphia
Northeast
Boston
Buffalo
Ottawa
Montreal
Toronto
Southeast
Carolina
Florida
Nashville
Tampa Bay
Washington
Western Conference
Central
Columbus
Dallas
Chicago
Detroit
St. Louis
Pacific
Phoenix
Los Angeles
Anaheim
San Jose
Vancouver
Thinking back, Minny stays in the NW (very close to Winnipeg, obviously), So Vancouver moves to the Pacific, Dallas to the Central, Winnipeg to the NW, and Nashville to the SE.
Not great, but I think if Phoenix relocates, I could come up with a better one.
This is perfect, except for the ridiculous idea of moving Columbus to the South East!
houston in the nhl would be pretty freaking great. it would be a natural rival, and i doubt the stars would be losing a lot of fans in the process. houston isn't exactly a dallas stars hotbed right now. everyone i've ever met from houston that is a hockey fan cheers for the wild, thanks to the aeros.
make the aeros an NHL team, and i think things would be very heated and interesting and fun. i'm tired of the battle of alberta, and the battle of pennsylvania, and the battle of ontario...
i want an NHL playoff series called the battle of texas. how fun would that be?
and if people start cheering for houston because it's fresh and new (sorta like that influx of houston texans hats i saw when they got a team), then so be it. even if they start to appear in dallas, that'll just fire up the stars fan base a little more. rivalries breed passion and passion breeds ticket sales. wings fans buying tickets isn't the only reason dallas/detroit is usually so packed. there's a lot of stars fans buying tickets to those games in hopes of seeing us beat detroit.
dallas/houston could be twice that intensity/interest/passion.
plus, we could go to road games to try and fight back a little
as far as waiting to see what happens in phoenix before deciding alignment, or holding out hope that phoenix moving will get us out of the pacific... i don't understand it. wouldn't moving phoenix east only put dallas further west in terms of NHL franchises? if we're in the pacific now, moving the coyotes east of dallas would only make it more likely that dallas stays in the pacific.
That'd be really interesting. I'd have a tough time choosing a #1 between those two if they move here.
I'm kinda hoping if they do, though, they don't keep the name "Aeros". Sure, it is pretty much the only name we've ever had, but I'd wanna see something new.
And as for the whole bandwagoners (sort of), if they don't improve from what they are now, that shouldn't last long at all.
i guess one of the most lasting impression i've had of houston hockey fans was the day we traded for brad richards.
i was in corpus christi for a class/seminar for my job, and i was wearing a sergei zubov tshirt. this girl in the class came up to me and asked me if i heard of the trade, and i told her that i had been on my phone all day trying to see if we'd pull the trigger, and i was thrilled that we had.
she said that she can't stand the stars, but knew johan holmqvist from his time in houston. she said i'd absolutely love him. i never really got a chance to. lol.
but that conversation led to a few other hockey fans chiming in. one other guy who said he lived in dallas in the late 90's said he liked the stars, but 2-3 other people in the class said it was wild all the way for them.
now i'm starting to get off topic, but it was the only time i'd ever been to a non-metroplex texas city at the time... and it freaked me out that all the gas stations had dallas cowboys and mavericks and rangers stuff everywhere. just like here. not a single texans/rockets/astros/spurs thing. i found that odd... and of course no stars stuff anywhere except my own luggage.
then when the texas stars were in the calder cup finals, me and my then-girlfriend-now-wife went down there for a game and to stay with some friends of ours. i didn't see any sports stuff except for longhorns and dallas/texas stars stuff. i thought that was really cool. made me like austin more than i already did. loads of people in texas stars tshirts and dallas stars baseball caps. and i'm not even talking about at the game. i'm talking about at "mighty fine" and the grocery store. lol.
i guess one of the most lasting impression i've had of houston hockey fans was the day we traded for brad richards.
i was in corpus christi for a class/seminar for my job, and i was wearing a sergei zubov tshirt. this girl in the class came up to me and asked me if i heard of the trade, and i told her that i had been on my phone all day trying to see if we'd pull the trigger, and i was thrilled that we had.
she said that she can't stand the stars, but knew johan holmqvist from his time in houston. she said i'd absolutely love him. i never really got a chance to. lol.
but that conversation led to a few other hockey fans chiming in. one other guy who said he lived in dallas in the late 90's said he liked the stars, but 2-3 other people in the class said it was wild all the way for them.
now i'm starting to get off topic, but it was the only time i'd ever been to a non-metroplex texas city at the time... and it freaked me out that all the gas stations had dallas cowboys and mavericks and rangers stuff everywhere. just like here. not a single texans/rockets/astros/spurs thing. i found that odd... and of course no stars stuff anywhere except my own luggage.
Cowboys down there and pretty much anywhere south of the Greater Houston area are all Cowboys' fans. Some big player for them was from around there, and it's just stuck. That, and they want more of a successful team, anyways.
I don't know many NHL fans, but there are a ton that play hockey. Probably nothing compared to Dallas, but it's huge considering how small the market it down here.
Rockets owner has to approve it, I believe. If they wouldn't be able to play at the Toyota Center, then would have to build a new arena and that's pretty much out of the question I would think.
Sprint Center seats like 17k people for a hockey game. Whether or not it's a decent hockey market remains to be seen, but there was a game played there this preaseason between the Pens and Kings with a sellout crowd.
I agree it's validity as a hockey market remains to be seen, but they would be a good alternative to relign the divisions. Perhaps something like:
Anaheim
Colorado
Los Angeles
San Jose
Vancouver
Calgary
Chicago
Edmonton
Minnesota
Winnipeg
Columbus/Detroit/Nashville (the two that don't move)
Dallas
Kansas City
St. Louis
Chicago and Detroit won't get split up unless Detroit goes to the East.
St. Louis is farther west than Chicago as well, but farther south.
Heh, it wouldn't matter if Detroit is the one picked to move east, and I figured Kansas City should be in the same division as St. Louis if they ever got a team.
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And I've never understood why Vancouver isn't in the Pacific. I mean, they're pretty much on the ocean...
Wasn't Vancouver in a division with the California teams before it switched to three divisions per conference? My memory is fuzzy from back then.
Heh, it wouldn't matter if Detroit is the one picked to move east, and I figured Kansas City should be in the same division as St. Louis if they ever got a team.
Wasn't Vancouver in a division with the California teams before it switched to three divisions per conference? My memory is fuzzy from back then.
Vancouver was in the Smythe with Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg, and Los Angeles and then San Jose joined that division when they entered the league.
How much priority is everyone placing on travel and time zones when creating proposals as opposed to what would be actual good rivalries within the division ie reuniting some of the old divisions prior to all the change up back in 1993 as much as possible ? From what I'm seeing, not much of the latter. Which tells me not many of you were fans before the Stars moved to Dallas when they had the top 4 in each div make it and go through the divisional rounds, and I don't mean that to be insulting at all I'm just observing that we're coming from different places on this.
Vancouver was in the Smythe with Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg, and Los Angeles and then San Jose joined that division when they entered the league.
How much priority is everyone placing on travel and time zones when creating proposals as opposed to what would be actual good rivalries within the division ie reuniting some of the old divisions prior to all the change up back in 1993 as much as possible ? From what I'm seeing, not much of the latter. Which tells me not many of you were fans before the Stars moved to Dallas when they had the top 4 in each div make it and go through the divisional rounds, and I don't mean that to be insulting at all I'm just observing that we're coming from different places on this.
i'd also guess that most of us became fans after the move.
imo, the rivalries argument is overstated. divisional rivalries are more relevant in the east (could even exclude the southeast). in the west, off the top of my head, i'd call chi-det, cgy-edm, & la-ana worth any significance. the nhl tried this argument when they made teams play divisional foes 8 times each! when living in l.a., i could only stand watching phoenix play at staples center only so much.
years ago, wasn't toronto in the western conference?
all this said, i agree with the poster who suggested 4 divisions versus the current 6. it becomes easier to arrange teams. it also curbs the problem of the leader of a sorry division getting a higher seed than a team with more points. the main negative is that the math won't work out perfectly (7 & 8 team divisions), but i don't see that as much of an issue.
i'd also guess that most of us became fans after the move.
imo, the rivalries argument is overstated. divisional rivalries are more relevant in the east (could even exclude the southeast). in the west, off the top of my head, i'd call chi-det, cgy-edm, & la-ana worth any significance. the nhl tried this argument when they made teams play divisional foes 8 times each! when living in l.a., i could only stand watching phoenix play at staples center only so much.
years ago, wasn't toronto in the western conference?
all this said, i agree with the poster who suggested 4 divisions versus the current 6. it becomes easier to arrange teams. it also curbs the problem of the leader of a sorry division getting a higher seed than a team with more points. the main negative is that the math won't work out perfectly (7 & 8 team divisions), but i don't see that as much of an issue.
maybe they can get rid of divisions altogether?
I totally agree with the bold part. Four divs, and the divisional playoff format. The 8 in two divs and 7 in the other two isn't an issue. Things will never be perfect anyways.
As far as the rivalries go, that's just the thing. There really aren't any nowadays. Sure you have you Pitt-Philly as maybe the best going or maybe Pitt-Wash, the original 6 will always have something going too, but after that it gets pretty weak and any other rivalries are by chance and short lived.
The real rivalries, the peak of the rivalry, was/were back when it was the divisional playoff format in the 80s and early 90s. That's why as a fan prior to the current format, I'm in favor of the divisional rounds and trying to re-unite the old rivalries as much as possible. As far as the Stars go, we played ( just off the top of my head ) the Blackhawks and the Blues 5 or 6 times each in the playoffs between 1982 and 1991. Talk about hate brewing. Those were real rivalries. You didn't have to wait until game 3 or 4 for a possible story line, they were hated rivals already chomping at the bit ready to go at it before the drop of the puck. Not to mention, The Battle Of Alberta hasn't happened since 1991, which is a shame. They league failed miserably when they pinned div foes against each other 8 times per in the reg season. That's not how to build rivalries at all. It's the playoffs.
While I totally agree with the fact that rivalries are created in the playoffs, not in the regular season. I think the playoff format should remain the same while going back to four divisions. That being the division winners and the six next best teams in the conference make the playoffs. The idea of only the top four in each division just doesn't sound good to me, and I believe that this is how it worked in the year before the NHL switched to the six division format.
While I totally agree with the fact that rivalries are created in the playoffs, not in the regular season. I think the playoff format should remain the same while going back to four divisions. That being the division winners and the six next best teams in the conference make the playoffs. The idea of only the top four in each division just doesn't sound good to me, and I believe that this is how it worked in the year before the NHL switched to the six division format.
No they've never done it that way. It was the top 4 in each div right from I believe 1981 on through 1993, then for the 93-94 season they went to the top 8 in each conference. Off the top of my head it was 1980 that they tried the 1 though 16 format and prior to that it was divisional rounds as well. Going back to the first expansion in 67 they divided the league between the East div and the West div. One of expansion teams and the other the original 6.
Having the divisional rivals battle it out on the way to the conference finals and then Cup final has proven to be the best as far as rivalries go, by far. The NHL has just failed to replicate that in any way and there is no way to replicate it unless they go right back to the way it was. I'm not sure where their priorities lie though knowing Bettman and knowing what Ive heard, it's mostly time zones and travel etc that theyre concerned about. They can easily do both if theyre willing to budge a little. It's never going to be perfect but the old way is about as perfect as it can be while slotting the expanison/relocated teams accordingly and as best as possible.
I'm a big proponent of going back to 4 divisions, but I'm not sure I want to see the old format return where you have to play within your division to start the playoffs. I agree that it would be the most effective way to spark as many rivalries as possible around the league, but from a selfish standpoint I don't like that it would greatly reduce our chances of meeting Edmonton or San Jose in the playoffs.
It's weird, because almost all the teams that generate regular season interest here are currently in the Central. But our old playoff rivals would end up being in the westernmost new division.
No they've never done it that way. It was the top 4 in each div right from I believe 1981 on through 1993, then for the 93-94 season they went to the top 8 in each conference. Off the top of my head it was 1980 that they tried the 1 though 16 format and prior to that it was divisional rounds as well. Going back to the first expansion in 67 they divided the league between the East div and the West div. One of expansion teams and the other the original 6.
I meant the late-90's, or rather only one season that I checked on: 1997-1998. The year before the switch to six divisions. The playoff standings clearly looked like a top 8 in each conference rather than top 4 in each division.
Also the current system isn't that bad on rivalries as even with the system being more random, several teams have meet each other in the playoffs the last few years, which is what you stated is what creates rivalries. Those teams being Chicago/Vancouver, San Jose/Detroit, and Boston/Philadelphia are the first three that come to mind. No doubt there are more.
