History UsefulNotes / NationalHockeyLeague

When a fight is going on, play stops completely. The linesmen only intervene when either nothing is happening even a brief lull counts), a player is getting utterly shit-stomped, or both players fall to the ice. If someone else tries to come in and double-team, the linesmen will put a stop to it immediately. Almost always, the fight will cause the crowd to get into it, even if the home team is down by several goals, and is an effective way at livening up an otherwise-dull affair.

When a fight is going on, play stops completely. The refs only intervene when either nothing is happening, a player is getting utterly shit-stomped, or both players fall to the ice. If someone else tries to come in and double-team, the refs will put a stop to it immediately. Almost always, the fight will cause the crowd to get into it, even if the home team is down by several goals, and is an effective way at livening up an otherwise-dull affair.

Line brawls are very rare, and almost always stem from rivalries or anger. Almost always, all five skaters on each side throw down, and sometimes [[BigFun even the two goalies]] will go at it. All players participating get five-minute majors, only the one who sparked the conflict gets the instigator penalty, and everyone has to skate on over to the penalty box to wait out the five minutes rather than just running off five minutes from the clock.

The National Hockey League (NHL) is the top-level professional UsefulNotes/IceHockey league in North America, and is the fifth wealthiest sports league in the world.[[note]]The number 1-4 spots go respectively to the UsefulNotes/NationalFootballLeague, UsefulNotes/MajorLeagueBaseball, the UsefulNotes/NationalBasketballAssociation, and the UsefulNotes/EnglishPremierLeague.[[/note]] Founded in 1917, it is currently composed of 33 teams (with one inactive): 26 in the UsefulNotes/UnitedStates and seven in UsefulNotes/{{Canada}}, with [[UsefulNotes/{{Utah}} Salt Lake City]]'s unnamed team as the league's newest franchise.[[note]]The truth is a bit more complicated than that, since Utah's team is really the relocated UsefulNotes/{{Arizona}} Coyotes. The Coyotes still technically exist however as an inactive franchise. The most recent unambiguously established team was the UsefulNotes/{{Seattle}} Kraken in 2021.[[/note]] UsefulNotes/TheStanleyCup represents the league's championship, and is the oldest such trophy in North America; traditionally, each member of the championship team obtains possession of Lord Stanley's Bowl for a day, and due to this it has had [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditions_and_anecdotes_associated_with_the_Stanley_Cup#Misadventures some rather odd misadventures]] in its time. The current Stanley Cup champions are the [[UsefulNotes/LasVegas Vegas]] Golden Knights, who won their first Cup in 2023 after previous losing in 2018, in their inaugural season.

'''Current Head Coach:''' Jacques Martin (''interim'')\\

** ''Most Recent Winner: Nikita Kucherov, RW, Tampa Bay Lightning''

* '''Jim Gregory General Manager of the Year Award''': ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin. First presented in 2010, with the voting body consisting of the league's [=GMs=], plus five NHL executives and five media members. As of the 2022–23 season, it's the only major award that ''isn't'' presented at the awards show, instead being presented at the NHL Entry Draft. Following the 2019 death of former Maple Leafs GM and NHL executive Jim Gregory, the league added his name to the award. Lou Lamoriello, who had won the 2020 award, became the first two-time recipient in 2021.

'''Current Head Coach:''' Rick Bowness\\

The NHL has never placed a team in Houston at any point in the league's history. The Houston Aeros operated in the WHA from 1972–78, being one of that league's most financially stable and dominant on-ice teams, winning two WHA championships back-to-back in 1975 and 1976. When the WHA began merger talks, the Aeros were thought to be a lock for inclusion; however, the NHL was only willing to accept four teams in the merger, and the WHA insisted that all three of its Canadian teams be accepted, leaving only one open slot for an American team. The NHL was hesitant to add another Sun Belt team after the Oakland Seals moved to Cleveland in 1976[[note]]and subsequently folded only two seasons later[[/note]], and the Los Angeles Kings and Atlanta Flames[[note]]who would relocate to Calgary just one year after the merger[[/note]] were struggling financially, which led to the WHA using the New England (Hartford) Whalers as the fourth merger team. Seeing the writing on the walls, the Aeros folded after their 1977–78 season ended, thus being the only WHA champion not to join the NHL. From 1994–2013, Houston had a minor league team named the Aeros, in honor of the former WHA club; the IHL/AHL Aeros left Houston when their affiliate/majority owner, the Minnesota Wild, were unable to renew their arena lease due to conflits with the Rockets' ownership. The NHL ''almost'' came to Houston in 1998, after then Rockets' owner Les Alexander made a bid to move the Edmonton Oilers[[note]]coincidentally, Houston had lost the NFL's Oilers just two years prior, after their owner Bud Adams controversially moved the team to Tennessee[[/note]] down to Houston; however, a local Edmonton group managed to make an eleventh-hour deal to keep the Oilers from moving. Alexander sold the Rockets and the Toyota Center to Tilman Fertitta in 2017. Since then, Fertitta has expressed interest in bringing an NHL team to Houston, with discussions between him and the league intensifying as of February 2024.

Since the Seattle Kraken's 2021 launch, San Diego is currently the largest U.S. metro area without either an NHL or NBA franchise as well as the largest U.S. metro area with only one major pro sports franchise.[[note]] However, when including MLS, the latter will no longer hold true when San Diego FC launches in 2025.[[/note]] From 1974–77, San Diego had a WHA team named the Mariners; despite having a decent on-ice showing, the team struggled with attendance and folded after attempts to move the team to South Florida fell through. Besides the Mariners, the city has had several minor league teams at various points, with the current iteration of the Gulls being the AHL affiliate of the Anaheim Ducks just up the road. The city's main indoor arena, the San Diego Sports Arena, was built in the mid-1960s and is functionally obsolete by modern NHL and NBA standards, by both seating capacity and amenities. In the early 2020s, the San Diego city council put the Sports Arena site up for redevelopment. The winning proposal, Midway Rising, would see the Sports Arena replaced with a 16,000 seat modern arena along with housing, commercial, and retail space. In June 2023, Avalanche owner Stan Kroenke became the lead investor in the Midway Rising project through his real estate development arm.

Hamilton attempted to join the NHL in the early 90s expansion window, but were passed over in favor of San Jose, Tampa Bay, Ottawa, Anaheim, and Florida. Since then, there were several attempts, most of them fronted by [=BlackBerry=] founder Jim Balsillie, to relocate struggling franchises, such as Pittsburgh, Nashville, Arizona, Atlanta, and Buffalo, to Hamilton, but every such attempt was unsuccessful, with the teams in question either remaining in their present market or in Atlanta's case, moving to a different market altogether. The biggest hurdle for an NHL team in Hamilton is the city's location between Toronto and Buffalo; both the Maple Leafs and the Sabres won't allow a team in Hamilton without heavy indemnification payments for encroaching on their territory, the Leafs more so than the Sabres. Another major obstacle is Hamilton's largest arena, [=FirstOntario=] Centre, which was built in the mid-1980s and would either need extensive renovations or outright replacement to be a viable home of an NHL franchise. A third obstacle that applies to all Canadian teams, especially in smaller markets such as Hamilton, is that the NHL's collective bargaining agreement dictates that all player contracts are paid in US dollars. While this means that payrolls won't fluctuate with exchange rates, it leaves Canadian teams vulnerable to exchange rate issues, since they collect essentially all of their revenue in Canadian dollars. When the loonie is close in value to the US buck, as it was at the start of the 2010s, it's very good for those teams' bottom lines. When the loonie badly lags, as it has since about 2014... not so much.

The '''Winnipeg Jets''': formerly the UsefulNotes/{{Atlanta}} Thrashers. On May 31, 2011, the team was sold and moved to Winnipeg[[note]]The ''[[HistoryRepeats second]]'' time a team moved from Atlanta, the first being the Flames in 1980. While many Atlanta hockey fans were not necessarily against the Coyotes staying in Arizona or even the return of an NHL team to Winnipeg (at least before True North came knocking on the Thrashers' door), most believe that the wrong team moved to Winnipeg in 2011, as the league had nearly two years to resolve the Coyotes' situation post-bankruptcy, yet they allowed the Thrashers to move to Winnipeg with practically no good faith efforts to keep the team in Atlanta beforehand. Since then, the Coyotes had remained under the near-perennial threat of relocation, with the team's hockey assets ultimately being transferred to Utah, while the Coyotes franchise went dormant.[[/note]] for the next season, resurrecting the previous team's name due to overwhelming fan support for it (this has also led to a ''massive'' ContinuitySnarl, as the history of the original Winnipeg Jets is entrenched in the backstory of the presently-inactive Arizona Coyotes,[[note]]Meanwhile, the NFL's Cleveland Browns, the NBA's Charlotte Hornets, MLS's San Jose Earthquakes, and the NLL's Philadelphia Wings all either retained (Browns, Earthquakes, and Wings) or retroactively reclaimed (Hornets) the history of their original franchises after their relocations to Baltimore, New Orleans, Houston, and Connecticut, respectively. Additionally, Seattle retains the rights to the history of its former NBA team, the [=SuperSonics=], after that team's move to Oklahoma City; making matters worse, the Coyotes are expected to retain the original history of the Jets upon their deactivation in a similar manner to the Cleveland Browns and Seattle [=SuperSonics=][[/note]] a severely contentious issue among Jets purists). The Jets play in the smallest ''standalone'' market among the Big Four sports leagues and are one of two major pro teams based in a metropolitan area with less than one million residents.[[note]]While the Green Bay metropolitan area is less than half the population of Winnipeg's, the NFL considers UsefulNotes/{{Milwaukee}} as part of the Packers' home market, given the team had historically played one to three home games there annually from 1933--94.[[/note]] Season tickets for Winnipeg's 2011–12 season sold out in ''17 minutes''. The team then remained two years geographically miscast in the now-defunct Southeast Division[[note]]OK, Winnipeg ''is'' in the southeastern part of Manitoba.[[/note]] before the league and the players' union accepted a new realignment. Prior to the 2017-18 season, the franchise only made the playoffs twice, getting swept both times, once in their only appearance as the Thrashers in 2007 against the Rangers and again in their first appearance as the Jets in 2015 against the Ducks. The Jets ''finally'' won their first playoff game against the Wild on April 11, 2018, and the Jets subsequently won the series 4-1, marking the first time since ''1987'' that a Winnipeg-based team advanced to the Second Round, which it did win against the Predators, making it to the Western Conference Finals (and thus the league semi-finals) for the first time in the history of either incarnation of the Jets. Even better, the Jets managed to score a massive upset in the 2021 play-offs by ''sweeping'' the [=McDavid=]/Draisaitl-led Oilers in a series that went so well for the Jets that it ''caused serious concerns about the Oilers as a franchise'' - although being swept by the Canadiens in the following round raised questions as for whether the Jets were good or simply lucky. Those questions have deepened in the seasons since due to them straddling the playoff line[[note]]missed by a handful of points in '21-'22; squeaked in as the Second Wild Card in '22-'23, only to get crushed by Vegas, the eventual Cup champs, in the opening round[[/note]] while the coaching staff turned over,[[note]]the head coach that oversaw their 2018 and 2021 successes, Paul Maurice, resigned his post in fall 2021 (he later joined the Panthers and helped engineer their 2023 Finals run); interim Dave Lowry was let go at season's end; Rick Bowness took the reins for 2022-23 after an attempt to hire Barry Trotz fell through[[/note]] rumors of locker room strife swirled and multiple top players insinuated their desires to leave the team. Compounding the locker room drama, the Jets have been struggling with declining attendance since the COVID-19 pandemic; from 2021--24, the Jets lost over a quarter of its pre-pandemic season ticket base, many of them individuals, putting the long term viability of the Jets into question, implying that they too could relocate elsewhere much like the original Jets.

** ''Most Recent Winner: Auston Matthews, C, Toronto Maple Leafs''

The National Hockey League (NHL) is the top-level professional UsefulNotes/IceHockey league in North America, and is the fifth wealthiest sports league in the world.[[note]]The number 1-4 spots go respectively to the UsefulNotes/NationalFootballLeague, UsefulNotes/MajorLeagueBaseball, the UsefulNotes/NationalBasketballAssociation, and the UsefulNotes/EnglishPremierLeague.[[/note]] Founded in 1917, it is currently composed of 33 teams (with one inactive): 26 in the UsefulNotes/UnitedStates and seven in UsefulNotes/{{Canada}}, with [[UsefulNotes/{{Utah}} Salt Lake City]]'s unnamed team as the league's newest franchise.[[note]]The truth is a bit more complicated than that, since Utah's team is really the relocated UsefulNotes/{{Arizona}} Coyotes. The Coyotes still technically exist however as an inactive franchise. The most recent unambiguously established team was the UsefulNotes/{{Seattle}} Kraken in 2021.[[/note]] UsefulNotes/TheStanleyCup represents the league's championship, and is the oldest such trophy in North America; traditionally, each member of the championship team obtains possession of Lord Stanley's Bowl for a day, and due to this it has had [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditions_and_anecdotes_associated_with_the_Stanley_Cup#Misadventures some rather odd misadventures]] in its time.

The NHL has never placed a team in Houston at any point in the league's history. The Houston Aeros operated in the WHA from 1972–78, being one of that league's most financially stable and dominant on-ice teams. When the WHA began merger talks, the Aeros were thought to be a lock for inclusion. However, the NHL was only willing to accept four teams in the merger, and the WHA insisted that all three of its Canadian teams be accepted, leaving only one open slot for an American team. The NHL was hesitant to add another Sun Belt team after the Oakland Seals moved to Cleveland in 1976 (and subsequently folded only two seasons later), and the Los Angeles Kings and Atlanta Flames were struggling financially, which led to the WHA using the New England (Hartford) Whalers as the fourth merger team. Seeing the writing on the walls, the Aeros folded after their 1977–78 season ended. From 1994–2013, Houston had a minor league team named the Aeros, in honor of the former WHA club; the IHL/AHL Aeros left Houston when their affiliate/majority owner, the Minnesota Wild, were unable to renew their arena lease due to conflits with the Rockets' ownership. The NHL ''almost'' came to Houston in 1998, after then Rockets' owner Les Alexander made a bid to move the Edmonton Oilers[[note]]coincidentally, Houston had lost the NFL's Oilers just two years prior, after their owner Bud Adams controversially moved the team to Tennessee[[/note]] down to Houston; however, a local Edmonton group managed to make an eleventh-hour deal to keep the Oilers from moving. Alexander sold the Rockets and the Toyota Center to Tilman Fertitta in 2017. Since then, Fertitta has expressed interest in bringing an NHL team to Houston, with discussions between him and the league intensifying as of February 2024.

Atlanta has a rather checkered history with the NHL, with the city losing two separate franchises to Canada within a 40-year period. Many hockey fans as well as casual observers outside of Atlanta generally accept the narrative that both the Flames and Thrashers failed due to a lack of fan support; however, most Atlanta hockey fans argue that it was other factors, namely economic issues for the Flames and the dysfunctional ownership of the Thrashers, that caused them to lose their teams. The Flames began play in 1972, partly as a ploy to keep the upstart World Hockey Association out of the then-newly built Omni Coliseum. The Flames were a decent team on the ice, although they had a bad case of EveryYearTheyFizzleOut come the Stanley Cup playoffs; however, like many of their late 60s/early 70s expansion contemporaries, the Flames struggled financially due to the arms race between the NHL and WHA. The decline of the Atlanta real estate market in 1970s also caused owner Tom Cousins to bleed money on the Flames, selling the team to a Calgary-based group led by Nelson Skalbania to avoid bankruptcy in 1980. From 1992–96, in-between NHL franchises, Atlanta had a relatively successful minor league team in the defucnt IHL known as the Atlanta Knights, winning that league's championship in their sophomore season; the Knights moved to Quebec City after their 1995–96 season because the Omni Coliseum had to be demolished due to structual defects and a new arena, now known as State Farm Arena, built in its place as a condition of then Hawks owner Creator/TedTurner being granted the Thrashers in 1997. While the Thrashers had the typical growing pains of an expansion team when they began play in 1999, things went downhill in 2004, after Time Warner divested Turner's sports interests, selling the Thrashers, Hawks, and operating rights to State Farm (née Philips) Arena to a group called Atlanta Spirit. The group was notorious for its legal in-fighting as well as neglecting the Thrashers in favor of the Hawks. The group wanted to rid themselves of the hockey club as soon as legally possible, claiming they lost over $100 million despite running the Thrashers on a shoestring budget, barely spending above the league's salary floor. After buying out and settling a lawsuit with an ex-partner in late 2010, Atlanta Spirit sold the Thrashers to True North Sports and Entertainment in the 2011 offseason, becoming the current Winnipeg Jets.[[note]]Just months after shipping the Thrashers off to Winnipeg, Atlanta Spirit attempted to sell a majority stake of the Hawks and arena operations to current Arizona Coyotes owner Alex Meruelo, but that deal ultimately fell through; Atlanta Spirit would eventually sell the Hawks to a group led by Tony Ressler in 2015.[[/note]] Most hockey traditionalists want to permanently write off Atlanta as a lost cause due to two failed franchises; however, most Atlanta hockey fans believe that the Atlanta market is too large for the NHL to ignore, and some remain optimistic that the league will eventually give the Peach State a third try should the right opportunity arise. In September 2023, amidst earlier expansion rumors, deputy commissioner Bill Daly made remarks that the NHL is open to returning to Atlanta, believing that the challenges the league had faced in Atlanta's two prior attempts could now be overcome. As of March 2024, there are ''two'' competing proposals to bring an NHL franchise back to the metro Atlanta area; both groups plan to build an NHL-sized arena as part of a larger mixed-use development in or near the suburb of Alpharetta, 30 miles north of downtown Atlanta. One proposal is The Gathering at South Forsyth, led by businessman Vernon Krause; The Gathering is planned to be built on an undeveloped tract near the Forsyth County-Fulton County line. The other group is led by former NHL player Anson Carter, and his group plans to redevelop the North Point Mall site. Since 2003, the Atlanta Gladiators of the ECHL have played in Duluth in Gwinnett County, and since 2022, the team has held a "Thrashers night" annually, being one of their most popular promotions; Carter also owns a minority stake in the Gladiators.

Hamilton attempted to join the NHL in the early 90s expansion window, but were passed over in favor of San Jose, Tampa Bay, Ottawa, Anaheim, and Florida. Since then, there were several attempts, most of them fronted by [=BlackBerry=] founder Jim Balsillie, to relocate struggling franchises, such as Pittsburgh, Nashville, Arizona, Atlanta, and Buffalo, to Hamilton, but every such attempt was unsuccessful, with the teams in question either remaining in their present market or in Atlanta's case, moving to a different market altogether. The biggest hurdle for an NHL team in Hamilton is the city's location between Toronto and Buffalo; both the Maple Leafs and the Sabres won't allow a team in Hamilton without heavy indemnification payments for encroaching on their territory, the Leafs more so than the Sabres. Another major obstacle is Hamilton's largest arena, [=FirstOntario=] Centre, which was built in the mid-1980s and would either need extensive renovations or outright replacement to be a viable home of an NHL franchise. A third obstacle that applies to all Canadian teams, especially in smaller markets such as Hamilton, is that the NHL's collective bargaining agreement dictates that all player contracts be fixed in US dollars. While this means that payrolls won't fluctuate with exchange rates, it leaves Canadian teams vulnerable to exchange rate issues, since they collect essentially all of their revenue in Canadian dollars. When the loonie is close in value to the US buck, as it was at the start of the 2010s, it's very good for those teams' bottom lines. When the loonie badly lags, as it has since about 2014... not so much.

Emerged as an expansion (or rather, reactivation) candidate in April 2024 after the league facilitated a sale of the Arizona Coyotes to Utah Jazz and [[UsefulNotes/MajorLeagueSoccer Real Salt Lake]] owner Ryan Smith, who had made an explicit request to the NHL to open the expansion process that January. Previous Coyotes owner Alex Meruelo will have a five-year option to reactivate the Coyotes with an "expansion" draft on the condition that he succeeds in getting a new NHL-capable arena built in the Phoenix metro area within that time frame.[[note]]While Smith received the Coyotes' player roster, coaching staff, and front office, the Coyotes' brand, history, and franchise rights remain with Meruelo in Arizona, much to the chagrin of Jets fans, whose original team history is still tied to the Coyotes.[[/note]] Much like Atlanta, traditionalists would rather see the league permanently write off Phoenix as a lost cause than even ''attempt'' to return, believing that the original Coyotes' 28-year tenure in Arizona was a complete farce, particularly since the team's 2009 bankruptcy and especially their last two years at Mullett Arena.

Since the Seattle Kraken's 2021 launch, San Diego is currently the largest U.S. metro area without either an NHL or NBA franchise as well as the largest U.S. metro area with only one major pro sports franchise.[[note]] However, when including MLS, the latter will no longer hold true when San Diego FC launches in 2025.[[/note]] From 1974–77, San Diego had a WHA team named the Mariners; despite having a decent on-ice showing, the team struggled with attendance and folded after attempts to move the team to South Florida fell through. The city has had several minor league teams at various points, with the current iteration of the Gulls being an AHL team that serves as the farm team for the Anaheim Ducks just up the road. The city's main indoor arena, the San Diego Sports Arena, was built in the mid-1960s and is functionally obsolete by modern NHL and NBA standards. In the early 2020s, the San Diego city council put the Sports Arena site up for redevelopment. The winning proposal, Midway Rising, would see the Sports Arena replaced with a 16,000 seat modern arena along with housing, commercial, and retail space. In June 2023, Avalanche owner Stan Kroenke became the lead investor in the Midway Rising project through his real estate development arm.

Saskatchewan's largest city, Saskatoon, has attempted to bring an NHL franchise to the prairie province. In the early 1980s, former Edmonton Oilers founding owner Bill Hunter attempted to purchase the financially-floundering St. Louis Blues with the intent of relocating them to Saskatoon. Despite having the financial backing of the Saskatchewan government and Molson Brewery, the league's Board of Governors near-unanimously rejected the Blues' proposed relocation, as the league was not willing to lose the St. Louis market, citing issues with Saskatoon's small population and remote location[[note]]At the time, the city of Saskatoon had about 160,000 people. Even today, its metro population is only about 318,000, slightly below Green Bay, Wisconsin; the only other major population center in the province is the capital of Regina (~250,000 metro), which is roughly 260 kilometers (160 mi) south of Saskatoon. By contrast, the population the Quebec City metro area, the largest Canadian market without an NHL franchise, is almost equal to Winnipeg's. One reason Green Bay can support an NFL team, apart from its public ownership and storied history, is its secondary market of Milwaukee, whose metro population of about 1.6 million is noticeably greater than that of ''Saskatchewan''.[[/note]] as well as Hunter's prior involvement with the WHA in the 1970s; the Board made a counter-offer to allow Hunter to purchase the Blues under the stipulation that the team remain in St. Louis, but Hunter was not interested. When the NHL opened up expansion in the early 1990s, Hunter made a bid for one of the expansion slots; however, he was forced to withdraw his bid when the provincial government declined to financially support his new bid. In 2009, after the Phoenix Coyotes' bankruptcy, a potential ownership group proposed playing five games of their 2009–10 regular season home schedule in Saskatoon, but the proposal never came to fruition.

The '''Winnipeg Jets''': formerly the UsefulNotes/{{Atlanta}} Thrashers. On May 31, 2011, the team was sold and moved to Winnipeg[[note]]The ''[[HistoryRepeats second]]'' time a team moved from Atlanta, the first being the Flames in 1980. While many Atlanta hockey fans were not necessarily against the Coyotes staying in Arizona or even the return of an NHL team to Winnipeg (at least before True North came knocking on the Thrashers' door), most believe that the wrong team moved to Winnipeg in 2011, as the league had nearly two years to resolve the Coyotes' situation post-bankruptcy, yet they allowed the Thrashers to move to Winnipeg with practically no good faith efforts to keep the team in Atlanta beforehand. Since then, the Coyotes had remained under the near-perennial threat of relocation, with the team's hockey assets ultimately being transferred to Utah, while the Coyotes franchise went dormant.[[/note]] for the next season, resurrecting the previous team's name due to overwhelming fan support for it (this has also led to a ''massive'' ContinuitySnarl, as the history of the original Winnipeg Jets is entrenched in the backstory of the presently-inactive Arizona Coyotes,[[note]]Meanwhile, the NFL's Cleveland Browns, the NBA's Charlotte Hornets, MLS's San Jose Earthquakes, and the NLL's Philadelphia Wings all either retained (Browns, Earthquakes, and Wings) or retroactively reclaimed (Hornets) the history of their original franchises after their relocations to Baltimore, New Orleans, Houston, and Connecticut, respectively. Additionally, Seattle retains the rights to the history of its former NBA team, the [=SuperSonics=], after that team's move to Oklahoma City; making matters worse, the Coyotes are expected to retain the original history of the Jets upon their deactivation in a similar manner to the Cleveland Browns and Seattle [=SuperSonics=][[/note]] a severely contentious issue among Jets purists). The Jets play in the smallest ''standalone'' market among the Big Four sports leagues and are one of two major pro teams based in a metropolitan area with less than one million residents.[[note]]While the Green Bay metropolitan area is roughly half the population of Winnipeg's, the NFL considers UsefulNotes/{{Milwaukee}} as part of the Packers' home market, given the team had historically played a portion of its home schedule there.[[/note]] Season tickets for Winnipeg's 2011–12 season sold out in ''17 minutes''. The team then remained two years geographically miscast in the now-defunct Southeast Division[[note]]OK, Winnipeg ''is'' in the southeastern part of Manitoba.[[/note]] before the league and the players' union accepted a new realignment. Prior to the 2017-18 season, the franchise only made the playoffs twice, getting swept both times, once in their only appearance as the Thrashers in 2007 against the Rangers and again in their first appearance as the Jets in 2015 against the Ducks. The Jets ''finally'' won their first playoff game against the Wild on April 11, 2018, and the Jets subsequently won the series 4-1, marking the first time since ''1987'' that a Winnipeg-based team advanced to the Second Round, which it did win against the Predators, making it to the Western Conference Finals (and thus the league semi-finals) for the first time in the history of either incarnation of the Jets. Even better, the Jets managed to score a massive upset in the 2021 play-offs by ''sweeping'' the [=McDavid=]/Draisaitl-led Oilers in a series that went so well for the Jets that it ''caused serious concerns about the Oilers as a franchise'' - although being swept by the Canadiens in the following round raised questions as for whether the Jets were good or simply lucky. Those questions have deepened in the seasons since due to them straddling the playoff line[[note]]missed by a handful of points in '21-'22; squeaked in as the Second Wild Card in '22-'23, only to get crushed by Vegas, the eventual Cup champs, in the opening round[[/note]] while the coaching staff turned over,[[note]]the head coach that oversaw their 2018 and 2021 successes, Paul Maurice, resigned his post in fall 2021 (he later joined the Panthers and helped engineer their 2023 Finals run); interim Dave Lowry was let go at season's end; Rick Bowness took the reins for 2022-23 after an attempt to hire Barry Trotz fell through[[/note]] rumors of locker room strife swirled and multiple top players insinuated their desires to leave the team. Compounding the locker room drama, the Jets have been struggling with declining attendance since the COVID-19 pandemic; from 2021--24, the Jets lost over a quarter of its pre-pandemic season ticket base, many of them individuals, putting the long term viability of the Jets into question, implying that they too could relocate elsewhere much like the original Jets.

Since the Seattle Kraken's 2021 launch, San Diego is currently the largest U.S. metro area without either an NHL or NBA franchise, and it is also the largest U.S. metro area with only one major pro sports franchise.[[note]] However, when including MLS, this will no longer hold true in 2025, when San Diego FC launches.[[/note]] From 1974–77, San Diego had a WHA team named the Mariners; despite having a decent on-ice showing, the team struggled with attendance and folded after attempts to move the team to South Florida fell through. The city has had several minor league teams at various points, with the current iteration of the Gulls being an AHL team that serves as the farm team for the Anaheim Ducks just up the road. The city's main indoor arena, the San Diego Sports Arena, was built in the mid-1960s and is functionally obsolete by modern NHL and NBA standards. In the early 2020s, the San Diego city council put the Sports Arena site up for redevelopment. The winning proposal, Midway Rising, would see the Sports Arena replaced with a 16,000 seat modern arena along with housing, commercial, and retail space. In June 2023, Avalanche owner Stan Kroenke became the lead investor in the Midway Rising project through his real estate development arm.

Saskatchewan's largest city, Saskatoon, has attempted to bring an NHL franchise to the prairie province. In the early 1980s, former Edmonton Oilers founding owner Bill Hunter attempted to purchase the financially-floundering St. Louis Blues with the intent of relocating them to Saskatoon. Despite having the financial backing of the Saskatchewan government and Molson Brewery, the league's Board of Governors near-unanimously rejected the Blues' proposed relocation, as the league was not willing to lose the St. Louis market and cited issues with Saskatoon's small population and remote location[[note]]At the time, the city of Saskatoon had about 160,000 people. Even today, its population is only about 270K, and its metro area is barely larger at about 320K--even smaller than that of Green Bay. The only other major population center in the province is the capital of Regina (≈250 K metro), which is about 2½ hours' drive away. One reason Green Bay can support an NFL team is that it's about 2 hours' drive from Milwaukee, whose metro population of about 1.6 million is noticeably greater than that of ''Saskatchewan''.[[/note]] as well as Hunter's prior involvement with the WHA in the 1970s; the Board made a counter-offer to allow Hunter to purchase the Blues under the stipulation that the team remain in St. Louis, but Hunter was not interested. When the NHL opened up expansion in the early 1990s, Hunter made a bid for one of the expansion slots; however, he was forced to withdraw his bid when the provincial government declined to financially support his new bid. In 2009, after the Phoenix Coyotes' bankruptcy, a potential ownership group proposed playing five games of their 2009–10 regular season home schedule in Saskatoon, but the proposal never came to fruition.

The '''Tampa Bay Lightning''': AKA the Bolts. Currently the Southernmost team to win the Cup, having won in 2004, 2020, and 2021, although all three had some form of controversy attached.[[note]]the "phantom goal" that would have cost Tampa the Cup in '04 is arguably the most controversial call other than Brett Hull's "foot in the crease" in 1999; the 2020 Cup is sometimes questioned due to the unusual circumstances caused by the pandemic (same scenario would've befallen their Finals opponents the Dallas Stars had they won the Cup, making it a lose-lose situation regardless of the victor); the 2021 Cup caused a firestorm amongst fans and even other players due to accusations of LoopholeAbuse to circumvent the salary cap, at least in spirit, and bring an overpowered roster into the playoffs (ironically enough, their 2015 Finals opponents the Chicago Blackhawks pulled the exact same tactic during their 3 Cup runs, and Tampa Bay was one of the teams that attempted to get the rule changed)... Think twice about bringing up these allegations to the Bolts faithful![[/note]] They were the first attempt to market hockey in a former Confederate state since the Atlanta Flames (who moved to Calgary), and helped start a wave of expansion teams and team relocations during TheNineties when they showed a steady fanbase. They set single-game attendance records for a few years due to playing in a then-vacated domed baseball stadium (now Tropicana Field and home to the Rays), which was larger than any hockey arena but also made it hard to keep the ice solid. They quickly turned heads in their first year by having the first female goalie in NHL history in Manon Rhéaume![[note]]She appeared at training camp and in the pre-season, never appearing in a regular season game, though she was very solid regardless during her short stint which lead to her becoming a household name since.[[/note]] They were first led by star players such as Vincent Lecavalier (drafted in 1998 during the Bolts' DarkAges [[note]]where they were used as a part of a money laundering scheme by their first owner Okubo, who was in league with the Yakuza which nearly bankrupt the team due to paying most of their players in the form of loans, the issue got so bad to the point that the League had to get involved to save the team from outright folding[[/note]]), Martin St. Louis and Brad Richards early in the 2000s, later helping lead the Bolts to their first Stanley Cup in 2004. However the NHL lockout happened shortly after which wiped out the entire 04-05 Season preventing the Bolts from properly defending their crown (leading to a brief AudienceAlienatingEra that saw them getting bounced early in the playoffs or in some cases nearly missing the playoffs,[[note]] which lead to the trade of Brad Richards, and wasting the career of Vinny's and Marty's best years[[/note]]). After drafting Steven Stamkos in 2008 with the #1 pick and Victor Hedman #2 the following year (and the eventual drafting of goalie Andre "Big Cat" Vasilevesky and perennial scorers Nikita Kucherov and Brayden Point), they started to have stretches of good play in the past decade becoming one of the strongest teams of TheNewTens, first including a surprise run to the Eastern Conference Finals in 2011 (during Vincent's twilight years) where due to a lack of a permanent goaltender they lost to the eventual Cup winner Bruins in 7 games ([[note]]it's heavily theorized that had the Bolts won the series, they'd likely would've beaten the powerhouse Vancouver Canucks in the Final that year due to having a stronger offense and defense than Vancouver, despite the lack of a permanent goalie[[/note]]), then later advancing to their second Stanley Cup final in 2015 (eventually losing to the Blackhawks in 6 [[note]]tarnished due to the Kyle Beach scandal (see below)[[/note]]). They then started having a small period of EveryYearTheyFizzleOut where they made 2 Conference Finals appearances ([[note]]first losing to the Crosby-led Penguins in 7 games in 2016 and then losing to the Washington Capitals in 2018 in which both teams would go on to win the Cup, much to the displeasure of the Tampa fanbase[[/note]]). But the failure ultimately peaked in 2018-19 where they won the President's Trophy that year while tying the 1995-96 Red Wings for the then-most dominant regular season in NHL history (62 wins!)... [[EpicFail only to end up becoming the first ever President's Trophy winners in NHL history to be swept in the first round after losing their series to the Columbus Blue Jackets, led by their former coach John Tortorella who had coached them their first Stanley Cup victory back in 2004 no less]], leading many media pundits to question the Bolts' ability to win in the long run. However, they came back with a vengeance in the following year, winning their second cup after the playoffs were delayed till August due to the COVID-19 outbreak, and then their third cup the following year. They then made history in 2022 by making their '''third straight Cup final appearance in a row!''' (Becoming the first team to do so in the current Salary Cap Era since ''Gretzky's legendary 80s Oilers''). However their quest for the first three-peat since the legendary 80's Islanders squad ended in heartbreak as they lost to the far more highly powered offense of the Avalanche in 6 games [[note]]though to be fair, the Bolts were coming off from extremely short Summer off-seasons in-between their 3 straight runs along with key injuries to superstar Brayden Point which severely affected the Lightning's performance during their third run[[/note]]. Set a new standard for stadium RuleOfCool in 2011 when renovations to the St. Pete Times Forum (now Amalie Arena) included the installation of Tesla coils in the rafters that [[ShockAndAwe shoot real lightning]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEm_9IIRitc during the pregame intro and after goals]]. Oh, and despite those aforementioned ''Florida'' Panthers (who play in a suburb of UsefulNotes/{{Miami}}), the Bolts predate them by one year. They outright hate Boston with a passion (arguably moreso than the Montreal Canadians who are the B's longtime rivals), moreso than any American club. They hate them so much so that their fans will often chant "Fuck Boston!" in Amalie Arena even if they aren't playing the Bruins (leading to many cheers from the Bruins' rivals who also hate Boston, sans Toronto) [[note]]this unknown hatred may have formed due in part to the notorious dirty plays and hits from the Bruins during the 2011 Eastern Conference Finals that cost the Bolts a chance to likely win the 2011 Stanley Cup and cut fan favorite Vincent Lecavalier's career short that led to him signing with the Philadelphia Flyers, especially from Chara and Marchand and the NFL Buccaneers signing of Creator/TomBrady away from the Patriots that wrecked Boston's dynasty[[/note]]. In contrast their in-state rivalry with Florida hasn't been much of a thing and barely gets acknowledged, though it has been heating up in recent years (with it now being full blown hatred between the two clubs and their fanbases), with the Bolts and Panthers meeting in the playoffs over the last two years, with Tampa Bay winning both times and met again in the 2023-24 playoffs, where hated Florida finally got the better of the aging Lightning squad in 5 games [[note]] ensuring that the Panthers will likely remain the Lightning's little brothers as long as they remain cupless[[/note]]. They also dislike both of the New York teams (moreso the Isles than the Rangers), they also hate the Toronto Maple Leafs, [[note]]whom they have split their first round series at 1 apiece following the Bolts' loss in the first round[[/note]] which has begun to heat up in recent years (both of their respective first round matchups featured lots of fighting between the two clubs and dirty plays), and have a mild dislike of the Montreal Canadiens[[note]]due to Tampa's recent defeat of them in the Finals and the accusations of their recent Cup wins, though they both have a shared hatred of Boston and Toronto[[/note]] and have begun to develop (as of their recent Cup loss) a potential new rivalry with the Colorado Avalanche (though much like the Cup loss with the Blackhawks in 2015, it has yet to properly develop), the 2022-2023 season was a massive regression due to the Cup years and injuries finally taking their toll on the team and they bowed out to the hated Maple Leafs in 6 games, which got far worse the following year when their hated in-state rivals Florida finally crushed them in 5 games.

'''Home Arena:''' Scotiabank Saddledome (since 1983)\\

[[UsefulNotes/{{Utah}} Salt Lake City]]'s currently unnamed NHL team is technically the newest team in the league, but the truth of the matter is that they are the result of the Arizona Coyotes' relocation. After years of instability with finding an arena in the Phoenix area, a deal was made between [[UsefulNotes/NationalBasketballAssociation Utah Jazz]] owner Ryan Smith and Coyotes owner Alex Meruelo, where the Coyotes' roster and front office were given to the new Utah team, while the Yotes would be deactivated until they get a new arena up and running within the following five years. For any fans of the UsefulNotes/NationalFootballLeague, this was essentially a hockey version of what happened between the original Cleveland Browns and the Baltimore Ravens back in 1995. At the current moment, the team [[NoNameGiven doesn't have a name]], with rumored reports saying that might have a temporary name for the 2024-25 season, à la the Washington Football Team.[[note]]SEG has trademarked 8 potential names with the intention of allowing fans to choose the name in a bracket vote, with "Yeti" being a popular frontrunner.[[/note]] However, it has been confirmed that it will have its regional moniker named after the entire state of Utah (much like the Jazz) instead of Salt Lake City. The NHL has told Smith that the Delta Center, home to the Jazz, will need hockey-specific upgrades; the Utah government plans to chip in close to $1 billion towards upgrades to the Delta Center as part of SLC's bid for the 2034 Winter Olympics.

The '''[[UsefulNotes/NewYorkCity New York]] Islanders''': If the Rangers represent the five boroughs and the Devils represent Newark and the New Jersey suburbs, then the Islanders represent the communities of Long Island. The team was founded in 1972, initially as a way for the NHL to prevent the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Hockey_Association World Hockey Association]] from establishing a rival second NYC team, seeing what happened with the [[UsefulNotes/NationalFootballLeague Jets]] in 1960 and [[UsefulNotes/NationalBasketballAssociation Nets]] in 1967. Despite having a horrible inaugural season (at only 30 points), they immediately started to field a quality hockey team, capping it off with a string of four straight championships from 1980 to 1983. Since then, history and a hatred for the Rangers [[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/28/sports/hockey/john-tavares-islanders-leafs.html and John Tavares]] [[note]]A former Islanders captain who, despite publicly expressing interest in staying, left for the Toronto Maple Leafs as a free agent.[[/note]] and two surprisingly good runs to the Eastern Conference Finals in 2020 and 2021 (which would lead them to a mild dislike of the Tampa Bay Lightning) are really [[VestigialEmpire all they have going for them]]. Spent more than two decades without winning a playoff series (1993, when they upset Pittsburgh in the division finals, to 2016, when they faced the equally unlucky Panthers in the first round). Has a reputation for [[IncompetenceInc managerial ineptitude]]: trading away future stars, overpaying on contracts, etc. (outstanding ones being injury-prone goaltender Rick [=DiPietro=] to a 15-year contract, which got bought out halfway through;[[note]]He wasn't even with the Islanders, but their minor league team Bridgeport Sound Tigers.[[/note]] and Alexei Yashin, whose buying out in 2007 would be spread out until 2015 ... when he retired in Russia in 2012!), not to mention their 1997 franchise sale to a con artist who convinced the NHL he had the money to afford an NHL franchise, only to be found out that he couldn't. Nassau Coliseum, their home from their creation through the 2014–15 season, [[WretchedHive was by far the crappiest arena in the league]], and was at the time the second oldest in the league, after Madison Square Garden, the Rangers' home (which is periodically renovated so as to stay modern); they attempted to build a new arena for years, only to be stopped by Nassau County's massive webs of red tape. They ended up moving to the Barclays Center in {{Brooklyn|Rage}} in 2015, which became the smallest arena in the league and is infamous for not being hockey-friendly,[[note]]Barclays was optimized for basketball, given that it was built by the NBA's Brooklyn Nets; thus, the jumbotron is not aligned with center ice and plenty of seats have obstructed views. Ironically, the Nets had originally planned Barclays to be able to accommodate an NHL team properly, but the Islanders chose to continue to focus their efforts on Nassau County instead, and by the time the Isles finally gave up, Barclays had been completed in its current configuration.[[/note]] eventually forcing the team to share games between the Barclays and a revamped Coliseum while their next stadium, UBS Arena (located right next to the Belmont Park [[UsefulNotes/HorseRacing horse track]] in Elmont), was being built. Before the team moved back full-time to the Coliseum in 2020–21, its nickname was arguably an ArtifactTitle.[[note]]Brooklyn is physically ''on'' Long Island, as is Queens, but to a NYC resident, "Long Island" means Nassau and Suffolk Counties.[[/note]] The new arena, the league's newest, opened in late November 2021, with the Isles playing their first 13 games on the road.[[note]]The Seattle Kraken's Climate Pledge Arena opened about six weeks earlier; while the interior was brand-new, the exterior is the league's oldest, dating to 1962.[[/note]]

The '''[[UsefulNotes/NewYorkCity New York]] Islanders''': New York's ''[[HufflepuffHouse other]]'' team. They have usually been bullied out of the media by the big-time Rangers, and have their radio coverage on the CollegeRadio station of Hofstra University (but with professional broadcasters) due to lack of listener interest or room on the dial because of the Rangers, Knicks, Nets and Devils all staking their claim on the big New York sports stations. They did have a string of four straight championships in the early 1980s. Since then, history and a hatred for the Rangers [[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/28/sports/hockey/john-tavares-islanders-leafs.html and John Tavares]] [[note]]A former Islanders captain who, despite publicly expressing interest in staying, left for the Toronto Maple Leafs as a free agent.[[/note]] and two surprisingly good runs to the Eastern Conference Finals in 2020 and 2021 (which would lead them to a mild dislike of the Tampa Bay Lightning) are really [[VestigialEmpire all they have going for them]]. Spent more than two decades without winning a playoff series (1993, when they upset Pittsburgh in the division finals, to 2016, when they faced the equally unlucky Panthers in the first round). Has a reputation for [[IncompetenceInc managerial ineptitude]]: trading away future stars, overpaying on contracts, etc. (outstanding ones being injury-prone goaltender Rick [=DiPietro=] to a 15-year contract, which got bought out halfway through;[[note]]He wasn't even with the Islanders, but their minor league team Bridgeport Sound Tigers.[[/note]] and Alexei Yashin, whose buying out in 2007 would be spread out until 2015 ... when he retired in Russia in 2012!), not to mention their 1997 franchise sale to a con artist who convinced the NHL he had the money to afford an NHL franchise, only to be found out that he couldn't. Nassau Coliseum, their home from their creation through the 2014–15 season, [[WretchedHive was by far the crappiest arena in the league]], and was at the time the second oldest in the league, after Madison Square Garden, the Rangers' home (which is periodically renovated so as to stay modern); they attempted to build a new arena for years, only to be stopped by Nassau County's massive webs of red tape. They ended up moving to the Barclays Center in {{Brooklyn|Rage}} in 2015, which became the smallest arena in the league and is infamous for not being hockey-friendly,[[note]]Barclays was optimized for basketball, given that it was built by the NBA's Brooklyn Nets; thus, the jumbotron is not aligned with center ice and plenty of seats have obstructed views. Ironically, the Nets had originally planned Barclays to be able to accommodate an NHL team properly, but the Islanders chose to continue to focus their efforts on Nassau County instead, and by the time the Isles finally gave up, Barclays had been completed in its current configuration.[[/note]] eventually forcing the team to share games between the Barclays and a revamped Coliseum while their next stadium, UBS Arena (located right next to the Belmont Park [[UsefulNotes/HorseRacing horse track]] in Elmont), was being built. Before the team moved back full-time to the Coliseum in 2020–21, its nickname was arguably an ArtifactTitle.[[note]]Brooklyn is physically ''on'' Long Island, as is Queens, but to a NYC resident, "Long Island" means Nassau and Suffolk Counties.[[/note]] The new arena, the league's newest, opened in late November 2021, with the Isles playing their first 13 games on the road.[[note]]The Seattle Kraken's Climate Pledge Arena opened about six weeks earlier; while the interior was brand-new, the exterior is the league's oldest, dating to 1962.[[/note]]