As a Canadian, it’s difficult to appreciate the NHL’s decision to plop a new team in the desert city of Las Vegas, especially after the efforts put forth by Quebec City to be part of the league’s expansion plan.
Although hockey is loved by many Americans, the sport has far less influence on their culture, especially in the deserts. During the winter time, just about every Canadian knows of a good frozen pond to play pick-up hockey; there’s enough hockey nets and goalie equipment on every street for double our population; and we’ve dedicated the majority of our Saturdays to Hockey Night in Canada.
While contention will occasionally arise between French and English-speaking Canadians, there’s nothing more unifying than our love for hockey.
Quebecers have to deal with more than three metres of snowfall each year. Like the rest of Canada, the province has ice rinks in every community, and it manages to produce the world’s best goalies.
On the contrary, Las Vegas’ culture is defined by slot machines and infidelity. With their economy based on tourism, many Las Vegas locals are presumably busy during hockey game hours. And I don’t anticipate many tourists planning out a good ol’ hockey game to augment a sin-laden vacation.
But even though putting an NHL team in Vegas seems like intentional bankruptcy, the league may argue that Quebec City already had its chance. Most fans are aware that back in the day, the community didn’t give the Nordiques enough support, leading the team to move to Colorado in 1995.
That doesn’t mean there isn’t a new business case to be made though. The city’s population has grown by 10 per cent between 1996 and 2011, and the Canadian dollar is stronger now than it was in the mid-1990s. Winnipeg also lost a team in the mid-1990s, only to reclaim it in 2011 with resounding success.
To mitigate the risks associated with giving the Nordiques back to Quebec City, the league should consider splitting the team between two cities. Saskatoon and Hamilton are both viable cities that could host half of the Nordiques home games.
That formula (to a lesser degree) has found success in Canada before, where there exist no NFL teams. Nonetheless there are many NFL fans in Toronto, and they have quite a strong Buffalo Bills following– which probably has a lot to do with the Bills’ Toronto series, running from 2008 to 2012 when Toronto’s Skydome was the home stadium for seven to eight Bills games each year.
It would be interesting to see the NHL adopt that idea and allow two Canadian cities to share one team. Of course there would be some logistical challenges, but with the level of doubt surrounding a team in Vegas, a tale of two cities could make for a less-risky business case.
If the Nordiques played half of their matchups in Quebec, and the rest in Saskatoon or Hamilton, tickets in both cities would be much more valuable with half as many home games. By building fanbases in two different markets, there would be more merchandise to sell and a much greater potential for television audiences. Also, a multi-hometown team would have the opportunity to ignite compelling rivalries with more teams.
Even though I don’t have much faith in Las Vegas’ ability to keep an NHL stadium regularly full, I suppose the possibility does exist, to a tiny degree, that a desert city full of transients, with no other major sports teams, will accumulate a profitable fanbase.
It’s unfortunate that as capitalists, we have to grant every businessman the right to fail, no matter how skeptical we are about their plan.
For example, there were businessmen who thought that under the brand name Target, Canadians would be interested in buying merchandise that was already available to us, but at higher prices. We all know how miserably that business expansion failed.
Maybe NHL executives worry that Canadians would snub a new hockey team the same way we did that poor excuse for a department store.
But if the investors behind this new hockey team actually want to make money in Vegas, their best bet is probably at one of the casinos.
DAN WALTON
Oliver Chronicle
