Quote:
Originally Posted by Cyrodill
I can't see why Regina has never been brought into the fold when these kind of discussions came about? It should be a definite canidate if an AHL team became available? Is it a "we have the Riders, hence Saskatoon should have the next Team", be it AHL/NHL in the future?
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Not at all.
Regina just does not have the capacity for an NHL arena. I'm not sure what the requirements of the AHL area, but I would imagine 6,700 seats would be either just above the minimum requirements for a franchise or not enough. The reason Saskatoon often gets talked about for a pro hockey team, is that they actually had a team for a few days in 1983, when Bill Hunter bought the St.Louis Blues, and announced they were moving to Saskatoon. The NHL vetoed the move, and Hunter padlocked the St,Louis arena doors, boycotted the 1983 draft, and turned the team over to the NHL.
The good thing about the event, is it may have encouraged Saskatoon to build an arena that could be expanded to 16,000 seats. The Credit Union Centre was the result.